Food Sector Examined From Every Angle

Leading figures from the food and pharmaceutical sectors gathered on a panel to discuss "Life Sciences Ingredients". The panel addressed recent global and domestic developments, innovations, and current agenda topics in the food and pharmaceutical sectors. The speakers reached consensus, particularly emphasizing the necessity of sustainability and the importance of making investments in line with global nutritional trends.

Speaking at the panel, Aromsa General Manager Murat Yasa addressed the insufficiency of the education system, while GIDABİL Vice President and Turkish Food and Beverage Industry Associations Federation Acting President Rint Akyüz emphasized that food security was the most critical issue.

GTBD Board Chairman Samet Serttaş, noting that nutritional habits are changing globally, stressed that investments in Turkey should be made by tracking nutrition trends. BASF Pharmaceutical Solutions Turkey, Middle East, Russia and Africa Sales Director Tanju Cepheli stated that the pharmaceutical market in Turkey is developing and that Turkey is a highly significant market for BASF within its European organization. Aromsa General Manager Murat Yasa, noting that multinational companies from abroad prefer to import high-value-added products such as food additives and flavors from overseas, said: "There is potential in this regard in Turkey, but we cannot convert it into action." Particularly addressing the education issue, Yasa emphasized the need to educate farmers. Highlighting the importance of sustainability for Aromsa, Yasa noted that the company has reduced its carbon footprint, works to avoid environmental pollution, and that employees are very diligent on this matter. GIDABİL Vice President and Turkish Food and Beverage Industry Associations Federation Acting President Rint Akyüz, stating that food security is the most critical issue in the food sector, said: "The world population will be 9-10 billion in 2050. For development, agriculture and industry must be integrated with each other. If you cannot integrate agriculture into production, you cannot succeed. Turkey, by its geographical position, is capable of serving its own region. If you make this sustainable, it means we have great opportunities." Rint Akyüz, noting that unregistered production is one of the biggest threats in Turkey's food sector, said: "The most important and greatest obstacle to ensuring food safety is what we call informal production. It is impossible to know exactly how much, but we estimate it to be roughly half. Rint Akyüz also pointed out that pesticide and aflatoxin are significant problems in Turkey and emphasized the need to address them.

GTBD Board Chairman Samet Serttaş: "

Plant-based nutrition is now at the forefront for healthy living. A 20-25 percent increase is being seen in vegetarian nutrition rates. Turkey can make progress in this field; we can produce concentrated products using plants. Besides vegetarian nutrition, another popular trend is gut health. We are familiar with kefir and yogurt. However, serious investments are needed in this regard. We must make investments by tracking trends," he said. BASF Pharmaceutical Solutions Turkey, Middle East, Russia and Africa Sales Director Tanju Cepheli, emphasizing that as BASF the pharmaceutical market in Turkey is developing and that Turkey is a very important market for them within its European organization, said: "The Turkish pharmaceutical market ranks 16th in the world. We want to increase our cooperation with domestic and foreign companies in relation to the market, support R&D activities, share and develop the innovative solutions and products that BASF produces for the pharmaceutical sector with our business partners. Turkey is a generic pharmaceutical market, which brings many opportunities. Particularly, the R&D processes of domestic pharmaceutical companies are very important because every pharmaceutical product develops through research and development. Drug development is a long process, taking approximately 2 to 5 years. We work closely with our customers' R&D departments. We provide support by using our laboratories abroad. We continuously follow our customers' projects in cooperation with them and work together to add value to their projects. We have cooperation with international companies as BASF. These collaborations continue in their own R&D centers and in our technology transfer laboratories in Turkey," he said.