Francisco Marin

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Fu-Hung Hsieh: a scientist
worthy of winning MT Prize
Growing up in a small town in Taiwan, it was very
dicult for Missouri University Professor Fu-Hung
Hsieh to get an educaton and pursue his dream of
becoming a successful scientst. His great eort
paid o and he has made a solid contributon in
Food Technology by creatng a meat-free
alternatve to chicken. He calls it Soy chicken.
His colleagues have acquiesced to try it and found
themselves surprised at how litle it diers from
chicken. Doctor Ingolf Gruen (2013) states in an
interview: People dont believe me when I tell
them they wont be able to tell the dierence.
Soy chicken only has two ingredients: a dry powder
of soy protein and wheat our, and water. Both
ingredients are cooked at 175C in an extrusion
cooking machine. In not more than a minute, the
machine expels hot soy chicken strips.

On the other hand, the process that leads to
obtaining chicken meat, is longer, more expensive,
more complex and involves slaughtering massive
amounts of them. Statstcs published by People
for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) state
that in the United States, more than 7 billion
chickens are killed for their esh each year, and 452
million hens are used for their eggs.
In terms of nutritonal content, soy chicken is also
healthier than regular chicken. Its cholesterol-free
and contains more proteins. Being more nourishing
than chicken, and consistng of plant proteins, soy
chicken is edible for anyone, whether they eat meat
or not.
When compared to a similar technology called
in-vitro beef, which emulates cow meat and is
manufactured in labs, the fake chicken once again
shows how good of an inventon it is. The simplicity
of its manufacturing process and its benets
compared to chicken are truly amazing.
In conclusion, Professor Hsiehs innovatve product
certainly proves a cheaper, simpler, healthier and
more universal alternatve to chicken which will be
an irreplaceable technology in the food market for
several years and less harmful to the environment.
Of course, for this inventon to truly shine, it needs
to reach a larger scale and be sold worldwide. For
this to happen, proper acknowledgement is due.
And what beter way to provide it than by awarding
a honorable prize to the man responsible for it.
That is why Professor Fu-Hung Hsieh, PhD, CFS,
should be the winner of Millennium Technology
Prize 2014.
Francisco Marin
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Jha, A. (2013, August 5 ). Synthetc meat: how the world's costliest burger made it on to the plate. The
Guardian, [ONLINE] Available at: htp://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/aug/05/synthetc-meat-
burger-stem-cells [Last Accessed February 27, 2014].

Tatum, M. (January 30, 2014). What is Extrusion Cooking?. [ONLINE] Available at:
htp://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-extrusion-cooking.htm [Last Accessed March 1, 2014].

Cloud, J. (2010, June 14). Tastes Like Chicken: The Quest for Fake Meat. TIME Magazine. [ONLINE] Available
at: htp://content.tme.com/tme/magazine/artcle/0,9171,1993883-1,00.html. [Last Accessed February
25, 2014]

IFTlive (June 14, 2013). Day in the Life of Food Scientst Fu-hung Hsieh [Video le]. [ONLINE] Available at:
htp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_0_pZE1VoE [Last Accessed March 1, 2014]

PETA. (n.d.). Chickens Used for Food. [ONLINE] Available at: htp://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-
for-food/factory-farming/chickens/ [Last Accessed February 26, 2014]
References
Food packaging solutions:
Present and future
Food waste, food loss. Two similar problems. Both
avoidable to a certainly bigger extent than it is
avoided nowadays. An estmated of one third of all
food produced worldwide is lost at some point of
the food chain. In order to eciently solve this
issue, it is necessary to tackle food loss and wastage
from their main causes. According to a survey
conducted by UNEP, about two thirds of all food
lost or wasted in developing countries occur in
early stages of the value chain, such as transport
and storage, whereas in developed countries like
Canada, USA, UK or Australia, more than half of
food loss occurs at later stages, such as in retail or
consumer level. And a big culprit is food packaging,
which needs alternatves to reduce waste and
become more ecient.
Losses at a consumer level are the most common in
developed countries. An eectve soluton to those
losses would be to sell poultry or sh in portoned
packaging. That way, people can open one part of
the bag and leaving the other parts sealed untl the
food inside is eaten, thus extending shelf-life.
Resealable packaging on the other hand, is a well
known soluton for losses caused by consumers
worldwide, although it has not fully setled yet.
Brian Pelleter (2005) says packagers can also
achieve a low-oxygen atmosphere through vacuum
packaging. []Vacuum packaging has many
advantages like eliminatng freezer burn and
allowing a shelf-life three to ve tmes longer than
conventonal packaging methods. []
Losses at retail level are very common worldwide.
One of the causes of this problem are low quality
packaging lms. Instead of using these, using
hermetc-sealing and biodegradable lms can avoid
potental harm to the environment and food
wastage. Back-of-store meat preparaton is
unhygienic and should be replaced with case-ready
meat packaging (packing meat in a factory, under
beter conditons). All these solutons could
eliminate nearly 2/3 of all food wasted in rich
countries.

As mentoned earlier, developing countries tend to
suer food losses mainly during food transport and
storage. Most produce, poultry and meat that
leaves the farms and crops, must be transported to
a place where they can be stored and processed.
Any vehicle, especially trucks, carrying food serves
as food packaging, for they must protect the food
from contaminatng. To keep it safe from bacteria
or drying out, all it takes is to make sure to use
vehicles specically for food transport, thoroughly
cleaning containers and covering them with a
cushioned surface to protect food from undesired
blows and high temperatures. All of these actons
should be done according to the amount of tme
food spends on transport.
In additon, food containers and crates are not
made of environmental-friendly materials, so the
best way to avoid this is to re-use these as long as
possible. By re-using them, one might think it is
dangerous for the food inside them. However this is
not in any way a risk, as long as they are carefully
cleaned before being reused.
Undoubtedly, there are negatve consequences to
food waste on an ethical level. Tristram Stuart
(2009) assures: There are nearly one billion
malnourished people in the world, but the
approximately 40 million tonnes of food wasted by
US households, retailers and food services each
year would be enough to satsfy the hunger of
every one of them. The lack of atenton people
pay to this issue is rather alarming. Although this
has certainly been the same for a long tme, it is
never too late to do something about it. People
from US should start to think more about others,
especially those who live in poverty.
Francisco Marin
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Francisco Marin
In spite of having a handful of ways to make food
packaging more ecient to cut down on food loss
and wastage, it is imperatve to think long term in
order to reduce the impact of these issues even
further.
The key to highly ecient food packaging lies
beyond the ordinary materials we normally use,
instead it lies on two simple, yet complex
technologies: nanotechnology and smart materials.
Food packaging must and should be based on both
technologies in the future.

Some innovatons made in the nanotechnology
eld recently, prove the immense benets it has
compared to what is used nowadays. For instance:
MIT engineers and nanotechnologists have
developed a special coatng which allows all traces
of food out of jars and botles. Food packaging is
the one sector of the industry where
nanotechnology applicatons are beginning to live
up to their promise.(2008).
Smart materials should also be an alternatve to
present days packaging materials. The use of
termochromic materials is denitely an eectve
soluton to uneectve packaging. They change
colour according to temperature so they can be
used as food packaging materials that show you
when the product they contain is cooked to the
right temperature.
Of course, these last two technologies mentoned
are denitely the type of food packaging we want
some years from now. The development of green
nanotechnology for instance, is constantly making
such state-of-the-art innovatons something
tangible, sustainable and even less harmful for the
environment.
Granqvist, Smith (2011) state:
All in all, it will certainly take some more years for
food packaging technologies to become less
specic and more universal solutons instead. In the
mean tme, reducing food loss and wastage
contnues to be bound to specic types of
packaging to solve the issue accordingly. Focusing
on this task will not only reduce loss and wastage,
but make way for new packaging technologies to
evolve faster and faster to nally get rid of
unnecessary lefovers and waste, for good.
processing, transport, biomedical technology,
and manufacturing of constructon materials.
In these areas also, there is much scope for
improvement through the applicaton of
nanoscience and nanotechnology. ( pag. 22)
Many human actvites that we have not
covered have large energy-related and
environmental footprints. These include
chemical and materials processing, water
provision and quality, food producton and
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Retrieved from: htp://aguzadera.wordpress.com/2011/
11/06/2013-ano-europeo-contra-el-despilfarro.[Last
Accessed 28 February 2014]
Francisco Marin
Granqvist, C. G., Smith, G. (2011) Green Nanotechnology. Solutons for Sustainability and Energy in the
Built Environment. CRC Press. Taylor and Francis Group
Stuart, T. (2009) Waste. Uncovering the Global Food Scandal. Penguin Books.
EUROPEN The European Organizaton for Packaging and the Environment. (2013) Packaging supply chains
good practces to prevent food waste.
Denis, I. One third of all food wasted!. [ONLINE] Available at: htp://www.unric.org/en/food-waste/
27133-one-third-of-all-food-wasted. [Last Accessed 26 February 2014].
Dixon, R. Which Packaging Materials Are Biodegradable?. [ONLINE] Available at:
htp://www.ehow.com/about_5387922_packaging-materials-biodegradable.html. [Last Accessed 25
February 2014].
EFE (2013). Informe de la ONU insta a luchar contra la prdida de alimentos. [ONLINE] Available at:
htp://www.latercera.com/notcia/tendencias/2013/06/659-526864-9-informe-de-la-onu-insta-a-luchar-
contra-la-perdida-de-alimentos.shtml. [Last Accessed 26 February 2014].
Murray, M. Preventng Food Waste in Developing Countries. [ONLINE] Available at:
htp://logistcs.about.com/od/industryfocus/a/Preventng-Food-Waste-In-Developing-Countries.htm.
[Last Accessed 25 February 2014].
Souter, W (2012). Nanotechnology in Food Packaging. [ONLINE] Available at:
htp://www.azonano.com/artcle.aspx?ArtcleID=3035. [Last Accessed 20 February 2014].
Willingham, J. M. Processing, Packaging, and Transportng Fresh Foods Safely. [ONLINE] Available at:
htp://ncfreshproducesafety.ncsu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Processing-Packaging-and-Transpo
rtng-Fresh-Foods-Safely-KSU.pdf. [Last Accessed 22 February 2014].
Smart Materials. [ONLINE] Available at: htp://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/design/electronics/
materialsrev5.shtml. [Last Accessed 24 February 2014].
References
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