The company Nutriset has made a peanut-based paste which could end global hunger. Nutriset’s non-profit partner, Edesia, produces the paste which goes by the name of Plumpy’nut. Plumpy’nut is a package that contains 500 calories and needs no preparation or refrigeration. There is a concern about food scarcity and inflation, prompting UNICEF to increase its Plumply’nut purchases. Click below to read more.
The main product Edesia churns out is called Plumpy’nut, a peanut-based paste created by Nutriset. Each Plumpy’nut package contains 500 calories and needs no preparation or refrigeration. Nutriset is a for profit company based in France, and sales of Plumpy’nut from the parent company and non-profit partners like Edesia topped $100 million last year.
At a time when the United Nations is so concerned about food scarcity and inflation (learn more) that it has asked the United States to suspend its ethanol mandate, UNICEF is planning to increase its Plumpy’nut purchases from 27,000 metric tonnes in 2011 to 28,000 MT this year and 32,000 MT in 2013. (Read More: Potential Grows for Food Crisis as Prices Surge.)
“There’s a steady increase in demand,” said Salem. Her Rhode Island plant manufactured 3,700 MT of Plumpy’nut last year, but it has the capacity to ramp up another 60 percent. The only thing stopping it is a lack of funding. “There is a big difference in need and funded need,” she added.
Donations to UNICEF and other agencies, which buy Plumpy’nut, dropped off in the recession in 2009, but Salem noted they have since recovered. Another challenge has been peanut prices, which rose considerably in the U.S. last year, forcing Edesia to look for other peanut sources. “We’ve been able to keep our end price stable,” she added.
A $50 supply of Plumpy’nut will rehabilitate a severely malnourished child in six weeks. As for peanut allergies, Salem noted that is something you only see in the developed world, not in places like rural Africa.
Still, it can be difficult to get a young child to eat, even if he’s on the brink of death. “Their bodies have trained themselves to shut down and not eat food,” she said. Taste matters. “Plumpy’nut tastes like the inside of a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup … the kids really like it.”
Some countries are making their own paste from local foods. Navyn Salem pointed out that Pakistan, for example, doesn’t have a lot of peanuts, so a paste is being made from chickpeas.
