The food market in Switzerland is largely saturated, and exposed to increasing cost pressure. This represents a challenge not only for industrial businesses, but also in particular for commercial processing facilities and agricultural production. In this climate, stakeholders can achieve success if they position themselves in market niches that strengthen innovation and can stand out from the competition in market segments with high quality standards.
Working together with the various sectors and using a systemic approach, this research field aims to improve products and production processes from the cultivation stage to the market-ready product, to enhance the long-term competitiveness of selected value chains, to support the creation of new value chains, to minimise food loss and to process by-products. The growing importance of an individually tailored diet for human health as well as further food trends lead to new market niches which it behoves us to recognise and fill.
Based on new findings regarding the interactions between humans (genetics, epigenetics), the environment and diet, as well as on an improved understanding of the factors influencing food choice (consumer research), we are developing principles for a healthy diet for the population. This includes emphasising quality criteria that promote both existing and innovative foods and food types.
A major challenge posed by food security is the provision of the population with high-quality proteins which tick all the boxes in terms of sustainable production, palatability, digestibility and health. Animal protein, while of high nutritional quality, is produced at the cost of negative environmental impacts; plant-protein production, on the other hand, is less environmentally polluting, but plants are, on average, much lower in essential amino acids.
