UMass Amherst Explores the 2036 Future of Food
“Food connects to nearly every major global challenge we face — from energy and water to disease, population and economic security,” said Lili He, professor and head of the Dept. of Food Science at University of Massachusetts at Amherst. A lot of that ground was covered by He and other speakers at “Food 2036: Shaping the Future of Food” two-day workshop in Boston.
“What will the global food industry look like in 10 years?” was the theme of the conference, held June 1-2. Most of the discussion connected the food industry’s evolution over the next decade with health and feeding the planet.
Scientists, industry executives, regulatory experts, policymakers and entrepreneurs were brought together to sort of chart an agenda for the next decade of food science.
In his keynote, Mehmood Khan, former chief scientific officer and vice chair of PepsiCo and current CEO of the Hevolution Foundation, positioned the workshop around five priorities:
- Leading rather than defending
- Integrating food, pharma, biotech, aging and public health
- Pursuing a moonshot to redesign protein and food supply systems
- Using rigorous science to connect food with health span
- Building global, cross-sector collaborations that treat food innovation as essential to public health, economic resilience and national security.
Discussions unfolded across five thematic sessions, each pairing expert panels with interactive roundtables led by five UMass Food Science faculty:
- Blurring the Line Between Food and Pharma
- AI in the Food System 2036
- How Novel Technologies Will Define Food Ingredients and Products in 2036
- Ultraprocessed Foods: Reimagining the Grocery Store
- From Challenges to Acceptance — Building Consumer Trust in Future Foods.
The workshop closed with a commitment to translate its discussions into durable outcomes. UMass Amherst announced plans to publish the insights drawn from the workshop and to develop a post-workshop roadmap, and the university introduced the Strategic Research Alliance — an industry membership model connecting corporate R&D with the expertise, research infrastructure and student talent of the UMass food science department.
For more information about the Future of Food Initiative, contact the Dept. of Food Science at 413-545-2277.
About the Author
Dave Fusaro
Editor in Chief
Dave Fusaro has served as editor in chief of Food Processing magazine since 2003. Dave has 30 years experience in food & beverage industry journalism and has won several national ASBPE writing awards for his Food Processing stories. Dave has been interviewed on CNN, quoted in national newspapers and he authored a 200-page market research report on the milk industry. Formerly an award-winning newspaper reporter who specialized in business writing, he holds a BA in journalism from Marquette University. Prior to joining Food Processing, Dave was Editor-In-Chief of Dairy Foods and was Managing Editor of Prepared Foods.