Source: Jokr

Every week we track the business, tech and investment trends in CPG, retail, restaurants, agriculture, cooking and health, so you don’t have to. Here are some of this week’s top headlines.

Alpha Food Labs, our sister company, was commissioned by Beef + Lamb New Zealand and New Zealand Winegrowers to understand the current state and future market potential of regeneratively produced food and wine within the United States, Germany and the UK. The research reveals consumers may be willing to pay more for regeneratively-produced food, especially if science can show it tastes better, is better for people’s health and better for the environment.

Despite an industry-wide slowdown in plant-based sales, Impossible Foods continues to grow and has global expansion in its sights. The company just closed a $500 million round, bringing its lifetime funding to more than $2 billion.

Delivery giants are hopping on the instant grocery trend. DoorDash plans to hire full-time couriers in hopes of eventually offering the service to retailers; Swiggy plans to invest $700 million in instant grocery; and Jokr just raised $260 million to fuel its ongoing expansion.

Last but not least, farmland has piqued the interest of corporate buyers as a means to generate carbon credits and offset their greenhouse gas emissions.

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Check out our weekly round-up of last week’s top food startup, tech and innovation news below or peruse the full newsletter here.

1. Manifesto for Regenerative Agriculture Adopted at Climate Farming Congress – Arc

Over 70 regenerative agriculture practitioners from over 16 European countries gathered to create a manifesto for unifying the voice of regenerative agriculture in Europe.

2. Regenerative Agriculture Market Scan & Consumer Insights Report

Alpha Food Labs, our sister company, was commissioned by Beef + Lamb New Zealand and New Zealand Winegrowers to understand the current state and future market potential of regeneratively produced food and wine within the United States, Germany and the UK. The research reveals consumers may be willing to pay more for regeneratively-produced food, especially if science can show it tastes better, is better for people’s health and better for the environment.

3. The Latest Farm Product: Carbon Credits – New York Times

Global cropland has the potential to sequester as much as 570m metric tons of carbon per year. New projects that pay farmers to adopt climate-friendly practices could help.

4. Instant Delivery Firm Jokr Raises $260M, Launches Service in Boston – Grocery Dive

The startup is now valued at $1.2b as investors continue to pour money into the nascent industry.

5. DoorDash Is Piling onto the 15-Minute Grocery Delivery Trend – Fast Company

Competing with the likes of Buyk, Jokr and GoPuff, the company has opened a ghost store in New York and will use real employees to operate it.

6. Food Delivery and Ride Hailing Apps Will Have to Shell Out Billions Under an EU Plan – Time

As many as 4.1m people working through food delivery and ride-hailing apps could be reclassified as employees under a forthcoming EU plan. The bill could cost the sector up to $5.1b more a year. Deliveroo, Just Eat and Delivery Hero shares plunged in the wake of the news.

7. New Active ETF ‘YUMY’ Will Target the Future of Food – Bloomberg

The VanEck Future of Food ETF will be the firm’s first to employ bottom-up, fundamental research and will focus on companies engaged in agricultural and food technology and innovation. VanEck is launching the actively-managed exchange-traded fund under the ticker “YUMY” on Thursday.

8. Amazon Warehouse Workers in Amazon Will Get Another Chance to Vote to Unionize – CNBC

The union argued Amazon illegally interfered in the election, kicking off a protracted legal battle, which resulted in the NLRB ruling in the RWDSU’s favor.

9. Could Kellogg’s Tentative Deal with Union Become a Measuring Stick for Future Labor Negotiations? – Food Navigator

Kellogg offered protesting union workers at four of its US cereal facilities higher wages, enhanced benefits and a path forward for transitional employees.

10. Amazon Warehouse Workers in Amazon Will Get Another Chance to Vote to Unionize – CNBC

The union argued Amazon illegally interfered in the election, kicking off a protracted legal battle, which resulted in the NLRB ruling in the RWDSU’s favor.

11. Singapore: Food Delivery App Grab Raises $4.5B Following Record-Breaking SPAC Deal – AFN

Grab CEO Anthony Tan said that mapping technology would be the number one area of internal investment for Grab as it deploys the proceeds from its listing over the next few years.

12. Swiggy to Invest $700M in Instant Grocery Delivery Service – TechCrunch

The startup is hoping to make its deliveries in 15 minutes by January 2022 by setting up the network of dark stores close to the majority of its customers.

13. Boxed Moves into On-Demand, Fresh Grocery Delivery with Acquisition – Grocery Dive

By acquiring New York’s MaxDelivery, the online retailer said it will be able to scale same-day, dark-store-powered service to additional markets in the months ahead.

14. US House Reps Introduce Bill to Regulate CBD in Food and Beverage – BevNet

Members of the US House of Representatives have introduced a new bipartisan bill aimed at establishing federal standards for CBD food and beverage.

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