Finnish food industry giant Fazer has begun researching cell-based chocolate, which will cultivate confectionery ingredients without the need for traditional farming inputs. As climate change threatens the traditional cocoa-growing areas in the equatorial regions of the globe, there is a critical need to explore alternative sources for cocoa.
“Research will take years before cell-cultured cocoa is launched on the market. This is a long-term project, aiming at the future. Managing traditional cocoa sustainably is Fazer’s first and foremost priority, but we want to explore and innovate for the future too,” Heli Anttila, VP of new product development, tells.
“Although we are exploring new means for raw material production, the taste experience of chocolate will remain unchanged. Fazer has already – in partnership with the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland – received the first successful results of cell-cultured cocoa,” she details.
“Now we are continuing the research as part of the larger CERAFIM-consortium, which joins several Finnish companies and research institutions around the theme of cellular agriculture to fearlessly explore future solutions.”
While the bulk of Fazer’s cocoa currently comes from sustainably managed sources in Ecuador and West Africa, the company will continue to promote the competence development of cell-based chocolate across its home markets, it maintains.
Soil-less cacao
Cellular agriculture means biotechnological production instead of farming, with minimal land and other natural resources required for the production. The production takes place in bioreactors under controlled conditions.
“Cell-cultured cocoa is a novel food in the EU, and it needs to be approved according to the European Food Safety Authority,” highlights research team leader, Dr. Heiko Rischer from VTT.
“First we need to master the cells we want to grow with cellular agriculture in the bioreactor. We are researching the process steps needed to produce great and desirable flavor components,” remarks Annika Porr, senior manager at Fazer Confectionery’s Forward Lab.
“We have already tested a few cocoa variants and their growing capabilities. The next stage is to scale up and develop different processing steps, which are regular chocolate process steps.”
Establishing a uniform label
Anttila comments that outside the EU, cocoa produced via cellular agriculture will also require FDA novel food approval. “There is not yet an established model for labeling cell-cultured ingredients,” she highlights.
As the new food category matures, proponents of cell-cultured food products have become increasingly outspoken in their push back at the “lab-grown” labeling term, which was first used to identify the earliest iterations of cell-based ingredients.
With consumer demand considerably influenced by labeling terminologies, a recent Rutgers study confirmed that “cell-based” and “cell-cultured” work best for labeling these novel foods.
The next confectionery renaissance
The accelerated demand for less environmentally intensive chocolate ingredients continues to fuel the development of new ingredients produced from alternative sources, like rice and even microflora-based dairy proteins.
Cell-based chocolate further extends industry’s capacity to completely eradicate critical humanitarian and climate issues linked to ingredient farming, such as deforestation and child labor.
This renaissance in the confectionery space – reflecting similar momentum in meat, dairy and seafood – is in global effect. Earlier this year, for instance, US-based cultured chocolate manufacturer California Cultured snapped up funding from sustainable food investment platform CULT Food Science Corp.
“Cell-cultured cocoa is still far from our plates, but it offers us a novel approach to managing the challenges of sustainable cocoa sourcing in a fair and transparent value chain,” Anttila concludes.
