The cheeseburgers of 2030 will not be the same as today, or at least that is the new strategy proposed by Brussels. This plan has recently been presented at the European Commission Farm to Fork and aims to change eating habits across the continent over the next decade to make the agri-food system more sustainable.
It includes a set of legislative proposals and goals that, at least on paper, would make European foods were healthier, more nutritious and plant-based; so the choices of consumers would be more conscious in their health and environment.
As its name suggests, the Commission's program will affect the entire food supply chain, from how food is grown and collected to the final meal on European plates. But what does it mean in practice?
How will it affect each of the components of the hamburger?
Bread
The hamburger bun is most likely fresh, not frozen, and comes from a local market, as Brussels aims to shorten food supply chains within the bloc and with trading partners. In 2019, the EU imported €1.000 billion worth of wheat from outside the bloc; in the future, the EU plans to be more self-sufficient and use more local ingredients for food production. It is also likely that the whole wheat bread, which the Commission considers to be the healthiest option.
Cheese
Brussels wants buyers a decade from now to be able to properly examine their cheese before buying it, assessing everything from nutritional values to its origin. The strategy calls for a front-line, mandatory, harmonized nutrition label, such as the French Nutri-Score system or the British traffic light system, which indicates how healthy or unhealthy a product is. also requires origin labels for dairy and meat. And he says products should have some sort of "green claim" if they are sustainably produced and sourced, such as an animal welfare label.
Carne
Be prepared that your burger may contain a veggie or insect-based burger, as the Commission wants you to Europeans adopt a more plant-based diet, with less red and processed meat. The proposed strategy includes the investigation of alternative proteins, such as vegetable, microbial, marine and insect proteins and meat substitutes. If you really want to follow a traditional beef-based recipe, the portion of meat you will eat should probably be smaller than it is today, as the strategy says that the current level of meat consumption among Europeans is too high, and therefore therefore unhealthy. A chicken burguer It could also be an option, since Brussels only mentions the reduction of red meat.
Vegetables
Many of them! Your future sandwich should be filled with fresh vegetables, as Brussels wants consumers to increase their consumption of fruits and vegetables. The vegetables will be harvested with half the amount and risk of pesticides or chemical fertilisers, and would ideally come from Europe's expanded parcels of organic farmland - Farm to Fork aims grow organic produce on a quarter of farmland of the EU by 2030, up from 75 percent today.
Ketchup and mayonnaise
These traditional burger seasonings are typically high in fat, sugar, and salt, so it'll be hard to find a place for them on the revamped burger. Possible alternatives include the beet protein ketchup or sweet paprika, which claims to be "healthier," "organic," and "low sugar." But these kinds of heat claims will also be subject to further scrutiny in future in Brussels' plans to restrict such terms to products that aren't actually too high, sugar and salt.
What will happen to the price?
Not too high and not too low. The Commission wants things to go well. On the one hand, Brussels wants to make healthy and sustainable food choices more affordable and accessible to all. For example, the strategy suggests that EU countries could use reduced VAT rates to support organic fruits and vegetables. At the same time, the plan aims to ensure that food price campaigns and promotions do not "undermine" citizens' perception of the value of food.