KEMIN
About company
Kemin is more than a supplier of ingredients; we are a global company that transforms the quality of life.
Kemin is the science inside the countless products you interact with every day. We create solutions that help strengthen your health and well-being. We provide nutrition and immune support for your pets and production animals. We protect the planet's natural resources and are dedicated to reducing our environmental impact, and we believe in protecting the global food supply chain for future generations.
At Kemin, we always look to tomorrow. Human imagination, scientific innovation and constant curiosity help shape our company and how we serve our customers now and in the future.
We see beyond what is, in order to see what could be.
The world has been transformed since R.W. and Mary Nelson founded Kemin in 1961, but our dedication and discipline in scientific research remain unwavering, as does our energy and enthusiasm to discover new ways to improve life. Every day, we ask ourselves how we can channel our experience and expertise into new opportunities to improve the quality of life around the world.
Company News
Market Information
3+ MIN
01/03/2024
Kemin Nutrisurance opens first Innovation Center and second Spray Dryer in South America
VARGEÃO, Brazil , Feb. 26, 2024 - Kemin Industries, a global ingredient manufacturer that strives to sustainably transform the quality of life every day for 80 percent of the world with its products and services, recently opened an Innovation Center and second spray-drying facility at its regional headquarters in Vargeão, Santa Catarina, Brazil, making the Kemin Nutrisurance location the largest pet food manufacturing plant in Latin America by volume capacity for producing dry and liquid palatants.
Kemin Nutrisurance, the pet food and rendering technologies business unit of Kemin Industries, has been expanding its Research and Exploration Services to enhance co-creation with customers to support them at every stage of pet food production. With its first Innovation Center in Brazil, the business unit can provide fast and accurate solutions for current and future palatant and protein customers in South America.
"Our first Innovation Center in South America will greatly strengthen our Research and Exploration Services in the region," said V Lucatelli, General Manager – South America, Kemin Nutrisurance. "We can now offer customers a local laboratory to improve and evaluate the performance of current and future products, as well as improve cost efficiency, to bring top innovations at the speed the pet food industry demands."
The Innovation Center and second spray dryer are part of the global business unit's continued growth in South America and the Latin American market. In 2008, Kemin purchased the property and has since invested in renewable energy sources while still increasing its capacity and capabilities, including Kemin Nutrisurance's Research and Exploration Services. This new expansion allows the Vargeão facility to not only supply the South American market, but also support Kemin Nutrisurance's palatant needs in other regions, such as Asia and Europe.
"With greater emphasis on Research and Development (R&D) support for our customers, we can utilize our data and analytics to fine-tune our products and services to find fast and accurate solutions that better serve the market," said Dr. Jason Shelton, Global Vice President – R&D, Kemin Nutrisurance. "By bringing our Research and Exploration Services to the regional level through an Innovation Center, we can create a local customer experience that focuses on specific needs at the speed required by a rapidly evolving industry."
The Innovation Center and spray drying facility were recently inaugurated during a ribbon cutting with Kemin Nutrisurance President Kimberly Nelson and Kemin Industries Worldwide Group President David Raveyre. Kemin Nutrisurance's newest additions at the South America headquarters are now open with expanded solutions for customers in the region's pet food industry.
About Kemin Industries
Kemin Industries is a global ingredient manufacturer that strives to sustainably transform the quality of life every day for 80 percent of the world with its products and services. The company supplies over 500 specialty ingredients for human and animal health and nutrition, pet food, aquaculture, nutraceutical, food technologies, crop technologies, textile, biofuel, and animal vaccine industries.
For over half a century, Kemin has been dedicated to using applied science to address industry challenges and offer product solutions to customers in more than 120 countries. Kemin provides ingredients to feed a growing population with its commitment to the quality, safety and efficacy of food, feed, and health-related products.
Established in 1961, Kemin is a privately held, family-owned-and-operated company with more than 3,000 global employees and operations in 90 countries, including manufacturing facilities in Belgium, Brazil, China, Egypt, India, Italy, San Marino, Singapore, South Africa, and the United States.
Source: Kemin Industries.
Micro Ingredients
6+ MIN
16/02/2024
Wet Pet Food Quality
Wet pet food is a popular choice among pet owners, with more than 6.5 billion kgs sold in 2022¹. Pet owners often see wet pet food as a more premium option than traditional dry kibble diets.
They expect their preferred wet pet food brand to be palatable to their pets and have the same appealing aroma, color, and texture every time they open a can or pouch. Consistency in these qualities is particularly important for pet food manufacturers to maintain their brand image. Flavor, aroma, color, and texture can be affected by key parameters of pet food production, including processing conditions, pH, grind size, and thickeners.
Kemin: Your partner in wet pet food
Testing solutions in wet pet food is more complex than in dry foods. Kemin has invested in a wet pet food pilot facility to provide partnership opportunities with customers seeking solutions to their wet pet food challenges.
This facility is used to build pilot-scale wet pet food batches of loaf or chunk in gravy formulas in cans, trays, and pouches. This facility offers an opportunity to leverage Kemin's expertise across the value chain to help address several key challenges, including palatability, biogenic amine formation, and color retention.
At Kemin, we care that our solutions work in pet food matrices and have minimal impact to product integrity and quality standards. Therefore, pilot-scale wet pet food runs can be tested for many success criteria, including palatability, texture, viscosity, pH, color, weep, and aroma analysis, depending on customer needs.
The right texture
While each wet pet meat dough manufacturing process may be unique, it has been observed that meat grind and disintegration quality affect loaf pâté texture or hardness. It has been observed that cats preferentially eat diets with significantly softer loaf pâté texture versus a harder one. Pet parents may also prefer the look of a softer loaf pâté versus a hard, brittle one². Loaf pâté quality is a metric Kemin measures on diets manufactured at their Wet Pet Food Pilot Plant.
Kemin Texture Testing³. A texture analyzer with a ball probe can simulate the feel of meat in an animal's mouth and on their model diet. Diets with various meat cutting shear were manufactured at the Kemin Wet Pet Food Pilot Plant and compared to a commercially available Turkey and Giblet Loaf Pâté diet using Tukey Honest Square Differences statistical analyses, with a p-value less than 0.05 to distinguish texture differences.
The Turkey and Giblet Loaf Pâté recipe with minimal meat grinding and cutting shear had a significantly harder loaf pâté than two times and three times more shear [Figure 1]. Compared to desired texture of the benchmark loaf pâté diet, it is observed that too little cutting shear created a significantly harder loaf pâté. Using two times and three times more cutting shear made similar texture hardness to benchmark loaf pâté.
Achieving the ideal "look"
Just like cooking a steak or chicken breast releases juices, meats in a wet pet diet release water during sterilization cooking through the retort process. Meat scientists refer to these juices as weep, syneresis or expressible moisture. Loaf pâté diets sometimes have too much liquid weep, which may thin out the gravy or gel. Too much weep can adversely affect consumer perception, as some consumers view quality wet pet diets as having thick liquid like a gravy or gel.
Often thickeners like starches, gums, and proteins are added to diets and special processing is used to enhance soluble proteins and reduce liquid weep. Literature from Kansas State University confirmed that wet pet diets containing only the ingredients necessary for complete and balanced nutrition may be too thin to rapidly fill cans, have sedimentation challenges, and express too much liquid after sterilization cooking. The type and quantity of thickeners must be balanced to achieve the right 'look', including the right amount and thickness of the liquid in a wet diet. Both 'Thick to Thin' and 'Thin to Thick' ingredients are necessary.
'Thick to Thin', Guar gum is a popular ingredient to add to nutritious wet pet meat doughs to thicken it, maintain a homogenous mixture, and to rapidly fill cans. After sterilization cooking, wet pet diets with added guar gum resemble diets with no guar gum. In other words, viscosity and thickness provided by guar gum assists in cooking but not to maintain a thick liquid after cooking.
'Thin to Thick', Other thickeners, gums, and proteins are added to nutritious wet pet meat doughs to enhance their qualities after sterilization cooking. These gums are considered 'Thin to Thick' ingredients, among them kappa carrageenan, xanthan gum, and locust bean gum. These thickeners offer some viscosity before the cooking step but have been observed to thicken remaining liquid and to significantly reduce liquid after sterilization cook.
Overall palatability
After optimizing look and texture, the last step is to ensure that the wet diet is palatable enough to encourage enthusiastic consumption by the target customer- the pets. There are many factors that impact palatability including texture, ingredient type and quality, processing and the type of palatability system that is used.
Freshness + Palatability. Ingredients are carefully selected by availability, quality, price, flavor, and processability to meet market needs. Many wet pet manufacturers use both fresh and frozen meats to make their product, which has advantages and disadvantages. Frozen meats have a significantly longer shelf-life and provide ingredient flexibility and availability. On the other hand, frozen ingredients can be difficult to grind or disintegrate, require more energy to activate than fresh meats, and require storage management. Fresh meats can be less expensive and are easier to process than frozen but are difficult to preserve more than a few days and challenging to minimize microbial growth. Aged, fresh meats grow micro-organisms which impact meat dough quality by developing biogenic amines and shortening mandate time – the time between seaming cans and starting sterilization cook process – for wet pet manufacturers. Figure 2 shows that cats prefer lower biogenic amine diets, which can be achieved by using fresher meat or utilizing an antimicrobial treatment to help maintain fresh character.
Use of a Palatability Enhancer. Wet pet food is often perceived to be highly appealing to cats, but some cats may be reluctant or refuse to eat a diet altogether. Pet food manufacturers can elevate the profile of wet cat food diets by adding palatability enhancers to the finished diet. Figure 3 shows that the addition of a dry palatant in the chunk component of a chicken-based chunk and gravy diet was statistically preferred to a control diet with no palatant. Palatability performance increases with increasing palatant application rate. All rations were made in the Kemin pilot plant.
Moreover, palatant addition to the wet cat diet can transform an amalgam of animal proteins into a product with a clean, unified consumer aroma. Palatants tested in the Kemin Pilot Plant have changed the perception of cat wet pet diets from one that is gamey or pungent to more pleasant meaty flavors or aroma typical of the retorted foods industry.
CONCLUSION
There are many factors that can influence the overall consumer experience of a wet pet food brand. Understanding how to make a consistent, appealing product is key to satisfying loyal customers and further gaining market share with new customers. Pet food manufacturers should consider the value of partnering with suppliers that understand the complexities of wet pet food production and make solutions tailored to their specific needs.
By: Gregg Schieffer, Ph.D Associate Scientist-Palatants, Kemin Nutrisurance.
Source: Kemin Nutrisurance.
1 Euromonitor, 2022.
2 Hagen-Plantinga, E.A., Orlanes, D.F., Bosch, G., Hendriks W.H., van der Poel, A.F.B. Retorting Conditions Affect Palatability and Physical Characteristics of Canned Cat Food. J Nutri Sci. (2017), 6, e23, 1-5.
3 Dainton, A.N., Dogan, H., Aldrich, C.G. The Effects of Select Hydrocolloids on the Processing of Pâté-Style Canned Pet Food. Foods. (2021), 10, 2506-2519.
4 Kemin Internal Document: (SD-23-25564).
5 Kemin Internal Document: (SD-22-25122).
Market Information
2+ MIN
02/10/2023
Kemin news with Mariane Bortolo
So, what have been the latest releases of the company? In May, at FENAGRA, we launched two new palatants: PALASURANCE® P D40-180 IP LIQUID, a vegetable hydrolyzate, naturally preserved and NO-GMO, compatible with various types of diets, traditional, monoprotein, and even vegetarian pet animal feeds. PALASURANCE® A DC70-350 IP LIQUID, a palatant for dogs and cats with super premium palatability, based on fish protein, naturally preserved, GMO-Free, and compatible with various diets. This product is the first fish protein-based product launched by Kemin Nutrisurance in South America that meets the market need. In the last three years, among all pet food launches in South America, fish was the second most popular protein in terms of the number of pet food product launches, behind chicken. Thus, we also launched ALLINSUR™ AS 11A, a liquid antioxidant and preservative additive containing ingredients designed to protect bulk animal fats or oils from auto-oxidative deterioration and preserve freshness during transport to the end user. Lastly, our last launch was in June, a product called ADDEFORM™ FG LIQUID, a water-soluble antifoam additive used to prevent foam formation in the processing of raw materials and by-products of animal origin. These products brought innovation, diversity in the use of animal and vegetable proteins, sustainability, NO-GMO products, naturally preserved, process improvement, food safety, and alignment with market trends and needs. And what upcoming releases are you currently working on? In our Innovation Center located in Vargeão - Santa Catarina - Brazil, where we can develop new products, co-create with customers, and improve our products, we are currently working on a product that is a blend of antioxidants and antimicrobials for pet food. We are also working on launches of palatability agents for wet food, as well as innovations in synthetic and natural antioxidants. What is the differential of these products & services? Kemin's differential is always innovation in products, molecules, and services. We have a team of technical services that gives all the support to our customers, both in the creation of tailor-made products to meet the needs of our customers, as well as assistance in their formulations, development of suppliers of quality raw materials, regulatory information, and laboratory. To find out more about Kemin, visit the WEB. Source: All Pet Food
Interviews
1+ MIN
01/09/2023
Interview with Kimberly Nelson President of kemin Nutrisurance
Kimberly gives an overview about the future of the pet food industry in terms of nutrition and nutritional ingredients for pets, as well as the way we should deal with the well being for our pets. Don´t miss the Interview: by All Pet Food
Formulation
2+ MIN
24/07/2023
Kemin Nutrisurance unveils new wet pet food pilot lab
During the ribbon cutting celebration on July 20, Kemin employees, customers and local guests were invited to tour the new pilot lab, which will be able to mimic the production of wet pet food in a smaller-scale plant environment. Chris Nelson, Ph.D., president and chief executive officer, Kimberly Nelson, president of Kemin Nutrisurance, and Jason Shelton, Ph.D., vice president of research and development at Kemin Nutrisurance, addressed attendees and shared the mission of the new business unit and pilot lab facility. 'There is enormous potential still left in wet pet food — to understand a lot about the chemistry and how to improve this overall product,' Chris Nelson explained. 'This facility allows us to test those new ideas for our customers.' The state-of-the-art facility offers Kemin Nutrisurance the opportunity to work with current and existing customers to create, test and validate pet food and treats to help better predict large-scale results. The pilot lab offers a dedicated space to develop wet pet food, as well as test dry kibble coatings. It features more production capacity and testing capabilities than most R&D labs, but its smaller scale plant environment provides more flexibility to produce smaller batches and adjust formulations during the process. The opening of the pilot lab served as a platform to introduce customers to Kemin's advancement in its R&D offerings under the new Research and Explorations Services umbrella. 'This is really a celebration of our formalization and the elevation of our service in R&D,' Kimberly Nelson said during the ribbon cutting. 'Services as a platform has been critical to our success for years, but bringing research and exploration as an element to it formerly is the next step in our commitment to our customers.' 'With Research and Exploration Services, we are able to elevate our own R&D efforts, building on Kemin's legacy of market-leading solutions and helping customers test, create and validate pet food products with unmatched accuracy and efficiency,' Shelton added. 'Now, with our expanded customer-service offerings, Kemin Nutrisurance delivers the industry's most comprehensive approach to R&D.' Kemin Nutrisurance's Research and Explorations Services will expand beyond the United States with pilot labs and innovation centers in Brazil, Italy and China. Source: Kemin Industries
Palatants
1+ MIN
31/10/2022
Kemin introduces new palatant line for wet cat food formulas
DES MOINES, IOWA — Kemin Nutrisurance, the pet food and rendering segment of Kemin Industries, recently announced a new line of palatants for use in wet cat food: PALIVATE™. With increased consumer awareness of pet health, many have switched their pets to more appetizing meals, like wet formats, which are often considered to be highly palatable. According to data shared by Kemin and reported by Euromonitor, cat owners choose wet formulas almost as often as dry ones, with wet cat food comprising 44% of the global volume of cat food. Although wet cat food is believed to be highly palatable, many consumers and pet food processors have struggled to get a cat to consume wet food, according to Kemin. Kemin's new PALIVATE palatants are designed to increase palatability of wet formulas while minimizing negative effects to a formula's overall integrity. The PALIVATE line can withstand retort processing and can be used for formats with low inclusions, including loaves and chunks in gravy. According to testing conducted by Kemin, the addition of PALIVATE in chunks in gravy formats increased a cat's overall intake of the food. The dry palatants also significantly outperformed a competitive palatant when used in chicken- and salmon-based loaf formulas, according to the company. By Nicole Kerwin - Pet Food Processing
