🌱 Kelp is on the way! Why is seaweed attracting so much attention?
+ 3 challenges faced by seaweed farmers
Happy Monday! Every Monday we suit up and get serious - digging into a climate topic, rounding up the past week’s Good(s) News and sharing updates from across FTF, so you’re never out of the loop.
Seaweed isn’t just for making delicious sushi and decorating sandcastles. Did you know, most toothpastes contain a thickener derived from seaweed? Well, we didn’t know either! Keen to learn more about this up-and-coming aquatic resource, we invited guest writers Daisy, a consultant and writer, and Chloe, a marine ecologist and social scientist, to share its climate benefits. We’re also teasing something we’re launching later this week... down at the bottom.
By the end of this newsletter, you’ll know:
why seaweed is a great resource in the circular economy
3 challenges facing seaweed farming
8 brands utilising seaweed today
2 ways your brand can explore using seaweed
Let’s dive, or snorkel, in…
> In Focus
Seaweed’s Sustainability Potential
by Daisy Lavington and Chloe Nunn
Though seaweed isn’t a panacea of sustainability. It does, however, have an important role to play in consumer products. It is celebrated for its diverse applications, low resource input, and fast growth rate. Seaweed, an umbrella term of all sorts of marine macroalgae, has been used for centuries across the world and might be in products you already buy, including yoghurt and Starbucks coffee. More recently, it has attracted attention for its potential to transform numerous sectors from skincare and food products to packaging.
5 exciting ways seaweed is used:
Plastic replacements: Bioplastics and coatings made from seaweed derivatives that can be biodegradable.
Nutrition: Seaweeds are high in protein, vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants crucial for human health making them a great addition to human and animal diets (potentially even reducing emissions from the beef industry).
Fertiliser: Elsewhere in agriculture, seaweeds are used as natural fertilisers for crops. The RHS is even promoting Seaweed as a traditional fertiliser for gardening.
Thickening and emulsifying: Seaweeds extracts carrageenan, alginates and agar are used in many products because of their thickening properties.
Seaweed-adjacent markets: There are also benefits to seaweed-adjacent markets such as Urchinomics, an organisation focusing on kelp forest restoration by removing sea urchins which cause kelp deforestation. They then ranch the sea urchins and sell them to the restaurant industry.
Why consider seaweed as an alternative input material?
It is vital that companies innovate and source alternative input materials to replace inherently unsustainable materials we currently rely upon like virgin plastic, synthetic fertilisers and resource-intensive food crops. Seaweed is a renewable and naturally biodegradable material and it has the potential to be a key input material or ingredient in food products, packaging, cosmetics, fertiliser and even biofuels going forward.
Seaweed plays a vital role in marine ecosystems by providing habitat, spawning ground, and food for marine life and can even reduce coastal erosion. Rapid growth rates and low resource requirements make it a promising crop for sustainable farming: it requires no freshwater, fertiliser, or arable land to grow.
How can seaweed improve a company’s environmental impact?
The main environmental benefit of using sustainably harvested or farmed seaweed in product formulations is that seaweed has the potential to be a great resource in the circular economy. The crop is renewable as it can be grown again and again and at the end of the crop or product life span, it remains biodegradable (unless the manufacturing process or other input materials in the product affect that outcome). Companies using seaweed as an alternative to plastic are reducing their reliance on non-renewable resources such as virgin plastics derived from fossil fuels.
In terms of carbon, the quantity of carbon that seaweed sequesters when it is growing is not yet scientifically proven and beyond that, just like with any tree you plant, the carbon only remains locked up in the carbon sink whilst the seaweed remains growing and untouched e.g.in a wild kelp forest.
Seaweed farms can also have other benefits for the marine ecosystem, for example, seaweed can be farmed alongside oysters which filter the water and increase water quality.
3 challenges facing seaweed farming:
Lack of processing infrastructure in the supply chain: Wet seaweed is very heavy before it is processed so processing plants need to be near the source of the crop to reduce transport related fuel consumption.
Potential undervaluing of the resource: Many seaweed product innovators have low demand because their products use very little of the crop, while high demand sectors such as agriculture using seaweed as fertiliser only need low grade seaweed which means the price per kilo is much lower and farmers can lose out on a good price for their crop.
Pest control and other local environmental impacts present challenges similar to other aquaculture farming. Light and temperature levels of the waters can be affected, leading to pests. This is exacerbated in conditions where monoculture farming is practised and the decreased biodiversity restricts natural pest control.
Which brands are leading the way?
Several companies are integrating seaweed into their products showing its potential for a wide range of applications:
Lush Cosmetics, Haeckels, Beauty Kitchen are among many companies using seaweed and algae in skincare products for their hydrating and soothing properties.
Shore Seaweed Chips and The Cornish Seaweed Company are two examples of companies in the food sector creating products that boast of its nutritional benefits.
Notpla is an Earthshot prize winning company using seaweed as an alternative to plastic packaging alongside other companies including Evoware and Kelpi. Notpla sachets are currently being used by Hellman’s for takeaway portions.
So, ocean bounty or is seaweed being oversold?
Seaweed is not the silver bullet to solve all our resource and product related sustainability challenges. It is one tiny part in a broader landscape of exploring less resource intensive crops and developing new products that use renewable input materials and remain biodegradable at the end of their life.
Seaweed’s diverse applications, from skincare to packaging, highlight its potential to alter the course of various industries. As more brands embrace seaweed, they have the opportunity to enhance their product offerings but also contribute to the circular economy.
2 ways brands can explore using seaweed:
Consider seaweed’s potential applications within their products and value chain. Once opportunities are identified, invest in R&D to explore new formulations of current products using seaweed as an alternative input material.
Avoid creating unintentional negative impacts. Identify sustainable sources of seaweed and engage with potential suppliers to foster strong relationships and ensure transparent sourcing practices.
> Follow up with…
Webinar: ‘Market Insights: Exploring End Markets for Seaweed Products’ by SMMR
Article: ‘Breaking down the barriers for the UK's seaweed sector’ by the fish site
> Last week in consumer goods x climate…
The Good(s) News
Up and coming brands…
🎯 Tiba Tempeh and Botanical PaperWorks announced they are both B Corp certified, with Tiba Tempeh achieving a score of 108.8!
🎯Eat Just launched the fifth version of their vegan Just Egg, made from mung beans. This new iteration has significantly improved in taste, texture, and functionality, allowing it to compete with conventional eggs.
Bigger organisations…
⭐Brompton Bicycle have created the first 100% fully post-consumer recycled aluminium wheel-rims bike in partnership with Norsk Hydro. This innovation forms part of their goal to make a net-zero bike by 2050.
⭐ Boots and No7 Beauty Company have set their decarbonisation intentions by partnering with Manufacture 2030. They follow the likes of Aldi, Asda, Tesco, and Waitrose who are already using the software to identify opportunities for emissions reduction along their value chain.
⭐Monsoon, in collaboration with My Wardrobe HQ, have launched their new hire service, “Rent Monsoon”, where consumers will be able to rent bridalwear and occasion dresses. After use the items can be returned for dry cleaning and restocking at no additional cost.
⭐ McDonald’s announced their trial of two plant-based ice creams made from rice milk. The Vegetarian Society-certified ice creams will be available in chocolate and strawberry flavours in select UK sites.
Want good news sooner? We post our top 5 stories every Friday on LinkedIn! If your CPG brand has good news to share, let us know.👇
> In case you missed it
Want more? Here’s what’s happening across FTF at the moment…
Liv Dawson of Sea Change Wine shared how she wants to break with tradition when it comes to the wine making industry in last week’s The Check-Out.
Not satiated for seaweed knowledge? Read about Algae Cooking Club and their revolutionary cooking oil.
We’re sharing more about our new event calendar in Thursday’s The Check-Out, but if you’ve read this far, go on and have a sneak peak.
That’s it for today!
Want more? Check out ‘The Check-Out’ this Thursday for the latest brands in our basket. In the meantime, if you want to get involved in our community activities (like the group chat), reply to this email or reach out at info@followingthefootprints.com to say hi.
Much love,
Team FTF