Martin Penders - General Manager at Jonker Petfood

“The world population is growing: we will have more and more mouths to feed in the future. A large part of the world’s protein production will have to be used for human consumption. Financially speaking, the western world could feed their pets food meant for humans – socially, however, we have to consider whether this is appropriate. We need to find new ways to give our pets what they need.

Vision

“Insects have a great food conversion – better than any other animal. While we have come a long way regarding the human consumption of insects, it is still not a widely accepted protein source. Pet are a different story. In recent years, Protix has worked hard to get legislation where it needs to be: they have all the necessary certifications to create ingredients for our pet foods, both on a national and on a European level. They are unique in this – foreign suppliers generally do not adhere to the standards set by the EU.

“In 2014 we showed our samples at the Interzoo Trade Fair: little pots of pet foods made from insect ingredients. Even those samples got us a lot of attentions: it goes to show that innovation is picked up quickly.”

“In 2014 we became one of Protix’ first regular customer. Two years earlier, cofounder Tarique Arsiwalla had called us to see if we were interested in their ingredients. I warned him that we would need large volumes of product – I believe I mentioned one thousand tons. Not weighed down by any awareness of the processes involved, Tarique wholeheartedly said “no problem”. Later, it turned out Protix was still a startup – but a startup with the right vision towards the future! That’s how we started on this fun and new path, not for commercial reasons, but for the sake of innovation. There was some risk involved in becoming a regular customer, but we were confident it was going to be a success.

Keep innovating

“That same year we showed our samples at the Interzoo Trade Fair: little pots of pet foods made from insect ingredients. Even those samples got us a lot of attentions: it goes to show that innovation is picked up quickly. That’s why we encourage Protix to keep innovating: to stay ahead of the competition, make good use of their knowledge and to continue to make fun, innovative products. Jonker Petfoods will be first in line to help develop and test them!