$10.4m Precision Fermentation Push Could Fuel New Zealand’s Future Food Exports

Precision fermentation just scored a $10.4 million boost from the Endeavour Fund, with AgResearch leading a five-year programme to turn pine pulp and other local side-streams into high-value food proteins and ingredients. Framed as a low-emissions bioeconomy pathway, the project is designed to convert forestry waste into scalable, export-ready ingredients that sidestep livestock emissions and feed into the next generation of sustainable foods .

The dollars matter. At NZ$10.4m, this is one of the single biggest bets MBIE has placed on food innovation, roughly twice the size of many conventional agri-grants. If successful, it unlocks not only ingredient exports worth hundreds of millions but also creates a backbone of infrastructure that smaller ventures can plug into. Think Daisy Lab’s dairy-free whey or OPO Bio’s cell media solutions: startups that often struggle with capital intensity could benefit from shared research, regulatory tailwinds, and a growing pool of trained fermentation talent .

For New Zealand, the benefits are threefold - a credible emissions-reduction strategy that doesn’t gut rural economies, a new export stream beyond milk powder, and the chance to position Kiwi science as a trusted supplier of animal-free proteins in Asia and beyond. For consumers, it means cleaner-label food options landing in supermarket aisles, from yoghurts to shakes, made possible by microbes and forestry pulp rather than cows. It’s a future food signal with both commercial and cultural heft.

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