Popularity of vegetarian food on the rise in Poland

The plant-based protein sources market increased by 28 percent last year, which is more than PLN 600 million (EUR 139.9 million), wrote a Polish daily newspaper devoted to business and economic issues on Tuesday.

Although the Polish diet is, traditionally, meat heavy, Puls Biznesu wrote that "the future is vegetarian."

Citing the results of its study, the daily said that in 2035 every tenth serving of protein will come from alternative plant sources, and 90 percent of the most popular dishes will have vegetarian counterparts.

According to experts at the bank BNP Paribas, the Polish plant-based protein sources market is very diverse, because it is still relatively young.

The same experts point out that there are two main factors contributing to the growing popularity of plant products: health and the environment.

In a study conducted by Mintel, 56 percent of the respondents indicated health as their motivation to increase the consumption of plant products, while more than 25 percent of Poles mentioned that they wanted to limit their meat consumption.

Moreover, 16 percent of those polled cited their consideration for the environment.

Also, 34 percent of Poles declared that they used plant-based substitutes, but only 6 percent did it regularly, reported the newspaper.

Magdalena Kowalewska, an analyst at BNP Paribas International Food & Agri Hub, said that although the market will double, this does not mean that plant products will replace meat.

"Replacements are mainly a curiosity for the consumer, an attraction, but they are not yet a permanent element of the standard shopping cart," she said.

She added that although the vegetarian industry was developing briskly, it was still relatively small.

The value of this sector in Poland "is about PLN 0.5 billion (EUR 109.9 billion), which corresponds to only 2 percent of the value of the poultry market, itself," she said.