Amino acid Industry special Report: Contributing to Food Security and Leveraging synthetic biology

Amino acids: the basic substances for building proteins, rich in categories and growing in scale

Amino acids are a class of organic compounds containing amino and carboxyl groups within the molecule, which is the basic material for building the protein of the organism. Amino acids/proteins participate in almost every chemical reaction in the biological body, and are used by the body to produce antibody proteins, hemoglobin, enzymes and hormones, etc., to maintain and regulate metabolism. According to whether the human body can autonomously synthesize amino acids, amino acids are divided into essential amino acids and non-essential amino acids, among which essential amino acids mainly include lysine, threonine, methionine, valine, tryptophan, phenylalanine, isoleucine and leucine. Since the body cannot autonomously synthesize or the efficiency of synthesis cannot meet the needs of normal metabolism, it must be supplemented by external intake. Non-essential amino acids mainly include glutamic acid, glycine, proline, alanine and so on. According to the market size and whether it is classified as protein amino acids, it can be divided into large varieties of amino acids, small and medium varieties of amino acids and non-protein amino acids and derivatives, among which the large varieties of amino acids are mainly lysine, glutamic acid, methionine, threonine and glycine, and the current global demand scale is one million tons or more. Small amino acids include valine, tryptophan, alanine, arginine and isoleucine, etc. Due to relatively high production costs and prices, the current global demand is relatively small. Non-protein amino acids and derivatives mainly include ornithine and citrulline.

According to ImarcGroup and PolarisMarketResearch, the global demand for amino acids in 2023 is expected to exceed 11 million tons, with a market size of nearly 30 billion US dollars, benefiting from the growth of downstream aquaculture, medicine and other demands, and the global demand for amino acids has maintained a growing trend in recent years. And it is expected that the global amino acid demand and market size will grow to about 12.6 million tons and 34.4 billion US dollars in 2025, respectively, with a 24-25 year CAGR of about 4.7% and 7.5%.

Since the main terminal of amino acids is the protein of the construction of organisms, the varieties that have been applied on a large scale, such as lysine, threonine, methionine and valine, etc., are mainly used in the farming field directly downstream, and a small amount is used in medicine and food additives and other fields. Amino acids are mainly used in farming, medicine and food additives and other purposes, and the final orientation is mainly absorbed by the human body.

Due to the necessity of amino acids for maintaining and regulating growth metabolism, the demand for replacing soybean meal in the field of aquaculture has continued to grow in recent years, and many companies around the world have actively distributed. On the domestic side, the representative enterprises include Meihua Biological, Star Lake Technology, Fufeng Group and Huashenwu, etc., European and American enterprises such as Evonik of Germany, etc., Japanese and South Korean enterprises mainly include Ajinomoto of Japan and CJ of South Korea.

Under the background of food security, the demand of amino acids for soybean meal reduction replacement continues to increase

Low-protein diet feed continues to be promoted to help solve the structural shortage of soybeans

The addition of amino acids in feed can better play the feed effect, improve the breeding efficiency, and save protein resources, improve nitrogen utilization efficiency and environmental protection, etc. At present, the global consumption of large categories mainly include lysine, threonine, methionine and valine varieties. More importantly, some amino acids are essential amino acids in the animal growth process, but they cannot be synthesized by the animal itself (also known as restricted amino acids), and must rely on feed addition to provide nutrients required for animal growth, such as the first 1-5 restricted amino acids in the growth process of piglets are lysine, methionine, threonine, tryptophan, and valine, respectively. The 1-4 limiting amino acids in the growth process of laying hens are methionine, lysine, tryptophan and threonine.