The researchers drew on two of the most extensive food databases available in Europe: Euromonitor’s Passport, which tracks commercial market data, and EuroFIR’s FoodEXplorer, which aggregates compositional food data from national food composition tables across the continent. By combining these sources, the team was able to chart market volumes from 2009 to 2024 and, in parallel, analyse the macronutrient profiles of the products on sale. Nutritional quality was scored using two complementary front-of-pack labelling schemes, the Nutri-Score and the Multiple Traffic Light system, and the researchers additionally assessed which products would be legally eligible to carry nutrition claims under EU Regulation (EC) No 1924/2006. Differences between plant-based analogues and their animal-derived counterparts were tested statistically using the Mann–Whitney U test, a non-parametric method suited to the skewed distributions typical of food composition data.

The headline market finding is unambiguous: plant-based analogues are no longer a niche. Between 2009 and 2024, the market volume of dairy analogues more than tripled, while the market for meat and seafood analogues grew approximately sevenfold. That trajectory reflects a convergence of forces, including rising consumer interest in flexitarian diets, environmental concerns about livestock production, and sustained investment by food manufacturers in improving the taste and texture of products designed to mimic burgers, sausages, milk, and yoghurt. Yet the study’s authors caution that rapid growth has not been accompanied by consistent product quality, and that the term plant-based covers an enormously heterogeneous set of foods.

That heterogeneity is most striking in the macronutrient analysis. Protein content varied widely within every category examined, but the variability was particularly pronounced among analogues to curded dairy products, the plant-based equivalents of cheese. Many of these products provided little to no protein at all, a finding that undercuts a common consumer assumption that a plant-based cheese alternative is nutritionally comparable to the dairy product it replaces. Dairy cheese is a significant protein source in European diets, and the analysis suggests that consumers relying on analogues to fill that role may, depending on the product chosen, receive almost nothing in return. The researchers attribute this variability to formulation: some products are built on protein-rich bases such as pea, soy, or almond concentrates, while others rely heavily on starches, oils, and flavourings.

The Nutri-Score results, which grade foods from A, the healthiest, to E, the least healthy, based on levels of energy, sugars, saturated fat, sodium, protein, fibre, and fruit or vegetable content, revealed consistent but category-dependent patterns. Approximately half of the meat and seafood analogues analysed achieved an A or B rating, placing them among the better-scoring packaged foods. Dairy drink analogues, by contrast, displayed much greater variability, with scores spread across the scale depending on added sugars and fat content. The most troubling result concerned analogues to curded dairy products: every single one scored D or E, the two worst grades. The researchers traced these poor scores to three drivers: high total fat, high saturated fat, and elevated salt levels, a combination that mirrors some of the less healthy characteristics of the cheeses these products imitate.

The Multiple Traffic Light system, which colour-codes fat, saturated fat, sugars, and salt per portion, reinforced the same picture. It also highlighted salt as a recurring concern across several analogue categories. While plant-based products are often perceived as inherently healthier, the processing required to make legumes, grains, and vegetable oils resemble animal products can involve substantial amounts of added sodium, thickeners, and flavour enhancers. The study’s findings suggest that the health halo surrounding plant-based labelling is not always earned by the nutritional composition of the food inside the package.

There were genuine positives, however. More than 60 percent of the meat and seafood analogues qualified for legally defined claims of high protein and low saturated fat, indicating that a majority of products in this fast-growing category do deliver on at least two of the nutritional attributes consumers most often seek. Across the board, the comparison with animal products showed a consistent pattern: plant-based analogues contained more dietary fibre and less total and saturated fat than the animal foods they replace. Fibre is essentially absent from meat, dairy, and seafood, so any product built from plants carries an automatic advantage on that front, and the lower saturated fat content aligns with long-standing dietary guidance linking saturated fat intake to cardiovascular disease risk.

The less favourable side of the ledger concerned protein and the more variable nutrients. Overall, the analogues contained less protein than their animal counterparts, and their sugar and salt levels were inconsistent, sometimes higher and sometimes lower depending on the product and category. This matters because protein, salt, and added sugars are precisely the nutrients around which public health advice in Europe is most actively framed. A consumer who replaces a portion of meat with a low-protein, high-salt analogue may be making a trade that is beneficial for fibre and saturated fat but detrimental elsewhere in their diet. The authors emphasise that the nutritional contribution of any analogue depends heavily on product formulation and on the dietary context in which it is consumed, rather than on the plant-based label itself.

For the researchers, the policy implications are clear. The plant-based analogue market is expanding and is likely to continue doing so as Europe pursues more sustainable food systems, but the sector’s contribution to healthy diets is not guaranteed by growth alone. The study concludes that reformulation could substantially enhance the role these products play, particularly by raising protein content in underperforming categories such as cheese analogues and by reducing salt, saturated fat, and total fat where front-of-pack scores are poor. Because the analysis shows that quality is formulation-dependent rather than intrinsic to the category, targeted reformulation is technically feasible, and the eligibility of many products for nutrition claims suggests manufacturers already have the tools to differentiate better products on shelf.

The study also fills an important evidence gap. Although plant-based analogues have attracted considerable attention in national surveys and single-market studies, EU-wide data on their market evolution and nutritional quality had remained limited. By systematically combining commercial market intelligence with compositional data and validated front-of-pack scoring systems, the Joint Research Centre team has produced the kind of baseline that regulators, public health authorities, and manufacturers can use to monitor the sector as it matures. As the authors note, plant-based analogues are rising in market share, but whether they become a reliable pillar of healthy and sustainable diets will depend on the choices made now about what goes into them.

Subject of Research: Market trends and nutritional quality of plant-based packaged food analogues to animal products in the European Union

Article Title: Plant-based packaged foods as analogues to animal products: market trends and nutritional quality analysis

Article References: Kokkorou, M., Hoffzimmer, A., Dias, J., Grammatikaki, E., Wollgast, J., & Maragkoudakis, P. (2026). Plant-based packaged foods as analogues to animal products: market trends and nutritional quality analysis. BMC Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12916-026-05207-x

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1186/s12916-026-05207-x

Keywords: plant-based analogues, packaged foods, nutritional quality, Nutri-Score, EU market, market trends, dairy analogues, meat analogues, protein content, sustainable diets, food reformulation, BMC Medicine

The research, led by scientists analysing the composition and environmental profiles of thousands of packaged foods and drinks sold in the United Kingdom, took an approach that departs from the usual product-by-product view of food reformulation. Instead of asking whether a single sauce, biscuit or soft drink could be improved, the team modelled what would happen if manufacturers optimised their whole portfolios, shifting the overall mix of products they sell while adjusting recipes within them. This portfolio-level perspective captures trade-offs and synergies that isolated product studies inevitably miss, and it revealed that the combined opportunity is substantially greater than the sum of typical single-product estimates.

At the heart of the analysis is a simple but consequential observation: packaged foods and beverages made by large manufacturers account for a dominant share of what British households actually eat and drink. Small percentage changes in the salt, sugar, saturated fat and calorie content of these products, applied across hundreds of items and multiplied by enormous sales volumes, translate into large absolute reductions in nutrient intake at the population level. The same arithmetic applies to environmental pressures. Modest reductions in the greenhouse gas emissions, land use and water requirements embedded in high-volume products can compound into meaningful national sustainability gains.

Technically, the researchers combined nutritional composition data for individual products with environmental impact estimates linked to their ingredient lists, applying optimisation frameworks that search for feasible reformulation and product-mix scenarios within realistic commercial constraints. Rather than assuming manufacturers can radically redesign every item, the models respected the boundaries of familiar product categories and consumer expectations, identifying changes that keep foods recognisable and palatable while still lowering their health and environmental burdens. This constraint matters, because the most successful reformulation programmes in history, such as the steady reduction of salt in bread and processed foods, succeeded precisely because consumers barely noticed the changes.

The results indicate that large nutritional improvements are achievable without any change in purchasing behaviour whatsoever. If the products on the shelves become modestly lower in salt, sugar and saturated fat, and somewhat less calorie-dense, the average shopper’s diet improves automatically, simply by continuing to buy as before. This is a crucial policy insight. Public health campaigns that rely on individual behaviour change have historically produced small and uneven effects, while structural changes to the food supply reach everyone, including the households least engaged with nutrition labels and dietary advice.

Equally striking is the study’s finding that nutritional and environmental goals are not inherently in conflict. A long-standing tension in food policy debates assumes that making food healthier might require more resource-intensive ingredients, or that cutting emissions might compromise nutrition. The portfolio analysis suggests the opposite: well-designed strategies can advance both objectives at once, particularly when manufacturers rebalance their ranges toward plant-rich formulations, reduce reliance on the most emissions-intensive ingredients, and trim excess calories and salt simultaneously. Some products offer wins on one dimension and losses on another, and the optimisation approach explicitly accounts for these trade-offs, but across entire portfolios the opportunities for mutual reinforcement dominate.

The implications for corporate strategy are significant. Food manufacturers face mounting regulatory pressure, from salt and sugar reduction programmes to mandatory environmental disclosure rules and net-zero commitments. The study effectively provides those companies with a quantitative map of where the biggest returns lie, suggesting that prioritising high-volume, high-impact categories delivers far more benefit per unit of reformulation effort than scattered token changes across a range. It also implies that voluntary industry pledges, which critics have often dismissed as toothless, could become genuinely transformative if they were set and monitored at the level of whole portfolios rather than individual flagship products.

For policymakers, the research offers a framework for accountability that matches the structure of the modern food industry. Food standards agencies currently tend to set category-level targets, such as maximum salt content per hundred grams of soup or breakfast cereal. The new findings suggest that supplementing these with portfolio-level metrics, measuring the average nutritional and environmental profile of everything a company sells, would better capture the cumulative effect of reformulation and give regulators a clearer picture of progress over time. Such metrics could be woven into national strategies on obesity, cardiovascular disease and agricultural emissions, creating a common scoreboard for government and industry alike.

The study also carries a message about the pace of change. Reformulation is not instantaneous; recipes must be tested, supply chains adjusted, and consumer acceptance secured. But because the required changes are incremental rather than revolutionary, they can be implemented steadily across reporting cycles, and their effects compound year after year. The researchers’ modelling suggests that within a realistic implementation horizon, portfolio-wide programmes could deliver reductions in population salt, sugar and saturated fat exposure that dwarf what has been achieved through decades of piecemeal product launches marketed as healthier alternatives.

Ultimately, the study reframes the corporate product portfolio as one of the most powerful levers available for improving both human and planetary health. Agriculture, retail and consumer choice all matter, but the composition of packaged food, decided in the research kitchens and ingredient sourcing offices of a few dozen multinational manufacturers, shapes the diets of an entire nation. Harnessing that lever deliberately, the authors conclude, could deliver large nutritional and environmental improvements across the food system faster and more reliably than almost any other intervention currently on the policy table.

Subject of Research: Portfolio-wide nutritional and environmental optimisation of products by major UK food and beverage manufacturers

Article Title: Large nutritional and environmental improvements can be achieved across the product portfolios of major UK food and beverage manufacturers

Article References: Hammond, E., Bandy, L., Milner-Gulland, E. J., Pechey, R., Rayner, M., Scarborough, P., Jain, S., & Clark, M. (2026). Large nutritional and environmental improvements can be achieved across the product portfolios of major UK food and beverage manufacturers. Nature Food. https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-026-01420-2

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1038/s43016-026-01420-2

Keywords: food reformulation, UK food manufacturers, nutrition, environmental sustainability, greenhouse gas emissions, public health, food policy, salt reduction, sugar reduction, sustainable diets, product portfolios, Nature Food