When plant-based meat replaces Knorr soup… The young French company Umiami announced on Thursday that it had chosen the former Knorr site in Duppigheim (Bas-Rhin), closed in 2021, to set up its meat substitute production plant, which will should create 65 jobs in 2023.

It will thus be "the first factory in the world capable of producing any type of meat and fish fillet on a large scale using only plants", said in a press release Umiami, which has patented its technology to imitate the taste and texture of meat with vegetable proteins.

The plant-based meat and fish substitutes produced will be intended for the food industry and restaurant chains in the European and American markets.

Key jobs

Umiami will thus be able to take advantage of the 14,000 m2 building from the second half of 2023. Based in Essonne, the company, which tested its project with a pilot production unit for a year, is initially aiming for a production of 7,500 tonnes per year. and per production line.

"Eventually", a production reaching up to 22,000 tonnes and the creation of 200 skilled jobs are targeted.

The amount of the total investment on the site of Duppigheim, a village located on the edge of the metropolis of Strasbourg, has not been communicated.

To launch industrially in Alsace, Umiami should benefit from aid of 7.4 million euros from the State, within the framework of a call for projects "Première Usine", and 3 million from the Grand- East.

The Unilever group announced in March 2021 the closure of its Knorr soup factory, which still employed more than 250 employees, citing underutilization of production capacity.

"The arrival of a company carrying a strong project on the Duppigheim site is the fruit of the work carried out hand in hand with the Grand-Est Region", underlined, in a written communication, the management of Unilever France,

Economy

Bas-Rhin: Unions and Unilever agree on a PES to close the Knorr factory

Strasbourg

Alsace: The Knorr factory in Duppigheim will close, 261 employees threatened

  • Economy

  • Meat

  • Feed

  • Agrifood

  • Use

  • Region

  • Ecology

  • Great East

  • Strasbourg