Belonging to the food market carries with it a great responsibility: that of providing millions of people worldwide with access to basic nutrition. A population that continues to grow and whose expectations in terms of taste, formulation and consumer experience are also changing and diversifying, while providing the maximum guarantee of quality and food safety.

Casings play a key role in this market. They are soft, cylindrical containers made from animal gut or from materials specially designed for stuffing meat or other food ingredients. They give sausages and cold meats their characteristic shape and are of great importance to our customers, who are looking for greater efficiency, increased production speed, reduced waste, and assured quality and consistency. That is why the use of casings is widespread throughout the world.

The casings market exceeds 57 billion meters and has an estimated value of €4.2 billion. In order to meet the sausage filling needs, a meat processor must choose among the different alternatives on the market, either with animal casings (a 47%of the market), or if he prefers customized casings which can be produced with different materials depending on the desired production and product characteristics, combining a better range of casings with production savings. Thus, the greater the production requirement and the sophistication of the meat processors, the greater the tendency to adopt customized casings as opposed to animal casings, and for this they have four main types of technology, cellulosic casings (13% of the total market), fibrous casings (7%), collagen (21%) and plastic casings and others (16%)

Growth in the customized casings market lies within the historical average range of 2-4% in volumes thanks to strong fundamentals based on:

• Population growth:  An average annual rate of 1%, with emerging areas driving this expansion.
• Eating habits:  Increased per capita demand for meat led by emerging areas thanks to the increased purchasing power of the middle classes, globalisation of eating habits and the growth of the population in cities. In developed areas, nutritional trends are evolving towards the search for greater convenience, and products of higher nutritional quality and food safety.
• Greater sophistication of meat processors:  Increased search for productivity, food safety and hygiene, and the development of new products drives the replacement of animal casings with customized casings (mainly collagen) as well as the development of new products.

At Viscofan we feel the responsibility to adapt and create value in this market. This is reflected in the fact that 18% of the market (including casings and animal gut) trust our customized casings, compared to 15% at the beginning of the strategic period (2016). Moreover, if we take into account only market players with production of customized casings, the market share stands at 34% (30% at the end of 2015).

As with other basic food products, food crises or shortages can act as a brake on this growth trend.