From bacteria to beanless chocolate: What will we be eating by 2050?

In place of cows farting in fields, there will be bubbling tanks of bacteria.

Supermarkets will have aisles full of foods for the elderly, as well as the usual baby pouches and snacks. Your chocolate won’t come from cocoa at all, but from broad bean plants.

These are some of the possibilities for food in 2050, and most of them are already under development.

This year alone, a dog treat will go on sale in the UK made from microorganisms. Pet brand Tuggs, which already sells food made from insects, is sizing down a species to use bacteria too.

They buy their powdered microorganisms from MicroHarvest, a company which believes the smallest creatures are ‘tiny heroes’ that could solve global food shortages. 

Founder and CEO Katelijne Bekers told Metro that bacteria don’t have the ‘ick’ factor that puts many off eating insects, because we already eat it all the time with fermented food like yoghurt, sourdough, and beer.

Some may question that, given Salmonella and E.Coli have given them a bad rep, but a growing group of biotech startups are betting that bacteria will soon be the main course.

An aging and ever larger global population with a growing taste for meat is going to mean even more demand for protein in future, but the planet is already struggling to keep up.

Katelijne said her team can convert sugars to protein in 24 hours. After they multiply in a soupy tank called a bioreactor, the bacteria are harvested and inactivated to form a powder, which can be sold on as an ingredient for things like baked goods, protein shakes, or even fake meats.

‘We can already produce one tonne per day,’ she said.

Although she was tight-lipped about exactly which little species went into the mix, said they are the same as those already used in fermentation.

Some companies are even creating food from ‘thin air’ with bacteria which feed on carbon dioxide and hydrogen.

Novonutrients is one of them, expressing its bold ambition to become ‘a new pillar of the food system, decoupled from agriculture’.

It says nutritionally, bacteria are on par with beef, ‘and superior to all plant based alternative proteins at greatly reduced costs’.

Both companies are on display at a new exhibition at The Mills Fabrica in London’s King’s Cross, which Metro checked out for its opening today.

It shows some of the latest innovations in farming and food, such as ‘beanless’ coffee and chocolate, and lots of focus on what to do with the parts of crops we currently think of as waste.

Kyomei had a display explaining its business model using crop leaves typically thrown away when fruit or veg is harvested.

Chief of staff Morgan Zaidel told Metro the company with a base in Cambridge is already buying greens from farmers in the UK, and in future these ‘biofactories’ could be worth more than the crop itself.

Plants it could work with include tomato, lettuce, alfalpha and sugar beet.

Explaining the pitch to farmers, she said: ‘The leaves would just get left on the soil and go to waste. We’re saying, “We’ll buy your leaves that currently have zero value to you.’

They extract a protein called rubisco, and compare this process to turning waste into gold.

‘It’s the most abundant plant protein on the planet and it has incredible nutritional properties, equivalent to meat, eggs, and dairy,’ Morgan said.

‘The only reason it hasn’t been commercialised to date is that it hasn’t been effective cost-wise to actually extract it out of all this biomass.’

As well, they are also looking at genetically modifying plants to contain even more useful proteins in the leaves,.

Potential uses for the leaf protein include replacing some of of the ingredients used in commercial kitchens which have been vilified as ultraprocessed and unnatural, such as xanthan gum and methylcellulose.

The ‘future of food’ is a big topic.

Climate change, population growth, and changing tastes of the existing population will all force a rethink of our current system, and many think there are big opportunites there.

In November last year, the inaugural Future of Food competition was held in London where companies vied for a £10,000, and recognition that their product is revolutionary.

Among those on display were runner-ups Dogtooth, who make fruit-picking robots as dexterous as a human worker.

Elsewhere, there were companies using AI to reduce food waste, plastic-free dishwashing sponge company Seep, vertical farms growing salad year-round, and winners Nice Rice which reduces the envinromental impact of rice.

Barney Mauleverer, a food entrepreneur who launched and hosted the contest, told Metro that immediate trends brands are trying to tackle include concerns over ultraprocessed or very sugary foods, as well as environmental concerns like finding a substitue for palm oil.

One trend which may be more overlooked is that by 2050, there will be ten million more people over the age of 65 than there are in the UK today. This means there will be a workforce issue, but it also means there’s a gap in the market for brands catering specifically to this growing demographic.

‘Older people perhaps need more bespoke nutrition,’ he said. ‘Or it could be foods easier to eat or ingest.’

He said that massive shifts in how we produce our food are coming, even if supermarket buyers still tend to think short-term.

‘The obvious one is climate change, but we’ve also got AI coming,’ he said. We’ve got aging and shifting populations. We’ve got space tourism around the corner. We will be going to space, and what does that mean for the population at large?’

‘I think the food industry needs to look up and accept these things are coming, and adapt quite quickly’ he said.

‘Taste of Tomorrow: What will the world be eating in 2050?‘ will be showing at The Mills Fabrica until July 31.

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