Consumer Foods To Go

Regenerative agriculture is a holistic approach to improving farming practices. Many downstream food companies are talking about encouraging regenerative agriculture practices at the farm level. They do this for various reasons: to achieve emissions reduction goals, to provide better food in general, and to stay within planetary boundaries. In this podcast, Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott interview Rabobank experts Elizabeth Lunik and Cindy van Rijswick on this topic. Listen to their discussion about definitions, targets, what regenerative agriculture is, and what it is not.    

Launched in 2017, Nutri-Score is a front-of-pack label to indicate a food product’s nutritional value. Quite a few food retailers and food companies have embraced Nutri-Score, but how consumers are responding to scores has remained unknown. In this podcast, Consumer Foods-to-Go interviews Elke Godden, a researcher who has explored this topic at the University of Antwerp. The key takeaway: Consumers are not all the same, and they interpret scores differently. Other attributes matter as well, like brand, price, and nutritional claims, among others.

Rabobank's Consumer Foods research team visited Natural Products Expo West in Anaheim, one of the largest food shows in the world. It's always fantastic to walk the floor and see new trends and products with your own eyes, and this year was no different! In this episode, the team shares their insights from the event together with hosts Cyrille Filott and Maria Castroviejo.

2022 may not have been the year the foodservice industry hoped for, but the post-Covid recovery was still quite strong. 2023 will be a year of continued uncertainty. Commodity prices are declining, but are still higher than in 2021. Consumers were fairly resilient in 2022, but it is unclear how they will behave in 2023 as economies may struggle to show any growth. In this episode of Consumer Foods-to-Go  Maria Castroviejo and Tom Bailey share their views on what might happen in 2023 in foodservice in Europe and the US.

Deflation of input costs is happening across the food sector, but the cost of labor is actually going to increase... by a lot. There are two main drivers behind this increase: 1) a catch-up effect related to high inflation in 2022 and 2) low unemployment. Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott quiz Rabobank economist Elwin de Groot on what may happen in the labor market in 2023 and in the long term. They also discuss the implications of the tight labor market for downstream food companies.

It is the time of the year to look back at 2022 and look toward 2023. Maria and Cyrille gathered the entire team of Consumer Foods analysts at RaboResearch to discuss the learnings from the year for the sector. And what a year it was! They also talk about next year. What should be on the corporate agenda? What will happen to sustainability? Anything new emerging? Find out in this episode of Consumer Foods to Go!

In terms of prices and price volatility, 2022 was an incredible year for agri commodities. The conflict in Ukraine, adverse weather conditions, and currencies impacted prices a lot. What will happen in 2023? Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott quiz Head of Agri Commodity Markets Research Carlos Mera on what's in store for 2023. They talk about the main drivers for agri commodity pricing and go one level deeper by singling out the commodities that may see interesting price actions.

Resilience is the buzzword in the food sector. Companies are very focused, in the short term, on preserving margins by shifting resources around and by being very aware of input costs and pricing toward customers. Many of the challenges that are impacting performance in the short run will also be important factors in planning for the long run. Companies should continue to look for resiliency. So, what is on the menu of options for food companies?

Michael Every joined the Consumer Foods-to-Go podcast a couple of times before to discuss inflation and the impact of the war in Ukraine on the food sector. Due to popular demand, Cyrille Filott and Maria Castroviejo invited Michael back. During the podcast, Michael shares his (gloomy) outlook for the geopolitical landscape and how any shifts might impact economic thinking and the food sector.

Prices for transportation – across land and sea alike – skyrocketed in the last couple of years due to a boom in demand during the pandemic and, more recently, disruptions from the war in Ukraine. It's time to assess what might happen next. In this podcast, Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott quiz analysts Xinnan Li and Viet Nguyen about what's happening with the supply and, perhaps even more importantly, the demand for goods and transportation. They also discuss current and future sustainability measures and regulations and how these might impact pricing.

Manufacturers from around the globe gathered in Amsterdam at the end of May to showcase their products at the Private Label Manufacturers Association trade show. Sebastiaan Schreijen and Cyrille Filott were on the scene asking food & beverage producers about the hot topic of the moment: the supply chain. Sebastiaan and Cyrille asked five exhibitors five questions about their supply chain challenges, including risks, strategy, and sustainability. The answers they received were definitely unexpected.

Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott discuss how higher food prices impact the consumer right now and in the remainder of the year. They discuss what usually happens when disposable incomes shrink, and how this time, at least up to now, is different.

During the pandemic, the branded chains were the ones taking share in foodservice. Most of these chains work with franchisees. These franchisees have become very professional over the years, and they generate quite a bit of cash. So what is in store for franchising now that Covid seems to be largely behind us? Cyrille Filott discusses this question with Maria Castroviejo from Europe and Tom Bailey from the US, and they come to a surprising conclusion!

Expo West is one of the largest food trade shows in the world, and after a two-year hiatus, it was back on the calendar in early March. The food industry went in droves to Anaheim, where the show is held. RaboResearch F&A was present as well, with three analysts in attendance: JP Frossard, Nick Fereday, and Tom Bailey. In this episode of Consumer Foods-to-Go, Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott quiz them on what was hip and happening, what was missing, and other key findings from the trade show.

The Ukraine conflict is, and will remain, headline news. The Consumer Foods-to-Go podcast has two goals: to bring the audience something new or to discuss something top of mind. To state the obvious – the war is top of mind for everyone, even for those in the food sector. As Rabobank is keen to provide perspectives, Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott invited Michael Every, macro strategist for Rabobank, to the podcast to discuss what might happen in the future, with a decoupled world as a likely scenario. Furthermore, Maria and Cyrille discuss the impact on the food sector.

Before the pandemic there was a lot of talk about startups and how they were disrupting the food & agribusiness sector. Since then, the focus in the sector has been on the impact of Covid-19 and, more recently, inflation. Startups may have fallen below the headlines, but they are still very relevant. Startups still are developing and investing in disruptive products and solutions that will support important F&A transitions. Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott caught up with the FoodBytes! team (Anne Greven and Sonia Shekar) to discuss what has happened with startups over the last few years. They also discuss the areas where startups are looking to the shake up the food & agribusiness sector even further. FoodBytes! by Rabobank is a startup discovery platform that champions cross-industry collaboration between the most promising F&A startups, corporates, and investors.

The foodservice sector has gone through some massive changes in the last few years. Obviously, Covid hit the sector hard. But also new ways of working, the use of technology, and much higher costs are impacting the sector. So what do we expect for 2022? Consumer Foods-to-Go host Cyrille Filott interviews co-host and Senior Consumer Foods Analyst Maria Castroviejo on these topics and much more.

It is always interesting to look at what is front of mind for investors in the food sector, in this case listed equities. Investors are important stakeholders for some food companies, and they might influence a company's strategic direction, if only by putting a valuation on it. Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott interviewed Christian Graven, Food & Agriculture Specialist at Kepler Cheuvreux (an independent European financial services company and a Rabobank partner) on what he believes the key themes for food investors are in 2022.

2021 has been the year of inflation. Almost all line items of food companies' cost of goods sold increased substantially. The ingredients (the agri commodities) are a key component. As it is the time of the year to look forward, Maria Castroviejo and Cyrille Filott invited Carlos Mera, Head of Agri Commodity Market Research, to discuss the outlook for the main commodities and the main drivers for price change going forward.

Labor shortages are all over the news right now. Many shelves are empty because, in many parts of the food & agribusiness supply chain, workers are missing. The same shortages are seen in foodservice. In this episode of Consumer Foods-to-Go, Maria and Cyrille discuss the labor challenges with Rabobank economist Elwin de Groot. Topics discussed include: sectoral shifts, government support schemes, and migration. All this should lead to an answer to the question: Are these shortages temporary or structural?