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Reimagining food systems for a growing world.
Our focus is on meeting the protein needs of 10 billion people by 2050 — one-sixth of whom will be Indian. With factors such as increasing disposable income and upward social mobility, India will be one of the largest contributors to the rising demand for protein.
Conventional animal agriculture significantly contributes to the world’s most pressing problems:
Climate change and environmental degradation
Animal agriculture is a leading driver of ecosystem loss and environmental degradation worldwide:
- Meat and dairy use 83% of the world’s farmland and are responsible for 60% of the greenhouse gas emission from agriculture.
- Closer to home, India is currently the fifth most vulnerable country to climate change.
- The country is experiencing immense pressure on its natural resources — including the worst water crisis in its history, with 600 million Indians living under high to extreme water stress.
Threats to public health and food safety
Human health is influenced more by food than by any other single factor. Farming animals for food exacerbates health and safety concerns:
- Contamination in animal-derived food products can result in foodborne illnesses, at the cost of individual wellbeing and community health, and disproportionately affects low-to-middle-income communities.
- Overuse of and reliance on antibiotics within animal agriculture threaten our ability to treat infectious and non-infectious diseases, as levels of antimicrobial drug resistance grow and we stop responding to antibiotics.
- Meat and dairy producers remain vulnerable to several endemic, infectious animal diseases, including African Swine Fever (ASF), Swine flu, and Avian flu.
Global food insecurity and nutritional deficits
Animal-based protein is often unaffordable and difficult to access, resulting in severe repercussions on nutrition and food security:
- When it comes to nutrition, India suffers from endemic deficits, performing poorly on a wide range of nutritional indicators, including stunting (38%) among children under the age of five and anemia (53%) among adult women. Combined with a large population, these rates mean that India bears the single largest burden of child and maternal undernutrition world-wide.
- In addition to this, farming animals for food is inherently inefficient. For example, it takes nine calories of food fed to a chicken to produce one calorie of meat. Producing food in this manner diverts massive quantities of crops away from direct human consumption and toward animal feed. Ultimately, this drives up the price of grains and legumes for human consumption, displacing subsistence farmers, and compounding food insecurity in low-to-middle-income communities.
Smart protein offers a safe, nutritious, and sustainably-sourced solution.
Across the global food system, we’re seeing an evolution of alternatives to animal-sourced foods. Enter smart protein.
Smart protein is what we call alternative food products to animal-derived meat, seafood, eggs, and dairy. These alternatives are focused on delivering the same cultural and sensory experiences to animal-derived foods — so that consumers and producers have alternatives that feel like a simple switch, not a sacrifice. Smart protein products can be produced using one or a combination of the following three modalities, from a product, cost, and infrastructure perspective:
ISPIC 2021 has an expanded focus beyond plant-based protein, training and directing hundreds of innovators toward the game-changing opportunities in fermentation-derived and cultivated proteins.
Plant-based
One of the most critical bottlenecks the rapid acceleration of the plant-based sector in India is faced with is the need for a robust, multidisciplinary talent pool across science and business. We need more biologists studying and optimizing plants for protein production, more engineers improving ingredients and processing techniques, and more food scientists combining these ingredients in novel ways to produce plant-based foods that offer consumers products they love, with superior taste at improved prices. The India Smart Protein Innovation Challenge — ISPIC 2020 — was a one-of-its-kind, comprehensive, 5-month program aimed at addressing the talent bottleneck. In 2021, we’re doubling down on the plant-based category, training hundreds of new innovators, and accelerating go-to-market and scale strategies for dozens of new entrepreneurs.
Fermentation-derived & Cultivated
Innovation in cell culture, stem cell biology, tissue engineering, meat science, fermentation, and chemical and bioprocess engineering have laid the foundation for the use of animal cell culture and fermentation-enabled technology to produce alternative proteins. In India, the talent pool and infrastructure available for cultivated and fermentation-derived protein are well-established, owing to our strengths in the biopharmaceutical manufacturing industry. By promoting upstream strain and feedstock improvements with the established operational expertise required for swift integration into large-scale manufacturing environments, India has a significant role to play in potentially accelerating new product innovation and the path toward cost reduction.
Eligibility Criteria
- This challenge has no application or entry fees. It is made possible due to the donors of The Good Food Institute India and the support of our key sponsors.
- Participants who have already participated in ISPIC 2020 can also apply and take part in ISPIC 2021.
- The challenge is focused on Indian Nationals, but we will allow participation on a case-by-case basis* from citizens of other countries if they have been working in India and understand the industry landscape.
- The target audience for this challenge is students, early-to-mid stage professionals, and scientists and researchers with a background in applied and basic sciences, engineering, technology, business, innovation, or entrepreneurship.
- For age restrictions from Phase 2, please refer to individual track requirements.
*More details are available in the application form. Go through our application guide too!
Challenge Sponsors
Title Sponsor
