Since 2020, the Protein Industries Cluster has played a key role in the growth of Avena Foods, helping the Regina-based company become not only a specialty miller of oats and pulses but also a high‑tech ingredient innovator.
Through its collaboration with the cluster, Avena Foods has accelerated its research and development and brought new, sustainable, market-ready ingredients to life, meeting the changing needs of customers in Canada and around the world.
Accessing the cluster's network and expertise, Avena Foods developed new oat and pulse flours that are more nutritious and environmentally friendly than traditional ingredients. These innovations support the creation of clean-label, allergy-friendly plant-based food products. Avena's ingredients, made from sustainably grown beans, chickpeas, lentils and peas, are fully traceable to the farm.
In this video, Avena Foods shares how working with the Protein Industries Cluster enabled valuable partnerships with industry and academic collaborators. These partnerships strengthened its in-house capabilities and accelerated innovation beyond what it could have achieved alone.
This collaboration is helping expand healthy food options, bring high-quality Canadian ingredients to global markets faster, reduce environmental impacts and support a more resilient food system.
Transcript
We're starting to understand that we can actually grow pulses in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, mill them here in Manitoba and ship it to Europe. And it has a lower ecological footprint than if you grow that same pulse in Europe.
Hi. My name is Wayne Arsenault. I'm the CEO of Avena Foods. We're a specialty miller in oats and pulses.
We partnered with Protein Industries Canada as well as partners at UBC in order to develop regenerative ag practices and working with our farmers to treat soil as best we can so that future generations have richer soil that's going to produce richer crops.
[What] partnering with Protein Industries Canada has done, we've been able to increase the size of our research and development by four fold, and that's really given us more capability.
And it's because of those capabilities, we've recently launched three innovations in the marketplace much faster than what we would have otherwise.
Partnering through the cluster really advanced our ability to hone in on understanding what are all of our great farmers doing and what are the practices that they're doing. And then being able to move that forward and launching a regenerative ag oats offering for our customers, so that that is now moving into the marketplace.
Bringing together all of these expertise in order to better understand how do you track great farm practices and how do you actually calculate what impact that has?
We started about 15 years ago with a group of pedigreed seed farmers, and since that time with the gluten-free options as well as the emerging alternative proteins versus meat, getting plant based proteins, we've rapidly grown over the last ten years.
We're blessed to be in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, where in pulses or in oats growing, it's the most sustainable area in the world.
Protein Industries Canada, that's where it comes together for us. They have access and knowledge to different partners. So do we. So do our customers. And then this just kind of brings it all together.
We were able to determine our life cycle for all of our products. Without that support, you know, eventually we'd be able to figure that out, but really developing that capability internally is very difficult.
It's really moved Avena to the forefront, and we're seen as an innovator in the marketplace. It's all about solving problems that consumers want solved, which is bringing it back to us to say, how do we solve it? And without the help, it'd be very difficult.
I want us to continue to be an innovator in the marketplace. I want us to continue to be the first at trying new things. It means you put yourself open to failure. But we need to continue to be the first.
Canada's Protein Industries Cluster
- Partners:
- Avena Foods Limited, Big Mountain Foods Ltd., Danone Canada Inc., Old Dutch Foods, University of Saskatchewan, Red River College Polytechnic, Manitoba Agriculture's Food Development Centre, University of British Columbia, South East Research Farm, Okanagan Valley College of Massage Therapy Ltd., ACCE International, Cereals Canada, Cintech Agroalimentaire, Joriki Beverage, Saskatchewan Food Industry Development Centre
- Impact:
- Innovative Product Success; Agriculture; Sustainability
- Location:
- Regina, Saskatchewan