Series Editors
Jack Legrand and Gilles Trystram
First published 2019 in Great Britain and the United States by ISTE Ltd and John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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© ISTE Ltd 2019
The rights of Gwenola Yannou-Le Bris, Hiam Serhan, Sibylle Duchaîne, Jean-Marc Ferrandi, Gilles Trystram to be identified as the authors of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2019948306
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ISBN 978-1-78630-489-6
When the two people in charge of the ÉcoTrophélia project – one being the outstanding organizer of the ÉcoTrophélia student competition and the other the head of AgroParisTech, a school for the training of the French food elite – asked me to write a foreword, I pondered the subject. Here is another book on this famous and indispensable ecological food transition, a book for “ecoinnovation” in food that is based on the reflections of “agro” students. Is this really serious? But once you know the background of the two authors, you are reassured about the rigorous aspect of the book.
Beyond its academicism, this book is crucial. Certainly so. It is crucial because it is essential for future professionals, students and engineers who will provide us with the food of tomorrow, a possible 10 billion human beings by 2050! Everyone knows or should know that if we continue to produce our food as we have done for decades, our planet will no longer accept it. We are talking about transition when the situation requires a revolution, a revolution to challenge decades of practice, habits, traditions, beliefs and doctrines. The authors are aware, to know them well, that the most recent in this game are the most effective.
This includes AgroParisTech engineers, who having worked for 20 years on the innovative projects of XTC’s customers, participate happily each year in the national ÉcoTrophélia Jury. I too know, beyond their rigor, their formidable creative power, their great ability to overcome established rules and not to bother with professional constraints… that they do not yet know. And I am always impressed with the result.
This is the great interest of this book: to know how to propose another perspective on the methods that will make tomorrow’s food, combining experience with imagination, the best of the scientific literature on the subject and the creative power of the best of tomorrow’s engineers.
The authors provide us with an overview of methodological guidelines, good practices and essential tools for all those who will contribute to our food future. However, they don’t add up to a collection of successful recipes. Because when it comes to innovation, there is no such thing. Innovation and probably even more so ecoinnovation remains a high-risk sport. One out of every two food innovations launched on the French market is a failure in the year following its launch.
Undoubtedly, we must ask ourselves what an innovation is. Let us keep it simple and avoid the sterile debate on the true and false innovation dear to theorists. There is only one useful innovation, the one that brings a new benefit to the consumer. This benefit, in this case, will be an “eco-benefit” that integrates the environment from the design of the product or service and at all stages of its lifecycle. From the formulation of the recipe, the farm, the processor, the packaging, logistics, the sale, the consumption, the end of life, these benefits are potentially very numerous. These include the ecology of the manufacturing process, the ecodesign of packaging, the reduction of energy resources, fair price for all operators in the sector, animal welfare, etc.
Eco-benefits will have to overcome constraints: compliance with specifications, technical feasibility, controlled impact transfer, cost control, time to market, risk management and, of course, consumer expectations. This final constraint is difficult to understand, with a somewhat whimsical and inconsistent behavior of those who refuse palm oil except in their favorite spread and stigmatize over-packaging by buying in bulk and their mineral water in packs of six bottles.
Let us never forget that the winning innovation is a set of several benefits whose combination will seduce the consumer. The main risk here would be to suggest that the ecodesigned nature of the product will be solely responsible for the failure or future success of the product.
It is important to remember one thing: beyond the vital aspect of eating, eating is above all an act of pleasure. But, in the same way that consumers do not accept a guilty pleasure in terms of their own health, they will refuse tomorrow a pleasure that could harm our planet. If this consumer is not aware of the urgency of the subject, those who will tomorrow be at the helm of the food industry could have the heavy responsibility of proposing an offer adapted to this vital issue for all of us. May this book help them to do so.
Xavier TERLET
President of XTC World Innovation
In 2012, the ÉcoTrophélia project was selected by the Agence nationale de la recherche (ANR) as one of the winners of the “Initiatives d’excelle en formations innovantes”, IDEFI (Initiatives of Excellence in Innovative Training) call for projects. Thirteen institutions took part in this project, the aim of which was to promote ecodesign and ecoinnovation in higher education courses, by promoting the development of curricula on this subject in their courses. These establishments are AgroParisTech, AgroSup Dijon, UL-ENSAIA, ENSCBP-Bordeaux INP, ISARA Lyon, Montpellier SupAgro, Oniris Nantes, EBI, ESIROI Université de La Réunion, ESIX, FMA-UHA, AgroCampus Ouest and PURPAN.
The success of these projects was based on the skills of a group of teacher-researchers, whose dual mission was to support and tutor student groups and to mobilize common knowledge and skills to propose new learning frameworks for ecoinnovation processes. These supervisors were numerous in all the institutions; the list provided below stipulates those directly involved in ANR ÉcoTrophélia. We equally thank their many colleagues who also contributed to the project. These direct supervisors of the project included:
The ÉcoTrophélia project was, in fact, also supported by the contribution of a group of engineers specifically recruited by partner institutions. These engineers were: Benoît Cuillère, Angela Frugone, Olivier Toppin, Stéphane Brun, Céline Levert, Hiam Serhan, Ana Amado, Amrine Lallmahomed, Alicia Bernardi, Flavy Benoit, Gaëlle Petit, Laura Cousin, Corinne Stewart, Grégoire Fronteau, Marie Maison, Élise Bourcier, Lou Dumas, Agathe Couvreur, Élodie Barre, Sophia El Andaloussi, Camille Ponchon, Mélanie Sotiriou, Lucas Arhens, Leslie Saint-Marc, Sylvain Claude, Marine Martin, Lucile Meyer, Anaïs Le Moign, Morgane Le Guisquet, Jacky Madi Corodji, Fatema Abassbhay, Noémie Gerbault and Marine Lagardère.
Since 2000, the ÉcoTrophélia competition has motivated the organization and participation of teams to present new ecodesigned products. This book illustrates a very small part of the ecodesign projects submitted to the national and European competitions. We extend our gratitude to all the members who organized these two contests.
Finally, this project was initiated, led and coordinated by CCI Vaucluse led by Dominique Ladeveze, whose team composed of Benoît Cuillière, Angela Frugone, Olivier Toppin, Stéphane Brun, Céline Levert, Catherine Gravezat and Nickie Mauche.
Our appreciation also goes to the ANR and to all these institutions, teacher-researchers, students, engineers and members of CCI Vaucluse, whose various contributions have fueled the ideas and work presented in this book, as we hope it will contribute to enriching your reflections and projects.
The history of food shows a permanent dynamic of innovation. These innovations concern the foods themselves, their production processes, and the methods of distribution or preservation used. Various innovation levers have been mobilized, highlighting at least two strategies:
In this context, companies have also changed their practices to include innovation as a major focus. Thousands of new foods are offered every year, even though not all of them find their market; this shows the remarkable creativity and dynamism of an undoubtedly very original economic sector.
All these innovations – whether they address food safety, the control or creation of new sensory perceptions, the redefinition of nutritional compositions, the introduction of efficient biological agents (such as probiotics), innovative packaging, food-related services such as ease of preparation – are always part of a purpose that accompanies human activities and their evolution or even their mutation.
There is little doubt that advances in science, a better understanding of the effects of food on humans, such as the ongoing work on humans’ digestive health, will continue to open up many avenues for food innovation or renovation.
However, in a societal context where ecological, environmental and societal responsibility concerns are on the rise, a new order is emerging. The environmental impact of food and agriculture plays a major role in global warming, carbon impact and in general the future of societies. This role is increasingly analyzed, informed and communicated, and modifies food demand and behavior. It also modifies the supply and influence of food companies’ strategies. This context induces a need for new innovations and opens up a field for ecodesign and ecoinnovation.
These types of approaches are not, in fact, so new. They were often practiced historically either to reduce costs (energy savings, and material savings in particular) or for reasons specific to a particular agricultural resource or food. There is nevertheless a great interest in understanding, mastering and implementing approaches, tools and methods to ecodesign food and develop more sustainable business models. In the absence of a formal method, good practices deserve to be analyzed, developed and compiled.
For a collective of teachers and institutions training in food engineering in various curricula, ecodesign therefore appears to be a significant challenge. Since 2000, several higher education institutions have jointly organized a dynamic based on the establishment of a national food innovation competition, reserved for graduate students (initially named Trophélia, then ÉcoTrophélia, see box This competition, which has become a European success, made it possible in 2012 to create a project to share methods, concepts and resources dedicated to the ecodesign of food. Thanks to the implementation of a project-based learning pedagogy in the training curricula, students developed project management, management and communication skills that traditional curricula did not provide and confront creative issues. It was a rewarding, useful, professional and practical experience that became highly sought after by companies. Higher education institutions have thus adapted the content of their courses, taking into account all the skills required to create eco-innovative food products. Eighteen years of cooperation around competition have made it possible to share a common analysis, a recent development of which has sought to better teach ecodesign of food. Each collective of teachers has strengths, originalities and the whole covers a priori all the necessary skills.
The objectives were:
In the pedagogical management of projects, it has proved useful in building training tools and reflecting on the very varied dimensions of ecodesign. The contextualization of each project shows that a generic method does not emerge, but practices, tools and training content are required and therefore the acquisition of certain skills is essential.
After six years of working together, it seemed useful to make a restitution so that engineers and students could have an overview and guidance on these methods, good practices and tools. This is the purpose of this book.
It was difficult to present the hundreds of projects developed and their diversity. A dozen of them were therefore chosen, and this description is the focus of a chapter. However, it was essential to contextualize current developments in food and, more generally, in food systems. The driving forces for companies to engage in ecodesign and innovation are then analyzed. Finally, on the basis of the ÉcoTrophélia cases presented and discussed, we have a chapter that analyzes the driving forces and obstacles to ecodesign and ecoinnovation. This provides the subsequent content of the book in detail.
Part 1, entitled “Food and Sustainable Development Challenges”, describes the context and issues of food sustainability based on an analysis of the structure and dynamics of food system evolution. It is structured around two chapters:
Part 2, entitled “Implementation of Ecodesign Practices in Food Innovation Projects”, illustrates the consideration of the four pillars of sustainable food development through the ÉcoTrophélia projects presented, highlighting these impacts on the characteristics of products and business models. This presentation is structured around two chapters:
This work is the result of a very significant collective of students, lecturers, researchers and engineers in companies, all of whom are thanked for it.