The Good Food Institute India (GFI India) has released a comprehensive analysis of India’s smart protein talent landscape, revealing a mismatch between the country’s educational output and the industry’s current and future workforce needs. Despite India producing nearly 250,000 graduates annually in relevant disciplines, the smart protein sector continues to face a shortage of job-ready, sector-specific talent, particularly in high-growth areas such as bioprocessing, cell culture, extrusion technologies, analytical methods, and novel food safety and regulatory pathways.
The study, conducted with support from Idoboro Impact Solutions, maps technical skill gaps across plant-based, cultivated meat, and fermentation technology value chains. It illustrates that while India’s academic institutions provide strong theoretical foundations in core sciences, limited hands-on exposure and the absence of smart protein-specific modules are constraining the sector’s ability to scale.
The report comes at a time when India’s smart protein ecosystem is gaining momentum, supported by enabling policy frameworks such as the BioE3 policy and a growing research and startup landscape. The findings of the study elucidate that without targeted interventions in education and skilling, talent readiness could emerge as a key bottleneck to growth.
“India has a strong foundation of scientific talent, but translating this potential into a future-ready smart protein workforce requires deliberate, coordinated action,” said Sneha Singh, Managing Director, GFI India. “Our analysis shows that curriculum innovation, deeper industry-academia collaboration, and hands-on training are essential to ensure graduates are equipped with the practical skills the sector needs to scale sustainably and competitively,” she added.
Strategic recommendations outlined by GFI India include:
- Leveraging the provisions of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 to fast-track the inclusion of smart protein electives and value-added courses in food technology and biotechnology programmes.
- Strengthening industry-academia partnerships to deliver hands-on training through internships, certificate courses, workshops, and co-supervised capstone projects.
- Establishing a national, government-backed consortium comprising academia, industry, research institutions, and skilling bodies to coordinate upskilling initiatives and create regional training hubs.
GFI India emphasises that aligning curricula, training, and industry demand will be critical for India to realise its ambition of becoming a global hub for smart protein innovation, while also supporting food security, sustainability, and economic growth.
