All PFN ARTICLES

New Zealand food technology startup ANDFOODS has made a strategic decision that may signal a new commercial model for emerging food innovators. Instead of manufacturing its fermented whipped cream in New Zealand, the company has chosen to produce it in China—placing manufacturing alongside its target customers before its first commercial launch in Singapore.

Australian supermarket giant Coles Group has awarded more than AUD$3.5 million to eight emerging food and agriculture businesses, signalling where one of the region's largest retailers sees future growth opportunities.

Monty & Sons has launched a pasta range made from New Zealand-grown durum wheat, creating what is believed to be one of the country's first fully traceable paddock-to-plate pasta supply chains. The wheat is grown by members of the Wairarapa Grains Collective before being milled and manufactured locally.

The company produces whole-cut plant-based meat products using a fermentation-based process built around soy and wheat proteins. Unlike many first-generation plant-based brands focusing heavily on burgers and mince, Chunk has built its range around premium steaks, pulled meat products and diced meat alternatives designed to deliver a more convincing eating experience.

In the aftermath of SIAL Shanghai 2026 this week, one thing is becoming unmistakably clear: Asia’s next food economy is not being built around hype, it is being built around functionality, affordability, portability and industrial scale. Across the exhibition halls, the strongest signals were not celebrity veganism or futuristic lab theatrics. Instead, brands showcased high-protein beverages, shelf-stable nutrition, AI-assisted ingredient systems, functional snacks, low-GI

The narrative that plant-based meat is “dead” keeps colliding with one awkward problem: consumers still want meat-like experiences without necessarily wanting more animals, more emissions, more industrial farming or belonging to a movement. Here comes Steakholder Foods with PERFECTA, a new U.S.-bound range of 3D-printed plant-based steaks, chicken breasts, salmon patties, white fish patties and filet mignon-style cuts looking uncannily close to the real thing.

The plant-based seafood sector may have just crossed a line from “interesting startup category” into something much bigger. Oshi, the company behind the first whole-cut 100% plant-based salmon fillet in the U.S. market, has secured a US$3 million strategic investment from one of Latin America’s largest traditional seafood manufacturers. That’s not just funding. That’s the old seafood economy quietly acknowledging the future may not look like trawlers forever.

China’s food strategy should be setting off alarms across New Zealand and Australia. Beijing is not merely trying to feed its population anymore, it is building a vertically integrated protein factory system spanning genetics, fermentation, synthetic biology, AI-led agriculture, ingredient processing and export manufacturing. Yet ANZ still largely behaves like a commodity frontier economy: grow it, ship it, hope the market stays loyal.

Winter in New Zealand doesn’t just mean gumboots, soup and shorter days anymore. It also means the return of one of the country’s most quietly luxurious food sectors - black truffles. North Canterbury producer Kings Truffles has confirmed harvesting will begin in early June across its Waipara Basin and Claremont Station blocks, signalling the official arrival of New Zealand truffles for 2026.

Heineken has just nudged beer into strange new territory: the gym bag. Its UK launch of Outd00r Brewing is a 0.0% alcohol-free lager range with electrolytes, vitamin C and magnesium, positioned as an “isotonic 0.0 lager” for the post-run, post-ride, post-padel, post-whatever crowd. In other words, beer is no longer just trying to be booze-free. This functional beer now wants to be useful.

Clinical evidence helps point the way. A randomised 3×3 crossover study, published in a peer-reviewed journal and indexed on PubMed, shows that adding avocado to a mixed meal can improve post-meal blood glucose response and satiety, particularly in overweight adults. For GLP-1 users, those outcomes are not theoretical, they map directly onto daily challenges around energy dips, under-eating and nutritional adequacy.

Fresh, live fermented foods are quietly breaking out of the health-food corner in the UK and sauerkraut is leading the charge. Once seen as a sour continental side dish, kraut is now being re-discovered as a flavour-forward, everyday food, buoyed by growing interest in gut health, fermentation literacy, and mounting consumer distrust of ultra-processed foods.