Shinsegae Food CEO Alex Song poses with the company’s new plant-based canned ham product, Better Meat Plant-Based Luncheon, launched on July 28, 2022. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, Dec. 13 (Korea Bizwire) — Nearly two-thirds of South Koreans in their 20s and 30s have positive views about alternative meat, a survey showed Monday.
Shinsegae Food Inc., a food business arm of South Korea’s Shinsegae Group conducted a survey of 1,000 people in their 20s and 30s, 67.6 percent of whom thought positively of alternative meat.
Most of them picked the environment (71.4 percent) as the reason for consuming alternative meat, followed by “animal welfare” (53 percent), “healthy diet” (43.5 percent) and “preparing for a food crisis” (36.5 percent).
Shinsegae Food said that South Korea’s vegetarian population jumped from 150,000 in 2008 to 2.5 million last year, indicating the market’s growth potential.
The number of certified vegan foods in South Korea grew from 13 in 2018 to 199 in 2020 and 286 last year.
Shinsegae Food said that today’s factory-based meat manufacturing system won’t be enough to meet the rising consumption of meat and that it would exacerbate greenhouse gas emissions, raising the prospect for alternative meat.
Ashley Song (ashley@koreabizwire.com)
