As climate change and supply chain disruptions put increasing pressure on natural ingredient production, CPI has joined COCO-AI, a new €6.3 million Horizon Europe project exploring how engineering biology and artificial intelligence could help build more resilient, sustainable supply chains.
Chocolate, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics may have little in common, but they all depend on a reliable supply of high-value natural ingredients. Climate change, crop disease and increasingly fragile global supply chains are placing growing pressure on the production of many natural ingredients. Cocoa is among the crops most affected, with extreme weather and declining yields contributing to supply shortages and price volatility.
To help address these challenges, COCO-AI unites a unique consortium of nine international partners from across the globe, bringing together expertise from industry, academia, and research and technology organisations to explore how engineering biology, plant cell culture, and artificial intelligence (AI) can create more resilient ways to produce high-value natural ingredients. The €6.3 million Horizon Europe project will use cocoa as its first demonstrator, before applying the platform to eight additional plant species, generating knowledge that could support the sustainable production of a much broader range of natural ingredients.
