Faces of the Future Food Fellowship

The Future Food Fellowship is a postdoctoral research program for exceptionally qualified young researchers who propose projects targeting future food issues, such as nutrition, production, packaging and health.

The fellowship program at ETH Zurich and EPFL is designed to attract talented individuals from Switzerland and abroad to conduct innovative and industry-relevant research and innovation in Switzerland and combine scientific excellence with industrial relevance.

The call for fellowship applications is now open. Further info about the fellowship: external page https://www.futurefoodinitiative.ch

The program currently has eight fellows working on diverse topics. In order to connect, exchange, and explore possibilities for collaboration, visits with industry partners Bühler Group, Givaudan, and Nestlé took place in October 2020. The exchange occurred both onsite and online, allowing fellows to obtain insights into the different activities of the companies and providing the chance to share their research projects.

The visits started in with Nestlé, where Head of Academic Alliances Christoph Hartmann began the online meetings with an exciting overview of the Nestlé Research Center in Vers-chez-les-Blanc. The fellows then had the opportunity to meet CTO Stefan Palzer. In one-to-one meetings with experts, the fellows had time to dive into the details of their projects and connect with potential future collaborators.

Crossing Switzerland, the visits led to Uzwil, where Bühler Group is located. The fellows were warmly welcomed in the CUBIC Innovation Campus. The Food Science Officer Beatrice Conde-Petit started the visit by providing fascinating insights into the multifaceted activity areas of Bühler and talking about food system challenges and how industry and science must collaborate. Before connecting to an online audience to talk about the research projects of the Future Food Initiative, the fellows received an exciting tour thorough the Bühler application labs and met the CEO Stefan Scheiber and the CTO Ian Roberts.

The last stop of the industry visits was a virtual one of the Givaudan Innovation Center in Kemptthal. Head of Science and Technology Fabio Campanile and the Research Director Matthias Schultz presented the company Givaudan and the Innovation Center. After presenting their projects, the fellows joined seminars where they exchanged ideas with experts from Givaudan and heard about current challenges from an industry perspective. Sixty persons from the U.S. and Europe joined these sessions.

A big thank you to Bühler, Givaudan and Nestlé for organizing three such inspiring days. The WFSC is looking forward to seeing more collaborations starting.