Macauba Ingredients: New technique developed for Brazilian macauba fruit oil extraction
12 Feb 2024 | Macauba Ingredients
We speak with Dr. Peter Eisner, CEO of Macauba Ingredients, who points to the issues with soy and palm production and the need for alternatives. He also shines light on the company's novel method to extract oil, protein and fiber from the whole macauba fruit, with applications including methionine-rich proteins for plant-based foods.
Hi, this is Inha Noreen from Food Ingredients First.
I'm joined today by Dr.
Peter Eisner, CEO of Macauba Ingredients, which uses macauba fruits to produce good tasting oil and high quality proteins and fiber preparation.
He's here to shed light on the use of macawba fruit and its potential applications in the food industry.
Welcome, Dr.
Peter.
It's a pleasure to have you with us.
Thank you very much for inviting me in China.
Yeah.
So, why don't you start by telling us a bit about the macauba fruit and why you focused on this particular fruit and its benefits.
Yeah, I think it's important to understand that maybe you know, the, the oil production, the plant oil production globally is increasing over the last years, really dramatically.
So around about 6 million tons per year, we have an additional production of plant oil.
And most of you know that a lot of oil is produced from soy and from palm, and for palm and soy production, the rainforest is deforested.
And for this reason, we were looking for alternatives and there have been some studies in, in Brazil already, what kind of alternative solutions there could be.
And then we learned, we have a subsidiary in, in, from our Fraunhofer Institute in Brazil.
We learned that there is a new poem, this is not a new poem, but there is a new poem in discussion, what is Macau about?
Makauba is a palm tree that is growing even in dry regions with low water, and low rain, so there is no need to put this in the rainforest region where we have normally a lot of rainfall.
It can be produced in very Poor regions with, with poor soil and it can be produced also very interestingly, it can be produced on pasture land.
So you have normally the pastures in Brazil, even in dry regions, Cerrado as an example in Mato Grosso Mina Gais.
Where we have animals degrading the soil and Macauba is able with the roots to, to make the soil a little bit more fluffy and to have it more humid, so to create a humid environment for, for different kinds of organisms, for microorganisms, of course, but also For, for animals as an example, so the biodiversity is increasing.
We have no erosion, a higher biodiversity, and a more fruitful land.
And in the end, the animals are happy because they can stand in shadow instead of being in the pure light and the pure sunlight.
So it's a win, win, win situation.
We do not have to deforest the forest.
We do not have to, we can increase the quality of the soil, we can increase the biodiversity, and And by the way, we can produce 2.5 tons of oil per hectare, and I think this is a very nice approach.
And if you know that Brazil has 150 million hectares of pasture land, it's a huge amount of oil we can produce there.
Yeah, wonderful.
So, can you tell us about the technology and the technique that was used to extract the oil?
I think there is a lot of companies already in the market existing and they are planning to extract the oil by pressing or maybe extraction with hexane and so on.
The problem is in the end, they will get a press cake or something, some residue from the, from the oil production, but this kind of residue can really be, can be used very in a high valuable range because you can produce proteins and fibers for the food industry based on this.
And we found out in our research that we, if we are using an ethanol extraction process, the quality and the color of the proteins is much brighter and the, and the flavor is much more neutral.
So in the end, you can see here a little bit, this is the powder we produced from the kernel.
Normally, under the conventional technology, this, this powder would be black or gray, and what we get out here is a very bright powder with a nice functionality that can be used as an example for meat substitutes, dairy substitutes.
So everything where we need nowadays, plant proteins for plant-based, foods, we can do this also with macapa.
And maybe as an additional information, we have a very high content of methionine here in the protein.
So a combination with soy and pea is very valuable because soy and pea have much less methionine compared to, as an example, animal proteins.
And if we combine both soy and macauba, then we have a much higher nutritional value.
Yeah, OK.
And, to produce this oil, what kind of research did you conduct and, how long did it take for you to come up with the product and convert it from oil to this powdered form that you just showed us?
So we started in 2017 with projects in, in Campinas, where we are located, our subsidiary is located.
And since this time, it's now 8 years from there, we, we learned a lot of things about this plant.
We, we saw there is different raw materials, different contents of oil, different contents of fiber and protein.
And over these years, we learned how to process the oil, how to get out the, the, the oil from the pulp, from the, from the outer pulp, and from the inner kernel, we can get out the fat, what is very similar to palm kernel fat.
And then we, we are looking for the residues for the proteins and for the fibers.
So this took, of course, a long time and we realized that there is a high, high potential in both in the oil and fat on the one side and also in the protein and on the fiber on the other side.
OK.
And in the food industry, it has been seen over a while now that there is discussion about the harmful effects of, palm oil cultivation and the deforestation associated with it.
So how do you think this particular product could help acknowledge that issue?
I think this is the strength of Macauba compared to other oil seeds like soy and palm, because we can produce it in regions where we don't have any agriculture besides pasture, besides production of cattle in the moment.
So what we can do, we do additional value added, so we are not in competition with anything, not in competition with the rainforest, not in competition with soy or other crops.
What we are doing is just an additional.
Production of, of palm trees, more or less to protect the animals, to give them shadow, and to make the soil a little bit better.
And as a byproduct of all this, we can produce oil and proteins, and for this reason, I think macauba is really the most sustainable raw material you can imagine because It is planted not for producing oil, but the production of oil is a byproduct from the protection of animals and for the increase of soil.
And I think this is the most interesting oil seed, and for this reason, I decided to leave Fraunhofer and to found the company and to go inside and to push this topic in the future.
OK, that sounds good.
So since Macawba Ingredients is a newly established company, what future plans do you have?
So we are established in just a few months.
So we are looking now for partners, partners in industry for application, but also partners that would like to be investors in this business.
And you know, the value chain is very big.
There are some players already producing macauba, so the, the first fruits will be available in some years.
But of course, we have also the option to plant, cultivate macaba, but we also can do the, the processing, and this is our intention of our Company, we are planning to invest in a company that is producing Macauba proteins and fibers and oil and fat in Brazil, inside Brazil, where the Macauba is, is growing.
And for this, of course, I would be very happy to find partners, in the investors, but also industry partners for application as an example, or just as to have a good partnership with, with, , people that can help us in our business.
So, Everybody who sees this video is cordially invited to join our company if this is possible.
Yeah, that sounds wonderful, and I wish you all the best from, our team at CS Media and Food Ingredients first.
Thank you for taking time out for us.
