From Dependency to Diversity: Why Europe’s Protein Transition is a Public Health Issue
In this Knowledge Hub piece, Dr Roberta Alessandrini, PAN’s Director of the Dietary Guidelines Initiative, reflects on the key insights and takeaways from the recently released report by The Protein Project, From Dependency to Diversity. Her analysis looks at why Europe’s soy dependency matters not only for food system resilience, but also for public health, and why protein diversification should be understood as a strategic opportunity to build healthier, more secure and more sustainable food environments.
Europe’s soy dependency is a food system vulnerability
Europe’s food security debate is increasingly being shaped by questions of resilience, preparedness and strategic autonomy. From Dependency to Diversity adds an important perspective to this discussion by focusing on one of the EU food system’s most concentrated vulnerabilities: soy dependency.
The report identifies soy as a critical pressure point for Europe’s food security and affordability. The EU produces only around 9% of the soy protein it consumes, while the vast majority is imported. This dependency is also highly concentrated, with Brazil, the United States and Argentina supplying 86% of EU soy imports.
This matters because soy is not a niche ingredient in Europe’s food system. Around 90% of soy use is linked to animal feed, making imported soy a structural input into Europe’s livestock sector, particularly pork, poultry and eggs. According to the report, without access to imported high-protein meal, the EU could lose up to 40% of its total livestock production capacity, with the steepest impacts in poultry, eggs and pork.
In other words, Europe’s soy dependency is not only an agricultural concern. It has direct implications for food security, affordability, public health and resilience.
A balanced pathway to reduce soy dependency
The Protein Project models how Europe could reduce soy protein imports by 20% by 2035, equivalent to around 3 million tonnes of crude protein. It assesses four protein diversification strategies:
Expanding domestic protein crop production
Increasing the circular use of agri-food side streams
Scaling domestic innovative protein production
Diversifying consumption patterns across European diets
One of the strengths of the report is that it avoids presenting any single solution as sufficient. Instead, it finds that the most feasible pathway is a balanced approach across all four strategies.
Concentrating effort too heavily on agriculture and circularity, or on innovation and consumption alone, risks pushing individual strategies beyond what is realistically achievable by 2035. The balanced scenario, by contrast, keeps each lever within a more feasible range: moderate expansion of protein crops, greater use of circular feedstocks, realistic scaling of innovative protein production, and a meaningful but achievable shift in consumption patterns.
For PAN International, this balanced framing is important. It moves the debate beyond polarised choices between animal, plant and novel proteins, and towards a more practical question: how can Europe build a more diverse protein system that supports farmers, consumers, public health and ecological resilience?
Why consumption matters for public health
One of the report’s most important contributions is its inclusion of consumption pattern diversification as a core strategy. This is where the food security discussion connects directly with public health.
At PAN International, we see strong alignment between protein diversification and the wider shift towards evidence-based, health-promoting dietary patterns. Diets that include a greater variety of whole plant foods, including legumes, nuts, seeds and whole grains, are consistently associated with better cardiometabolic health outcomes and a lower risk of major non-communicable diseases.
This does not need to be framed as restriction. It is better understood as an expansion of healthy, affordable and culturally adaptable food choices. A more diverse protein landscape can make it easier for people to include more beans, lentils, peas, chickpeas, nuts, seeds and whole grains in everyday meals, while still allowing room for different dietary preferences and traditions.
The EAT-Lancet planetary health diet offers one useful reference point, highlighting a dietary pattern rich in whole grains, fruits, vegetables, legumes and nuts, with space for modest amounts of animal-source foods. For PAN, the key point is not to promote a narrow or prescriptive diet, but to support food environments where healthier protein choices are accessible, appealing and normal.
The role of alternative proteins
The report also recognises the role of domestic innovative protein production, including technologies such as biomass and precision fermentation. These approaches can contribute to protein diversification by adding new protein sources that do not depend on imported soy.
From a health perspective, this area requires nuance. Alternative protein products are not automatically healthier simply because they replace animal-source foods. Their contribution depends on how they are formulated, processed, fortified and positioned in the wider diet.
PAN International supports innovation that helps expand healthier and more sustainable choices, especially when products are designed with nutritional quality in mind. This includes attention to protein quality, fibre, saturated fat, sodium, ingredient complexity and key micronutrients. When developed responsibly, alternative proteins can complement whole plant protein sources and help consumers diversify their diets in ways that are practical, appealing and aligned with health.
Policy must connect the full value chain
The report is clear that Europe’s protein transition cannot be delivered through isolated measures. It calls for coherent policy coordination across the full value chain, from research and farming to processing, markets and consumption.
This includes stronger cross-DG coordination and a coherent EU Protein Plan, alongside alignment with wider policy files such as the CAP, the Common Market Organisation, the European Competitiveness Fund, FP10 and biotech-related policy frameworks.
This is highly relevant for PAN’s policy work. Protein diversification should be reflected not only in agricultural policy, but also in dietary guidelines, public procurement, school meals, healthcare settings and prevention-oriented health policy.
The report’s recommendations on consumption pattern diversification are particularly important from a public health perspective. These include updating dietary guidelines to explicitly support protein diversification, aligning public procurement and school meals with protein diversification goals, investing in uptake rather than information alone, and shaping retail environments so diversified protein choices become easier for consumers.
These are the kinds of structural measures needed to make healthier food choices realistic at population level.
A shared agenda for resilience and health
The central message of From Dependency to Diversity is that reducing Europe’s soy dependency is feasible, but only if policy moves beyond silver bullets. The most credible pathway is balanced, coordinated and rooted in the full diversity of Europe’s food and farming systems.
For PAN International, the report also reinforces a wider point: food system resilience and public health cannot be separated. A food system that depends heavily on imported feed to sustain high levels of animal protein production is exposed to geopolitical, environmental and economic shocks. A more diverse protein system, by contrast, can support greater resilience while also creating healthier food environments.
The opportunity now is to ensure that Europe’s emerging protein policy agenda does not focus only on supply, productivity or competitiveness, but also on health. Protein diversification can help strengthen food security, support farmers, reduce environmental pressure and improve population health.
That makes it more than a food systems strategy. It is a public health strategy too.