In the last four years, 2.1 million Spaniards have changed their habits towards veggie diets. Thus, Spain currently has 5.1 million consumers who recognize themselves as flexitarians, vegetarians or vegans. What started as a trend has become a movement not even affected by the pandemic.
Fig. 1. Distribution of the adult Spanish population by type of diet: from 2017 to 2021
Within these more than five million veggie consumers (more than the total population of a country like Ireland), flexitarians are the most numerous, accounting for 10.8% of the Spanish population, followed by vegetarians, who account for 1.4%, and in third place are vegans, 0.8% of the national population. The strong increase in the number of vegans is significant, which has grown by 60% compared to 2019, a growth experienced at the expense of the number of vegetarians, which is slightly decreasing.
Cultured meat
One of the important elements for the development of in vitro meat is whether consumers are willing to buy and consume such products. This year, Lantern wanted to anticipate the arrival of these products and ask Spanish consumers about their willingness to buy them.