What’s FFE and What We’re About

Although many fermentation-derived ingredients already have a long history of safe use in Europe, newer applications or production methods need to obtain regulatory food safety approvals before becoming commercially available. This requires thorough evaluation and is a long process. FFE is actively advocating for a streamlined, more predictable and agile regulatory approval process.

No, we are not trying to replace traditional agriculture – quite the opposite. Farmers are essential partners in creating a more resilient food system. Fermentation-enabled foods serve as a complementary option alongside existing food choices to feed the world’s population that is forecasted to reach 9.7bn by 2050. In fact, farmers play a vital role in the fermentation industry by providing the raw materials (feedstocks) needed for fermentation processes. Fermentation technologies can also help to upcycle farmers’ lower value co-products in high quality ingredients, creating new market opportunities while helping to meet growing global food demand.

Fermentation has been used for thousands of years to produce foods and beverages we all enjoy daily. Today, technology enables us to make fermentation even safer for consumers and more effective to create nutritious ingredients for the food industry. Precision fermentation and biomass fermentation have a proven track record of safety spanning several decades. These technologies have been widely used to produce a variety of compounds for human consumption and medical applications, from vitamins to specialty ingredients such as human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs). HMOs produced through precision fermentation have been safely incorporated into infant formula for years. The process involves using carefully selected microorganisms in controlled environments, allowing for consistent and pure product creation without the risks associated with traditional animal-derived ingredients. Rigorous safety testing and regulatory oversight further ensure that products made through precision fermentation meet high standards for human use.

• Collaborative Impact: Working as a unified group, food fermentation innovators can better explain what we do, address common misconceptions, and highlight the benefits of fermentation in everyday life. Ultimately, this collective approach, can create a more informed and supportive environment for fermentation-based innovations, and shape favorable policies and regulations for the fermentation sector.
• Knowledge Sharing and Strategic Insights: Membership provides access to a network of experts and innovators, fostering the exchange of ideas, best practices, and potential collaborations that can drive individual company growth and advance the industry as a whole. Additionally, FFE’s efforts to build awareness and promote collaboration offer members valuable insights into market trends, consumer preferences, and emerging technologies. These strategic insights are essential for making informed business decisions and maintaining a competitive edge in a dynamic industry.
• Market positioning: Aligning with FFE’s mission demonstrates a commitment to sustainability and innovation. This association can enhance a company’s reputation, potentially leading to increased consumer trust and new business opportunities in the rapidly growing market for sustainable food solutions.
  If you’re interested in joining, we’d love to hear from you at info@foodfermentationeurope.eu.

The nutritional value varies between products, but we aim to provide products with the same nutritional value, or even better than their animal-derived counterparts. We are required to demonstrate a novel food is not nutritionally disadvantageous in order to be authorized in EU. For example, precision fermentation can create functional dairy proteins that are identical to those found in conventional dairy and biomass fermentation can create proteins that are often more complete than plant-based proteins. Each product’s specific nutritional profile will be clearly labeled according to regulatory requirements.

Nutrition: Provides a rich source of essential nutrients like protein, vitamins, and minerals.

Food Security: Mitigates risks of relying on traditional agriculture and increases food availability for a growing global population with increased nutritional needs.

Sustainability: Reduces environmental impact through optimized resource use and lower reliance on modern-day agriculture.

Efficiency: High production yields and rapid growth rates for efficient resource utilization.

Versatility: Adaptable to various food products, offering diverse and innovative options.

Animal-free: entirely removes the need for animals, which positively impacts animal welfare and a wider selection of high-quality vegan products.

Precision fermentation combines the process of traditional fermentation with the latest advances in biotechnology to efficiently produce a compound of interest, such as a protein, flavor molecule, vitamin, pigment, or fat. A specific molecular sequence is inserted into a microorganism to give it instructions to produce the desired molecule when fermented. These molecular sequences are derived from digitized databases rather than taken directly from the relevant animals or plants. At the end of the fermentation process, the resulting compounds are filtered out, separating them from the microorganisms that produced them. Precision fermentation has been in use globally for over 30 years to make medicines and countless common food ingredients.

Biomass fermentation relies on the principles of traditional fermentation leveraged by modern technological advances to maximize microbial production efficiency. In the fermentation process, the microbial culture (the working microorganism) uses nutrients provided to it to grow and multiply and the resulting products are then used as a nutritious food ingredient, animal feed, or a bio-based material for further processing.

How does it work?

• Microorganisms are selected to be the working strain, dependent on their biological composition and fermentative capabilities. These strains can either be natural (wild-type) or genetically modified (GMO). They can be used alone or in combination with other strains (mixed cultures).
• The cells grow in a fermentation medium inside a closed controlled environment (the bioreactor) with all needed nutrients (such as sugars, salts and minerals, etc.). This creates the opportunity to utilize gas streams and underused agrifood side streams as rich nutrient sources for the strain, making the whole process even more sustainable and impactful.
• Finally, cells can be used as is, separated from the fermentation media, or have an additional processing step to improve product characteristics. Depending on their application, the cells can then be kept active (bakers’ yeast, probiotic), or inactivated (food/feed ingredients).
• While via precision fermentation one or more specific compounds are produced and isolated, the product of biomass fermentation is the entire mass of microbial cells and their byproducts (biomass).

In fermentation for food ingredients, biomass fermentation and precision fermentation serve different purposes. Biomass fermentation focuses on cultivating the entire microbial mass, harvesting the whole content of the cells as the final product for use as nutritious ingredients, feed, or other bio-based material. In contrast, precision fermentation uses genetically engineered microorganisms to produce specific target molecules (like proteins, vitamins, or flavors), which are then separated from the microorganisms at the end of the process. While biomass fermentation values the whole microbial culture, precision fermentation uses microbes primarily as microscopic factories to create individual compounds of interest.

Proteins produced via precision fermentation are GMO-free. While genetic modification technologies are used in the process, there are no traces of GMOs to be found in the final product. Precision fermentation uses genetically engineered microorganisms like yeast and fungi to produce target ingredients (like proteins and fats), and these ingredients are combined with other substances such as water, fats and sugars to create final products like dairy products, egg replacements and more. By the time the final product is created, all genetic material has already been removed via the downstream processing. Biomass fermentation products can be derived from either natural or genetically modified organisms. However, regardless of the production method, these products must comply with local legislation. In cases where genetically modified organisms are used, the resulting products will be labeled as such in accordance with applicable regulations. This labeling ensures transparency for consumers and adherence to regulatory requirements, while allowing for the use of both conventional and genetically modified approaches in biomass fermentation.