We’re diving into the world of plant-based food and its potential to make a positive impact on our planet. Joining us today is Anabelle Co-Martinent, Co-Founder of Phuture Foods, a plant-based meat company dedicated to making delicious and affordable plant-based options accessible to everyone; redefining the future of alternative protein in Asia. They are committed to be part of the global conversation on sustainability and raising awareness about the ecology of the environment through their products. We’ll be exploring the rise of flexitarianism, the environmental benefits of plant-based diets, and the future of this innovative industry. 

This is a transcript of the interview, slightly edited for clarity. 

Freda Liu (Host)  

 
Hello, this is The Shift with Freda Liu and today I have a special guest all the way from Singapore. Introduce yourself. 

Rhianne Lovell-Boland (Special guest) 

Hi, I am Rhianne Lovell-Boland and I am a passionate person. I love talking about sustainability, so thanks so much for having me, Freda.  

Freda Liu 

So, the show, what’s The Shift about? In case you don’t know already, whether it’s seismic or small, there’s a need to make a shift towards sustainability. How are individuals and organizations doing this? It’s the collective effort of everyone. 

Rhianne Lovell-Boland  

So, well, Future Market Insights reports that the global plant-based food market size is predicted to expand by three times, witnessing an increase from US$11.3 billion this year in 2023 to US$35.9 billion in 2033. So, adopting a more plant-based lifestyle can actually lessen the impact of climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions that result from food production.  

Freda Liu 

Here today, my good friend, we’re here with Anabelle Co-Martinent, the CMO and co-founder of Phuture Foods. 

You see the logo in the background. You know, Anabelle, have you seen, I guess, consumer behavior change, even from your other business around being healthier, right? So, have consumers changed when it comes to plant-based food and since you started joining them in 2022? 

Anabelle Co-Martinent(CMO & Co-Founder of Phuture Foods) 

Yes. So, before this, as you know, I’ve already been looking into healthier diets with creating cold-pressed juices like La Juiceria, and a decade ago, it was an uphill battle. 

But we’ve seen that transform until the word cold-pressed juice became a norm. Every auntie and uncle on the streets kind of knows what it is. So, exactly the same transformation is happening for plant-based. Maybe it’s a mouthful to say plant-based food right now, but I do believe that the time will come that it becomes a norm, just like a computer in every home when Bill Gates had this long, long ago when we were much younger. A computer in every home was far-fetched because we couldn’t afford a computer back in Manila. But today, it’s a norm. Everyone has a computer walking around with also a mobile phone. So, plant-based will be the same. We see the shift already happening, being more conscious, the veganism and vegetarianism on the rise. Younger generations, like I would say the Gen Z, the next alpha generation, is already accepting and understanding the consequences of it. So, I think there is already a shift, but we will see it more as sustainability and climate change becomes an issue.  

Freda Liu 

You know, a PC in every home, you weren’t born yet. 

Rhianne Lovell-Boland  

[Laughter] 

Although I have to say, you know, being a millennial myself and, you know, talking about the shift, I have in the last five years, you know, seen me myself become a flexitarian, a lot of other people around me. So, now going towards plant-based alternatives is actually still not seen as affordable for your young average Malaysian. Why is that? 

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

So, plant-based is a technology, right? So, it’s from plants. However, we are making it better, more efficient and more delicious. This is important in every food industry. Whatever health benefits we do, if it’s not delicious, it’s very hard to be sustainable because people will not repeat purchases or a repeat eating or drinking of any products. So, with plant-based, we feel that as increased dollars are spent into the technology, into the advancement, then it becomes increasingly affordable. Just like the computer and the mobile phones, the same issues. Back then, we couldn’t imagine it because we couldn’t afford it. But with the right investments from private and then public, we see it becoming cheaper and cheaper until every cleaner, driver, private people all have mobile phones. So, the same for plant-based, we’re seeing already a close price between, let’s say, plant-based chicken as well as chicken. It’s right now double the price, but I do see a Phuture where it becomes a norm, if not cheaper, because of the resources. 

Freda Liu 

Right, okay. There’s also this argument that plant-based meat is heavily processed mock meats, which we find in the older vegetarian restaurants. So, how is the future different?  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

Oh, I’m so glad you asked that question. I’m so glad because most of the time when people say processed, it comes with a negative connotation. But if you drill down what it means, it’s just the process or the step that needs to be done for it to become another item or another product. So, in Phuture, what we do is we do mechanical and heat processing, which means it’s just like cooking. When you cook something, you are processing the ingredients into a whole meal. That’s a process, right? So, it’s the same thing. We source non-GMO, a lot of natural products and the most basic processing is heating element, mechanical element, which is a lot of machineries that press it into, let’s say, a chicken nugget. And the last step of the process is the high and the low temperatures, the low which is freezing it because we send out Phuture food in frozen form. So, let’s say it’s a plant-based nugget, it’s a plant-based chicken, then it’s flash frozen until it gets to the end consumer. So, these all small elements are called processing. 

Freda Liu  

Cakes are processed.  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

Cakes are processed. A lot of things are processed before they become the final goods except, of course, when people ask me, what is the best, Annabel? Well, the best is still going to the market, get the raw material and eat the raw food. But that’s not what we all want to eat as Asians, as Malaysians. We all want delicious food. So, we balance off living. We have the raw elements, which I think is the best. And then, you know, there’s also plant-based nuggets, plant-based chicken, as well as other plant-based options. 

Rhianne Lovell-Boland  

Right. Well, we know with change, there always comes a little bit of resistance and, you know, as you’ve just explained a bit about the processing, what other misconceptions are there towards alternative plant-based meats?  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

Typically, the taste profile. I think I don’t blame these people, especially if they’ve tried version 1, version 2. Even the big companies in the United States have gone through many steps and process. Just as the old mobile phones, I don’t know if you know, but I used to carry around a very brick Motorola, which was very heavy. 

And look at how the mobile phones of today look like, right? So, a lot of changes are happening, but a lot of misconceptions. So, second one is that plant-based is expensive. For me to be a flexitarian is expensive. 

The answer is no. It’s only expensive because we are not getting a lot of options. So, it’s a law of supply and demand, right? The more people demand, the future generations demand, there will be more solutions and more investments poured towards it. 

And hence, every supermarket, every cafe starts to do vegetarian meals. If you look very closely today, Malaysia is an incredibly competitive space for food. And yet, you see the rise of vegetarian food in cafes, in certain locations. 

10 years ago, this was not the case. So, that is already a conscious pivot of restaurants and SMEs and businesses trying to adapt and say, hey, people are looking for this. Yes, it’s not yet in volume, but they make it available now, which is not present in the past. So, these are misconceptions. It’s expensive. It’s going to be too costly. It’s not delicious. 

Rhianne Lovell-Boland  

Right. So, I guess like people, in case people don’t know, what are flexitarians?  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

Okay. So, flexitarians are basically people who are flexible, but of course, this is very much anchored on plant-based. So, veganism is strict. 

They don’t take any animal products. Vegetarians are more flexible, but they don’t eat animal products except for a bit of cheese and honey. But flexitarians, they, just like us, I assume, in our heart, we want to eat more plant-based and we do practice it as every conscious effort that we can. 

However, we’re in a meal, you know, people serve some chicken dishes and every now and then cheese and other things. We feel open and very easily adaptable, not like the typical, oh, I can’t eat this and that. So, flexitarians are on the rise because they have a conscious mind. 

I want to eat more plant-based food. I choose more plant-based. However, on certain days, on celebrations, on pier, you know, outings, I can eat everything. 

So, I think this is what we are seeing on the rise. And of course, if you do practice Meatless Monday, that’s already a small inch towards flexitarianism because you are choosing to go plant-based on certain days. And I think that the rise of Meatless Mondays is a very good movement that has gone through a lot of stages and now it’s become quite a norm for a lot of, I would say, established international companies. 

Freda Liu 

Right. You know, I was just thinking, for example, I try to, okay, five days a week to take vegetables and maybe just twice a week having meat, right? And it’s just like, I go on holidays and everybody’s like, I say, can we order vegetables, please?  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

Yes.  

Freda Liu 

Right. Instead. You know, researchers also estimate that 15% of global greenhouse gas emissions come from raising meat. So, producing 100 grams of protein from beef, for example, sends around 25 kilograms of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, making the same amount of tofu, on the other hand. 

So, it emits around 1.6 kilos. So, plant-based meats, meanwhile, have greenhouse gas emissions, 40 to 90% less than traditional meats. With those statistics that I just shared with you, do you think there’s enough will on the part of people to change food production, though? Especially in a country like Malaysia, right? I mean, I’ve just shared those statistics for people who don’t know, but do people have a will? Do people care?  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

So, I think that together with government, as well as information in the market, these two factors come together, then there will be a will. 

And then, God forbid, any catastrophe that makes us wake up to the fact, just as COVID has, given us a reality check that it can happen, that the world can stop operating, if need be. So, I hope that it doesn’t come to that, but we do see, for example, issues like chicken prices going up through the roof, or maybe it could be avian flu, you know, bird flu everywhere. These are situations where there will be a force of nature, right? From the government trying to keep up with demand and investing in certain things. 

So, I do think that the time will come, but it will be a slow change, unless the government sees that this is a change that’s needed. Just like technology, when a government, I always like to equate to technology, 

because it’s the same thing, right? When we were adopting, let’s say, 4G, or the speed of the internet on your hand, on a mobile phone, that wasn’t possible back then in the ICQ era, when we dialed up on a modem. So, it’s the same thing. 

If the government puts out the infrastructure, like the cabling, the enablement of companies to invest further in this technology to make it better, everyone will be a winner. So, I think we really need to work hand in hand, not just with government, but schools and people of the next generation. Because for oldies like us, we do have our habits formed already, and we’ve lived half of our life. 

But the younger generation have so much ahead of them, and I feel that as they move into the working space and to the government space, the changes will happen faster, because they want it. Unlike us, we want it, we’re conscious five days a week, two days, not really. But for them, it will be a very different landscape. 

So, I think that Malaysia is slowly changing, but we do see other countries like Singapore at a fast-paced speed in terms of investment. In terms of consumption, I don’t know. But if you say in terms of investment, governments focus on where to go, private investors, private equity, investing in these things, you see it very actively happening, unlike in Malaysia. 

Freda Liu 

Because I think it’s more of an issue for them. Food security is more of an issue, water and what have you.  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

That’s true. 

And food security, I believe, will be an issue in every country of the world eventually. But I fear for the day when that really comes. I do hear Malaysian governments speaking about food security, and I believe every country who is quite advanced in their hierarchy of need is talking about food security. 

However, which one is taking it seriously as part of the first three agendas, rather than the other developments. So, Malaysia is perhaps catching up on that. 

Rhianne Lovell-Boland  

You know, well, you discussed inflation, food security, and even supply chains. 

With all of that in mind, what has been your go-to market strategy in getting people to make that transition into the marketplace? 

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

Okay. Good question, because in every adoption, we need the products to be on the ground for people to talk about it, to experience it. So, some of the things we’ve done is partner up with companies who are very much close to the hearts of consumers. So, we’re talking about brands, right? Because they are already having a captured market, such as Coffee Bean, Old Town Coffee. 

A lot of these restaurants and F&Bs, food and beverage, have their own fans, right? They’re a group of fans. And they already come to these places because they know it’s familiar. So, we’ve partnered up with them. 

We’ve also gone to some very cool concerts, just like Blackpink, as well as Billie Eilish, to bring plant-based closer to the hearts of the young generation. And surprisingly, I was serving there at the concert, and you do see a lot of young people, and I’m talking about young, 12, 13, 14, with their dads and moms, you know, coming and ordering plant-based food because they are already conscious. Maybe as a parent, it wouldn’t be your first choice at a concert, but then your children already. 

Mom, this is what Billie Eilish loves. Billie Eilish is plant-based. So, these are some of the conscious changes we’re seeing. 

And I think by bringing this closer and closer to consumers, while we are figuring out technology changes, praying for adoption, praying for government support, all these things, while it’s simultaneous, we need to get the products to the consumers. And it’s waiting for that tipping point for meat and plant-based meat to be at equal footing and pricing. I think that’s when the magic will happen. 

Freda Liu 

Right. Okay. So, you talk about teenagers and bringing their parents, right? What’s happening? I know you’ve got a teenager. 

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

Yeah. 

Freda Liu 

What’s happening in your household with growing children?  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

Okay. So, interestingly, my daughter’s 13, my son is nine years old, and I’m seeing a shift in terms of the way they eat versus when it was during my time. Obviously, first, let’s talk about the parents. 

When my mom was at my age, I don’t think she was conscious about what plant-based was. She wasn’t conscious of maybe vegetarianism because we’re Chinese, but it was on occasional days that they go vegetarian. We do eat vegetables, but there’s not a table conversation, nothing much to discuss on the table, on the dining table. 

But today, I see my son enjoying ice cream mostly from plant-based companies, even though he didn’t know what the difference was. My daughter has been enjoying when she sees, let’s say, we go into a Kyochon and then she sees a plant-based wrap or a burrito versus a Kyochon chicken, for example. She would pick plant-based over that, and that’s a surprising turn of events for business owners because they want to understand why would they choose that when there’s a fried chicken? It’s because they already have that conscious thinking and choice and discussions at the school. 

When I was young, the only discussion was the CFC spray net that you shouldn’t use because the environment, you know, ozone layer. But today, some of the schools disallow students to bring packaging to the school because they don’t want them to have plastic everywhere. They start to talk about compost, which I didn’t know until I was much older. 

These are conscious conversations, and of course, COVID sped up all this understanding. Mom, there is such a thing happening in the world. So, they see animals, they see documentaries. 

Last time TV, for us, we watch what the TV gives us. But today, they choose what they want to watch. And when they watch TikTok, they watch socials, they see animal slaughter. 

We didn’t get to see animals slaughtered before. So, just that thought alone, seeing the animals slaughtered, I think it’s a powerful picture that allowed them to say, but mom, I don’t want to eat this. So, they are flexitarians. 

We eat mostly vegetarian at home because luckily, I have a helper to cook Mondays to Fridays. But on the weekends, we do go out and we do explore because I want them to grow up like normal kids like me when it was back then as a norm. But later on, I think they will have different choices as compared to me being an adult, maybe in my 20s. I believe that they are the future and they will bring change. 

Rhianne Lovell-Boland  

So, speaking of future, what is the goal of Phuture Foods at the end of the day now that you’re also in Singapore and Thailand?  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

So, Phuture is created by Asians, meant for Asians. I believe that this is one of the most powerful things that we as Asians, we can create many things equally as good, if not better, alongside other continents. 

And I think that we understand most, even though you’re from Singapore, from Malaysia, I’m from Philippines, we all have a few things in common such as the way we want to enjoy food around the table with the families, the way we want to stir fry and wok hay, all these things right. These are the differences as opposed to other technologies where maybe from other continents, they will have particularly good branding. As we know, Americans are very good at that. 

But for Asians, because it’s built here, it will be more cost-effective. Second, it will be tweaked according to what the companies will want. So, for example, in our dealings with Cafe A, B and C, whatever their brand is, they will always have a question about texture, design, their kitchen equipment. 

These are all factors we can consider because we have the factory in Malaysia. So, bringing business solutions for businesses and affordable plant-based meat for consumers. 

Freda Liu 

All right. 

Final question, Anabelle, do you feel there’s enough sense of urgency and should there be more urgency into moving towards a flexitarian or vegetarian diet and what would be your call to action?  

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

Okay. Yeah. That’s a good question because I do think that there is a need for all of us to just be aware. 

I think that by talking about it, it’s already the first step. I’m not making you vegetarians tomorrow, but I’m just saying that if you take a moment and you have all good Wi-Fi, good networks, all you got to do is google it up, right? You look at the statistics of living much longer by eating plant-based food, people having a better life, better way of living in terms of whether it’s diabetes, whether it’s weight, excess weight, Malaysia is high on the list. Hence, I do think that there is an urgency. 

However, 10 years ago when I saw this data, when I was already in Malaysia, 10 years after, it’s still the same. Malaysia tops on diabetes and obesity rates in Southeast Asia. I do think that you need to be the change in your family by reading up on statistics. 

Don’t just believe me or Freda, you know, all this kind of show, but read on your own the difference that it makes for cancer patients, for people who have issues like diabetes and obesity. It will bring change to yourself and I think the moment you taste the first change, the first step, you feel better, your digestion is better, your poo is going out better. You will know that, oh my gee, there is something to it and let me look into it and hopefully by then, more cafes, more technology, better prices is already surrounding everyone that the shift makes it so much easier to say, okay, I’m going to be flexitarian five days a week, two days of maybe a bit of easy going. 

So, I think the best thing you can do is read up on plant-based diets, read up and watch all the, you know, Netflix has a lot of films on this one, see the changes that’s happened to other people and maybe it might do the same change for you. 

Freda Liu 

Right, you talk about the shift and of course, you’ve been watching The Shift, Freda together with Rhianne and Annabelle Co-Martinent from Phuture Foods. 

Anabelle Co-Martinent 

 Thank you for having me. 

Freda Liu 

Thanks. 

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