Global football giant Real Madrid has teamed up with Meatless Farm!
one of Europe’s fastest growing plant-based food companies, on a joint mission to help drive education and action on more sustainable eating around the world.
The club and the company will set out a joint pledge and plan to work together on raising awareness of the importance of reducing meat consumption to reduce the environmental impact of food, as well as inspiring change when it comes to health and wellbeing. Real Madrid’s nutritionists will be working with Meatless Farm to show how plant-based food can work within a performance-based diet and the club’s players will be sharing their experience of reducing meat and increasing plant-based foods for both environmental and personal performance gains.
The partnership comes after Real Madrid became the first football club to sign up as a participant of the UN Global Compact – the largest corporate sustainability initiative in the world – and during a four-year refurbishment of its iconic Bernabéu stadium which will help to make the ground more efficient and sustainable.
Morten Toft Bech, Founder of Meatless Farm said: “The plant-based sector has grown massively in the last couple of years but we need to move faster if we are to address the urgency of the climate crisis and the role food plays in that. We know there is still a huge gap in consumer understanding of the positive impact reducing meat consumption can have on the environment so we have to reach far beyond vegetarians and vegans and significantly increase the ‘meat-lessers’ – encouraging everyone to reduce their meat consumption and increase their plant-based eating. For example, in a country like the UK we could reduce around 8% of the UK’s total emissions if we all had just one less meat meal per week.
“Real Madrid is the perfect partner for us in this mission – football is the biggest sport in the world and they are one of the biggest clubs. The relationship between a football club and its fans is unlike any other – it’s a close and lifelong commitment and Real fans around the globe are amongst the most dedicated, so the influence and reach that the club has is unparalleled.
“We are all familiar with Real Madrid’s success on the pitch and that comes from dedication and excellence behind the scenes – they excel in nutrition expertise and performance analysis. On top of that, they are one of the leading clubs for their sustainability commitments and research shows that their fans have a keen interest in health and environmental concerns, so the club shares our values but importantly so do their fans.
“Real Madrid has got the right values, ambition, expertise, reach and influence to help create a global movement for change so we can’t wait to work together on achieving these goals.”
Emilio Butragueño, Institutional Relations Director at Real Madrid C.F. added: “Meatless Farm brings together both sustainability and nutrition, two elements that are central to Real Madrid’s club and business strategy. As a global brand we have an important role to play in engaging communities to make real changes that help create a more sustainable world and improve personal health and performance.”
Meatless Farm’s mission is to reduce the world’s dependency on intensively farmed meat and create a more sustainable food ecosystem that reinstates biodiversity. This year is set to be a tipping point for the alternative meat category with 54% of consumers saying they want to reduce their meat consumption, climate change action being back on the global agenda and a steep rise in ‘ecotarian’ eating – eating for the good of the environment.
This is the latest milestone in Meatless Farm’s global journey since launching into the UK market in 2018. The brand is expanding worldwide, now operating in 24 different countries including Germany, Spain and Portugal. Meatless Farm kicked off 2021 with flagship partnerships with major foodservice brands Pret, Leon and itsu in January and has reported a 78% increase in sales year-on-year.
