Supported by the European Union (EU), EIT Food is the world's largest food innovation community. Its mission is threefold: healthier lives through food, a net zero food system and a fair and resilient food system. Its Consumer Observatory is Europe's central hub for current and future consumer insights on agrifood topics. The general and consumer-specific trends, wild cards and weak signals identified by the Observatory provide the basis for this scenario work.
The work continues the 2024 exercise on futures of food consumption and the agrifood ecosystem in 2035 in Europe, this time with emphasis on technological advances, specifically on consumer acceptance of processed and functional food and of alternative proteins. In 2025, Insight Foresight Institute engaged the EIT Food community and a broader set of food and foresight experts in three online workshops. The participants made sense of how societal and consumer trends could interrelate, explored alternative scenarios of food consumption by 2035 and reflected on their implications for today's agrifood ecosystem and policy.
Scenarios are not predictions of the likely future, but they depict possible futures, even less likely ones. The narratives are written in the present tense, as if we were already in 2035. Two dimensions structured the work and ensured that each scenario was truly different:
• Acceptance of alternative proteins, covering both traditional alternative proteins for European markets (e.g. tofu, seitan, tempeh and molluscs) and novel ones (e.g. mycoprotein, cultivated meat, precision fermentation and insects).
• Acceptance of processed and functional food, which may be unhealthy or healthy, even highly functional with health benefits and tailored to individual needs.
Crossing the two dimensions gives four scenarios:
• Scenario 1: NATURAL AND LOCAL – Low in processing, low in alternatives
• Scenario 2: WHOLE-FOOD MOSAIC – Low in processing, high in alternatives
• Scenario 3: HIGH-TECH SAVOUR – High in processing, high in alternatives
• Scenario 4: CONVENIENT AND AFFORDABLE – High in processing, low in alternatives
Scenarios in a nutshell
Natural and Local. Geopolitical shocks push EU guardrails and regional procurement, co-operatives scale open precision technologies and consumer scepticism keeps innovation practical, so that transparent, short and circular food chains prevail over long ones.
Whole-Food Mosaic. Geopolitical shocks and zoonotic scares push Europe to de-risk diets by diversifying protein (pulses, fungi, algae and even some insects). Flexitarian eating becomes the social default, with meat as an occasion.
High-Tech Savour. Safe-by-design novel proteins and smart reformulation gradually upgrade familiar meals, and per-portion life cycle assessments ensure that only options with clear health gains and lower footprints scale up. Wearables and GP-endorsed apps nudge personal choices.
Convenient and Affordable. Allergies linked to alternative proteins unsettle consumers, demand collapses and the system pivots to reformulated staples that are cheaper, safe and proven on-pack. Cost drives choices, and families accept functional processed swaps when taste holds.
Implications
The third workshop explored emerging issues in each scenario, and further desk work produced tables of threats, opportunities and possible stakeholder actions today. The most pressing cross-scenario implications are synthesised in ten thematic areas. They are not ranked in any particular order and are meant as openings for further reflection rather than fixed solutions.
1. Making healthy and sustainable food affordable for all. Fiscal measures such as VAT relief, targeted subsidies and levies on foods high in fat, sugar and salt (HFSS), or even on meat, could help align prices with nutritional and environmental value without widening inequalities.
2. Managing transitions and safeguarding farmers' futures. Every transition produces winners and losers. A structured transition management framework could include retraining, diversification incentives, cooperative ownership of new facilities and social safety nets, so that farming remains viable and valued across Europe.
3. Balancing industrial efficiency and niche innovation. Antitrust measures, fair-access rules and tailored standards could support the coexistence of large-scale food systems with smaller, innovative and regional models, while direct-to-consumer and cooperative marketing could rebalance power between retailers and farmers.
4. Strengthening retail diversity and direct market channels. Retailers might combine mainstream convenience with regional sourcing and digital marketplaces that connect consumers directly with local producers, enhancing transparency and consumer choice.
5. Reframing 'processing for good' with scientific evidence. Processing can either harm or improve nutrition depending on how it is applied. More research on ultra-processed foods and alternative proteins is needed to clarify their health impacts, while innovation in processing techniques (e.g. fermentation and bio-enrichment) could enhance health and sustainability outcomes.
6. Integrating food systems within the broader bioeconomy. Coordinated bioeconomy strategies could prevent competition between food, feed and bio-based materials, and links with biorefineries, nutrient recycling and cross-sector resource planning could optimise land and biomass use while ensuring food security.
7. Managing the energy and climate footprint of food production. Emerging food technologies such as fermentation, controlled-environment agriculture and precision processing require substantial energy. Renewable energy, energy recovery in food manufacturing, efficiency standards and collaboration between the food and energy sectors could mitigate new climate impacts.
8. Understanding and guiding consumer behaviour in the digital era. Social media, influencers and digital marketing strongly shape dietary norms, especially across generations. Better consumer insight research and collaboration with digital platforms could make the sustainable choice the socially desirable and convenient one.
9. Expanding protein diversification to include aquaculture. Marine resources, especially shellfish, algae and seaweed, could play a much greater role in future protein diversification through sustainable aquaculture and blue bioeconomy initiatives.
10. Coordinating multi-level governance and transition partnerships. Transforming Europe's food system requires coordination across silos. European food transition partnerships could connect the Common Agricultural Policy, Horizon Europe and other finance streams to coordinated action at EU, national and regional levels.
Together, the scenarios suggest that Europe's food future depends less on a single technological or behavioural breakthrough than on how effectively diverse innovations are coordinated across social, economic and environmental dimensions. No single actor can drive the transformation alone; it calls for the combined efforts of policymakers, food system operators, researchers and consumers. Twenty experts from the EIT Food community and beyond contributed to the workshops.
The report: https://www.futures4europe.eu/post/futures-of-food-consumption-in-2035-in-europe-3q46e