Investors urge food companies to shift from meat to plant-based sources of protein

A coalition of 40 investors managing $1.25tn in assets has initiated a campaign to encourage 16 food companies worldwide to seek new ways to source protein for their products in order to reduce environmental and health risks.

Highlighting the material risks posed by industrial animal production, the group has urged food companies to identify their plans to respond to these risks and set strategies to diversify into plant-based sources of protein.

Among the 40 institutional investors include Swedish state pension funds AP2, AP3 and AP4; Aviva Investors; Boston Common; Coller Capital; Folksam; Nordea and Robeco.

The companies being engaged include Kraft Heinz, Nestle, Unilever, Tesco, Walmart and General Mills.

The coalition has been brought together by the Farm Animal Investment Risk & Return (FAIRR) Initiative, in partnership with responsible investment organisation ShareAction.

FAIRR Initiative founder and Coller Capital CIO Jeremy Coller said: “The world’s overreliance on factory-farmed livestock to feed the growing global demand for protein is a recipe for a financial, social and environmental crisis. Intensive livestock production already has levels of emissions and pollution that are too high, and standards of safety and welfare that are too low.

"It simply can’t cope with the projected increase in global protein demand. Investors want to know if major food companies have a strategy to avoid this protein bubble and to profit from a plant-based protein market set to grow by 8.4% annually over the next five years.”

This initiative comes after an Oxford University study, which stated that $1.5tn in healthcare and climate change-related costs could be saved by 2050 if people cut down their dependence on meat-based diet.