Where does plant-based meat fit in the ultra-processed foods (UPF) conversation?

Le résumé fourni par la source

This guide, produced by the Good Food Institute Europe (GFI Europe) with the Physicians Association for Nutrition (PAN International), examines where plant-based meat sits within Europe's ultra-processed food (UPF) debate, offering a synthesis of available peer reviewed research. Plant-based meat is often classified as ultra-processed under the Nova food-processing framework, yet has little in common either nutritionally or functionally with the majority of foods in the category, generally having a good nutritional profile and consistently shown to produce beneficial outcomes in interventional studies. Highlighting this heterogeneity, 64% of plant-based meat products achieved a 'good' Nutri-Score (A-B) rating, compared to just 13% of UPFs overall. A 2025 meta-analysis of seven randomised controlled trials (n=369) found that replacing conventional meat with plant-based meat cut low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol by 12% (-0.25 mmol/L) and produced statistically significant weight loss - opposite results to those found in interventional trials on UPF as a whole. Epidemiological UPF research is also unlikely to be able to offer insight into the nutritional profile of plant based meat, given its very different from average nutritional profile within the group, and the fact that the datasets often pre-date widespread plant-based meat intake. In the UK Biobank cohort, plant-based meat made up just 0.2% of UPF calories consumed, and so is extremely unlikely to have impacted the outcomes of the group as a whole. Findings are drawn from nutritional-composition studies, Nova and Nutri-Score classification analyses, randomised controlled trials, and major European cohort datasets including EPIC and the UK Biobank, supplemented by market data from Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and the UK. These findings speak to the wider European protein transition and ongoing regulatory debate over UPF classification. This report is intended for health professionals, policymakers, researchers and NGOs working on food systems policy, to support evidence-based communication on plant-based meat. Summary versions also available in Danish, English, French, German, Italian, Polish and Spanish. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.21265029

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