217 Pierre Weill - After certifying the quality of over $3B of animal protein a year, now turning to vegetables

A check-in conversation with Pierre Weill, a world-leading researcher and practitioner when it comes to nutrient density and food and co-founder of Bleu-Blanc-Coeur, the largest certification body in the world focusing on the quality of food, about the latest scientific developments, research on animal protein and vegetable nutrient density, and more.
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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

You're going to listen to a check-in interview with the world's leading researcher and practitioner when it comes to nutrient density and food. The co-founder of the largest certification body in the world focused on quality of food. Objective, measurable, outcome-based, which is doing over 3 billion a year. Mostly animal protein. Is this egg good for you or could it cause inflammation? And recently they went to do veggies. So very interesting to learn more about that. There's no better person to talk to in this series on nutrient density, on the latest science, What are the connections between healthy farming practices, healthy soil, healthy produce, healthy gut and healthy people? Welcome to a special series where we go deep into the relationship between regenerative agriculture practices that build soil health and the nutritional quality of the food we end up eating. We unpack the current state of science, the role of investments, businesses, nonprofits, entrepreneurs, and more. This series is supported by the A-Team Foundation, who support food and land projects that are ecologically, economically, and socially conscious. They contribute to a wider movement that envisions a future where real food is produced by enlightened agriculture and access to it is equal. The A-Team Foundation are looking to make more investments and grants in the space of bionutrients. You can find more here, a-teamfoundation.org or get in touch directly, info at a-teamfoundation.org or check the information in the show notes below. Welcome to another episode. Today, we welcome back on the show, Pierre Wiel, the president of the Bleu Blanc Coeur Association. We had back here in October 2020, and let's say on the nutrient in general, but in the world, there was still full in COVID, but also in the nutrient side of things, the nutrient density, a lot has happened. So I'm extremely happy to have him back to check in. Of course, I will link below the interview we did before and a great interview he did with Dan Kittredge, just to, if you want to have more background, more general background, but I'm very happy to have you back here to check in what has happened in the world of nutrient density in Bleu Blanc Coeur and in general. Welcome back,

SPEAKER_00 2:19

Pierre. Thank you. Thank you. Welcome. Happy to be here.

SPEAKER_01 2:23

And I remember, I mean, for many non-French speakers, Bleu Blanc Coeur or not living in a French-speaking country, let's say, you're not very famous, unfortunately, but you're one of the biggest certification bodies, I think, in the world that specifically looks at quality and how many cases animal protein has been raised and specifically that was triggered and i won't repeat the whole interview we did before with a lot of soy import in in france that started 20 30 years ago and and now you have made a big step so i think we we start unpacking immediately and dive into the veggie side of things so no longer only animal protein but you're looking at at vegetables as well how come why make your life more difficult

SPEAKER_00 3:04

well i think last time i probably said something like we did the easy proof of concept on the animal side of the food chain, because we did all these trials in these 20, 30 years, making the proof that the way you feed the animal has an impact of the health of human beings. So, of course, you think you can make the same things on the vegetal side. The way the carrots, the tomatoes, the wheat is fed will have an impact on the nutrient density of the of the grain of the fruits of the leaves etc and will have an impact of the on the health of the human being in the same way but it's so we we we do it we we do trials on it we do research on it for a couple of years it's quite difficult but we we start we start looking at things that will be i think really important in in the future

SPEAKER_01 4:06

Because what makes it, I mean, it's almost interesting to see that the animal protein side is easier or quote unquote easier. Of course, you spent a few decades on it, but then where sort of the soil is one step away because the animal is absorbing it and eating it. In this case, when we go straight for the carrot or straight for the veggie, it's more tricky. Why is that? Is it we're not used yet? We have to spend a few decades on it? Or is it by definition more

SPEAKER_00 4:36

tricky? No, by definition, it's more tricky because a plant is fed by the sun first. After she took the energy from the sun, she put energy in the soil, and all the microbiology of the soil using this energy provides nutrients to the plant. And then the nutrient density of the plant is related to the chlorophyllic synthesis, the way the plant catches energy from the sun, gives to the soil, and then from the quality of the soil. And a lot of things happen in the soil. It's quite more complicated to feed cows with, for instance, grass compared to corn, compared to the way a tomato is fed in this kind of soil compared to another kind of soil. It's more tricky. So we did trials to see what is the difference. First, what we have to check, what we have to measure, what is nutrient density of a vegetable, what is nutrient density of a fruit, of a grain, etc. This was probably the first step. Like 20 or 25 years ago, we said, okay, let's go on the animal side. We'll go on the inflammatory, anti-inflammatory process, which is very related to the omega-6, omega-3 ratio in the fat, because animal fats are the main fat in the Western diet because the composition of the animal fat in omega-6 and omega-3 is related to the quality of the feed. We started the process. So the first step on the vegetal side, we say, okay, what is... Find the

SPEAKER_01 6:22

equivalent. What's the omega-3, 6 ratio of

SPEAKER_00 6:25

the carrot? Carrot, tomato, grain. Let's say roughly it's the antioxidant value of the vegetals. In all the nutritional advice, I say we have to eat more legumes, for instance, more pulses, I think, because it's very rich in antioxidants. So the first part of the work, we did it with Dan Kittredge and the Bionutrient Association in the US, in the lab was to check what is the level of antioxidants and polyphenols in different pulses, in different vegetables. And we found, we had the, we put the technology over done here in France with the lab and we analyzed the tomato, carrots, et cetera. And we found huge difference from one to 50, for instance, for the, yeah,

SPEAKER_01 7:31

I said. Because the lab wasn't functioning or because

SPEAKER_00 7:34

there were these differences? The lab was functioning, yeah. 1 to 50 is massive. Yes, it's massive. So, of course, it depends on the genetics, it depends on the season, it depends on the soil, it depends on a lot of things. That's just when you say eat carrots, because it's very rich in beta-carotene. That's true, but the quantity of beta-carotene is from 1 to 20. And down in the US, it has the same results. This was the first step.

SPEAKER_01 8:02

And did you find any connection to the soil? Like, is there, like, what Or did you find any potential explanation of these differences?

SPEAKER_00 8:11

This is the second step. First, to say, okay, we measured big variation, massive variation. And the second is to understand why. So to understand why, there is, of course, connection with the yield. If you have a very big yield, you will have lower nutrient density. It's connected with the...

UNKNOWN 8:36

Bye.

SPEAKER_00 8:37

with the genetic, with the variety, and it's connected with the soil, and especially with the organic matter of the soil. If you have, you, I don't know, you probably have heard of John Kempf, the US agronomist, and the John Kempf triangle, say, okay, first you have sugars. Sugars is made by the sun. You don't need soil to produce sugar if you are a plant. After you have protein, with the sugar, with energy, sugar from the sun, and with the genetic, you can synthesize the protein quite easily. Then comes the lipids and the small nutrients like antioxidant, vitamin, et cetera. And this is impossible to synthesize without the help of the microbiology of the soil. So of course there is big impact. And we checked, for instance, the difference between two tomatoes, the same variety, and the same day. They were implanted the same day, the same age. One was produced in the same place, without soil, like most of the tomatoes today, in a greenhouse. Then the second was also in greenhouse, in the same place, same variety, etc. But in the living soil, with a soil with a lot of of life with, they put wood, they put, you call it lombric, lombric is the literal word. Sleos. Yeah, et cetera, et cetera. And we had a difference in antioxidant with different tests, about 40 to 50% for some vitamins.

SPEAKER_01 10:31

Sorry, 40, 4-0, 5-0, right? Not 1-4 or 1-5.

SPEAKER_00 10:34

Yeah, 4-0, 5-0. for vitamin C. We had more, I think it's, I don't remember. For the total antioxidant, it was from 30, 3-0 to 40, 4-0, depending on the test. And for the vitamin C, it was 50, 5-0 percent more. So, but this is an easy test. First

SPEAKER_01 11:01

results, of course. Yeah, easy test, but still, it shows, I will link below because we have... John on the podcast before but also John had a great talk at some point with Dan Kittredge as well to explain that pyramid like it's easy the first few levels you can get without soil but then when you get to the complexer things that we also need but we barely understand then you need living

SPEAKER_00 11:22

soil but after if you compare two soils not one tomato without soil it's more difficult but we had some interesting results with leaves with salad like that. If you compare, so we had more, I don't remember the data exactly, but significantly more antioxidant value in the same soil with the same variety, same season, et cetera. But if you compare organic fertilizer to synthetic fertilizer, nitrogen. So we understand, like in the John Kempf triangle, If you provide a lot of nitrogen at the same time, the plant will use it to make growth, to make leaves, et cetera. But if you provide the nitrogen in an organic fertilizer with manure, a thing like that, then she will use it slowly. And she will be able to synthesize more antioxidants, more small nutrients. And she will need a lot of cofactors that comes not only from nitrogen, but also from the microbiology of the soil. So we discuss a lot with Dan and Dan Kittredge, and we have the same goal. The same goal is to not to say this is good, this is not good, but to say, okay, a tomato is supposed to have a lot of antioxidant, lycopene. A carrot is supposed to have a lot of beta-carotene. So our goal is to say, like we do in In milk, for instance, we say a milk without omega-3, it's like an orange without vitamin C. It's milk, but it's milk from a cow that was fed only with corn and soybean. And if the same cow eats grass, she will have omega-3 in the milk. So if a tomato is grown in the living soil, she will have a certain level of vitamin and of antioxidants. And this antioxidant ratio is very connected to the anti-inflammatory ratio for the animal side. So we continue. So now we want to develop more data with the current analysis, which are quite expensive. And we want to use some new technologies or some old technology like spectrophotometry, but to be able to give a quick view, a quick analysis of the value. And like in the animal side, we say, we think that once the farmer, the producer know the goal, he said, okay, I want this level of vitamin C or this level antioxidant, he will be able to produce it. He will use his own way of making the soil more, with more life, I don't know how you say, but it's a good objective.

SPEAKER_01 14:46

And that doesn't mean like with Bleu Blanqueur, because you have been certifying on omega-3 and 6 and certain specific ratios on animal protein and a lot, like just to give a bit of background, you certify a few billion euros a year in terms of animal protein in France, Belgium, I think Italy partly as well. And so this is not a a tiny label you do a massive amount of pork meat for instance eggs in France milk and other things is it in the plans that vegetables will follow is that the goal to do a similar program

SPEAKER_00 15:20

of course we have already vegetables on the market with the bleu blanc care brand it's quite

SPEAKER_01 15:28

which means you decided what's a good ratio like this is good enough to be

SPEAKER_00 15:32

it's a to

SPEAKER_01 15:33

be to have the

SPEAKER_00 15:34

step we go step by step first our spinach Spinach with a level of vitamin B. Why spinach first? Sorry? Because it's easy. Why spinach first? Why spinach? I don't know. Why spinach? It's the kind of spinach that is eaten by Popeye with a lot of iron. The iron, yeah. It's not iron. It's vitamin B, I think. B9, something like that. So we have spinach. We have salad. We'll probably have tomato very soon. And And we say, okay, that's the level. And the obligation of results is a level of antioxidant. And the obligation of means, you can be organic or you can be other things. Like in France, we call it agriculture for living soil or high value for environment, et cetera. We don't push for obligation of means. We need a minimum. but we have an obligation of results and so we have at the moment the first vegetables and we think we'll have more in the future but we have to go step by step and to implement the first scientific studies and also our own developments to have the tools for the measures because it's difficult. So the first step was probably the the more important to say, okay, what is important? It's probably this oxidant, antioxidant value. After, we'll have to make clinical trials because at the moment, nobody did it. Only very, very few in the literature when comparing, for instance, organic tomatoes to conventional tomatoes, they can find differences in the composition with more antioxidant in the... in the organic tomato, but when you give this tomato to volunteers, you don't find difference in the blood. So it's disappointing. So we'll have to organize it, to do it, and to prove, okay, if you eat this tomato, in a perfect word, if you eat a Bleu Blanquer meal with Bleu Blanquer meat, Bleu Blanquer cheese, and Bleu Blanquer salad and tomato, it will be better for you. We have to prove it. Yeah,

SPEAKER_01 18:11

because that's what you've shown. That's what you've shown with this obligation of outcome, but also a lot of clinical trials over the last decades that the difference with consuming, at least on the animal protein side, are quite strong. You can see it in your blood quite quickly. You can see it if you're breastfeeding quite quickly. You can see the differences in terms of inflammatory disease, etc. And so now you're going out into the vegetable and non-animal protein world to do the same because that hasn't been done I think there's very few studies I mean we've interviewed Stefan von Fleet who's doing a study in the US but I think there are very few randomized control because it's difficult of course it's very tricky but it's so

SPEAKER_00 18:57

easy it's difficult to prove you have a difference if you do it only with tomato for instance it's quite difficult and our goal is to do it with two different meals with all the all the stuff provided by agriculture or conventional agriculture and then the vegetable side is very important too but that's the difference between the it's very difficult to make proof with on the animal side with all our clinical trials except two were done only with dairy products dairy products is very important because it's about one sort of of the total fat that is eaten, at least in France, but of all the fat, including vegetal fat. But all the other clinical trials were done with eggs, plus dairy, plus cold cuts, et cetera. So when you approach global meat with vegetal and animals, I think it will be easier to measure difference.

SPEAKER_01 20:07

So why is dairy such a fundamental focus or has it been until now?

SPEAKER_00 20:14

Well, dairy fat is about one-third of the total fat eaten by an average French consumer. That's the first answer. And the second, the composition of dairy fat is very, very complex. You have something like 400 different fatty acids, and all of them change a lot. So the consequences, even a small fatty acid like conjugated fatty acid or omega-3 or omega-3 fatty acid from dairy fat have a huge impact on human health. So dairy fat, we did two trials that were dedicated to impact of changes in dairy fat. But the main objective of our clinical trial was to have the impact of a complete meal. And it's more difficult to have the specific impact of egg or tomato or bread, etc. Our final goal is to have the impact of a global meal. What

SPEAKER_01 21:19

do you think, I have to ask, of all the dairy alternatives? Has that entered your research somehow? Because of course, over the last 20 years, let's say a lot has changed in the alternative dairy space. What do you see and think there?

SPEAKER_00 21:36

Well, that's a main concern for us, not only for dairy, but for all the animal sectors, that there is a big environmental pressure to decrease the consumption of animal products. And it's true that to produce one calorie or one gram of protein of animal, it costs more in terms of environmental cost than one gram of a vegetable product. But we participate to study in 2014, it's a long time ago, to see what is the good balance between environment and nutrition. From a nutritional side, there is absolutely no possible comparison between soy milk, for instance, and cow's milk. I said in cow's milk, you have 400 different fatty acids. soy milk you have maybe 10 different fatty acids and the variety is the basis for health but you can just like a small

SPEAKER_01 22:47

sentence you mentioned like variety is the basis for health I think that's probably should base all dietary advice on but okay sorry continue

SPEAKER_00 22:56

not only for men same for the soil and for the animals variety is the basis for health so I think we need animal protein, not for protein, but for all the other nutrients which are related to animals, which means some long-chain omega-3 fatty acid, some vitamins, B12, D3, etc. But it's stupid to eat more animal protein with less nutrient density. So today in France we have, I think it's 63% of the protein are animal protein. we can decrease till 50-50, 50% without any nutritional problem. So we can decrease. But if we have a higher density value, higher nutritional density value, at the moment it's just a model, but it's an interesting model. We can decrease to 40% because we'll have more B12 because cows have good rumination, because we have more D3 because cows go outside with the sun and synthesize these vitamins. They will have more omega-3 because they are in pastures, they eat grass, etc. We have this idea to say we can decrease the... We must decrease the animal product consumption because of the environment, but we can decrease, we must decrease and we can decrease because we can have a higher nutrient density value. So nutrient density value for animal and for vegetal is really the basis for change, the agroecological change we all hope. If the consumer understands he can buy a little more because it's good for his health and if this premium is given to the farmer to change the practices, we can say that nutritional density for both animal and vegetal is the key for the change and we need this change in quantity and in quality

SPEAKER_01 25:09

and do you feel like the discussion on this has changed in the last let's say year and a half or year and a few months like since we talked like we were let's say in autumn of 2020 we talked like has it changed i mean we're doing a full series on it but of course we're not we're not the world media etc it feels like there is more discussion or there is more conversation on quality and not necessarily quantity but is it just my bubble? Do you feel that as well in the scientific world, in the consumer world? What is your feeling of the temperature, let's say, of the room?

SPEAKER_00 25:44

Maybe I'm not a good person because I'm so involved that I think all the discussion I have in my world, my small world, I think that the quality, the environmental and the nutritional quality of the food is more and more important. But it's my small world. I don't know. Has your

SPEAKER_01 26:06

small world increased? Do you see new people entering your small world compared to five years ago?

SPEAKER_00 26:13

I think so. When I discussed 20 years ago, 10 years ago, with the people on the dairy side, and I said it's very important to decrease the methane, the greenhouse gas emission from the cows. I said, oh, Pierre, don't tell that. Nobody knows that cows have a responsibility in the greenhouse gas. Nobody knows what is methane, et cetera. Now they know, and now they understand that they have to do things to improve things. But even 10 years ago, the big people in the dairy industry say, no, no, don't say that. It's not our problem. Now they know it's their problem. So they have to change. And of course, they have more interest to change.

SPEAKER_01 27:03

Do you see that methane issue? Is that connected? I mean, we've seen, I think, some signs of that to also the feed of the cow, the health of the cow, like healthy cows and healthy pasture have less? Is that something you've... I mean, we all want that, of course, but is it something you've also seen?

SPEAKER_00 27:22

Well, the first paper we published in the scientific press about methane emission and quality of the feed from the cows was in 2003. So we had a patent on not the way of feeding the cow, but the way of measuring the quantity of methane from the fatty acid and the in the milk but if it has been

SPEAKER_01 27:47

since then why 20 years later are we still saying like basically all cows are the same and all milk is the same all animal protein is the same methane is this and we see this beautiful but very wrong let's say stats of our world in data that I see constantly floating around everywhere is that just ignorance or just not wanting to go into the science

SPEAKER_00 28:08

I think it's related with the discussion we had before I'm not very proud because we knew how it to do 15 years ago. The recognition by the United Nations framework for climate change of our method was in 2012. What have we done since 2012? Not a lot of things. But during years and years, the people from the dairy industry said, as I said before, they were not concerned. They were not involved in the improvement the environmental quality. It was a typical example of greenwashing. Yes, we'll do it, but they didn't do it. But now they have to do it. I'm quite optimistic. I think we have the solution. Not only us, but in the scientific side of the forums, they have a lot of solutions. And now we just have to implement it and I think again if you only say to a consumer you have to buy this milk because the cows who produce this milk decrease the methane emission from 20% I said ok you will not buy it only 2 or 3 like me but if you say it's better for your health you will probably buy it so for me well I'm not a young man anymore but I'm enthusiastic like a young man sometimes because if you can prove, and that's what we've done in this last 20 years, is that the end point is the human health. And if you improve environment, if you improve soil health, plant health, animal health, the consequence will be good for me, for you, for the consumer. I think this is really the end point because you can change the way people buy food and the way people eat. And then you can improve a lot of things. Why we're so concerned about the vegetal side, because of course during these years, when you speak of climate, you need plants, you need a lot of plants, you need a lot of... Living roots. Yeah, you need life in the soils, you need carbon in the soil, it's If people understand that their life is connected to the life of the soil and the life of the animals, they will probably change. I know it's difficult to translate, but there was a political guy in France when I was young who said, he asked people to be civic, they didn't change. So I started to be cynic.

SPEAKER_01 31:14

And that's something like that. Yeah, no, no. It's a selfish, partly selfish or understanding you're part of a bigger system and your life and health depends on that. And have you seen, I was discussing that this morning on something different, but on the organic sector, which took a bit of a hit, let's say last year in some countries where inflation and prices, and especially in the supermarkets, like where you can easily compare one organic brand to a non-organic and people were wondering, and and often with extreme energy costs and extreme other costs. For the first time, many organic brands didn't grow or even lost money and market share. What has been the last few years like for Bleu Blanqueur? Because there it seems that the health connection is a big reason for many to buy. Sorry, long question. How has Bleu Blanqueur been doing for the last, let's say, two years in these crazy times?

SPEAKER_00 32:13

It's still growing. is even growing very well in some sectors. Which is fascinating. Bleu Blancard is an association. And when all the people meet together, it's people, some are farmers, some are consumers, some are retailers. Some are chefs. My job is to put all the people in the same direction, which is not so easy. And one of my big sentences to say what we need to have is a minimal cost for a maximal impact. Sometimes we didn't have a very strong position on the non-GMO, for instance, because non-GMO is a big cost and the impact on environmental health is low. I can understand that we have to fight the GMO, but it's just an example. But for me, the nutrition composition of the food is more important. So we still have an extra cost of something like 5% for a Bleu Blanquer product compared to another product. But it's not so important. So even some retailers, for instance, some big retailer in France, all the milk is Bleu Blanquer, all the eggs are Bleu Blanquer. After people can choose if it's Bleu Blanquer But the basis

SPEAKER_01 33:48

is that.

SPEAKER_00 33:49

Yeah, and so the inflation is a problem, but it's not a big problem like on the organic side because we manage the overcost.

SPEAKER_01 34:02

So do you think it's more that you've been growing because the difference is not so much or in some cases you're just a full, the full milk shelf is, is anyway, so that, that doesn't, or has it to do with the interest from the consumer for health has not gone down over the last couple of years or if you, I mean, of course you don't know, but what, what does your feeling say?

SPEAKER_00 34:24

Well, I should, I would like to answer it because the consumer want to buy something which is healthier. But I'm not sure I'm honest if I say that. It's because we had to convince not only consumers, but the people who put the food on the market, which means retailers, brands, etc. And for them, Bleu Blanquer, it's a good choice because now it's about 64%, I think, of the French consumers know what is Bleu Blanquer. They recognize the logo. They I don't know what it is, but they have a positive view. Even last year in France, Suddenly, my view is mainly French. In France, all the labels, organic red labels, decrease in terms of trust from the consumers. But not Bleu Blanquer. Bleu Blanquer grew in interest. So it's probably not enough, but we started from zero. Yeah, 64

SPEAKER_01 35:32

in 20 years is a lot.

SPEAKER_00 35:36

Even if the people don't know exactly what it is. We have now 30,000 people in the Bleu Blanquer Association. Some of them are health professionals, some of them are farmers, some of them are just consumers. A lot of them, let's say some of them, but important in France are chefs from big restaurants. Thierry Marx, which is a very famous chef in France, is now the official guy who talks for So it's important if you go to a restaurant or if you go to your physician and say, oh, Bleu Blanquer is good for you. Well, that's important. And of course, you need to convince them with the data, data for the chef and data for the physician. It's not the same data, but we have the data.

SPEAKER_01 36:35

Speaking of which, what has been exciting on the data side over the last two years, let's say, what has been interesting or two plus years in terms of studies, because you're continuously, of course, doing a lot of different studies. We talked about inflammation, I think, last time, of course, in terms of COVID, but also on the breastfeeding side, there were some very interesting studies. What has been exciting that you're working on or that has come out or that you are excited to share in terms of the science?

SPEAKER_00 37:04

Well, maybe, I'm sorry because I don't have the results of the trial, but the trial with the pregnant mother is finished now. The trial with? With the pregnant mothers that practice breastfeeding. So I spoke of this trial two years ago, and now the trial is finished, and we'll have the results in the next weeks or months. But the experimental scheme is very interesting because we had two groups of mothers that were recruited at a six-month visit at the hospital. And they received from six months to the birth, they received a Bleu Blanquer product or conventional product, the same meal, same quantity of egg, milk, bread, et cetera. Only the way of production, the food was different. It's very small, like in all our trials, the experimental variable was very little. You have the same meal, only the way of producing the food is different. And we measured three things. First is the quality, the composition of the milk, of the breast milk, of course, at 21 days and 40 days. So I hope we'll see something. And the second thing is the microbiote of the baby. So we took the feces of the baby. The human treasure, as

SPEAKER_01 38:48

we call

SPEAKER_00 38:49

it, yeah. Yeah, the human treasure, yeah. And we'll check. I don't know what we'll see, but what we will check. We'll check, is there something on the microbiote of the baby, which means the future of the baby? related not only to the way her mother ate during the pregnancy, but the way the cow, the chicken, etc. ate before the pregnancy. And the second footprint will be what we call the epigenetic footprint. Now the science have some interesting things about what they call predictive medicine. It's R And A, it's non-invasive. We'll check in the two different group of mother in the composition of the milk if we find this non-invasive markers of what can happen in the future, called predictive medicine. It's quite complicated. I don't know if we'll see something, if we'll have results. But anyway, to check with such a small difference of the way food is produced, to look for differences in the footprints for epigenetic footprint, microbiote footprint, and biochemical footprint, it's quite interesting and I'm quite proud to participate to this kind of trial. So you have to interview me another time when I have the results. With great

SPEAKER_01 40:25

pleasure. It's fascinating because I think you've done already some breastfeeding work before, right, where you have seen effect, but not this explicit or this deep and definitely not with double blind.

SPEAKER_00 40:41

It's always the same with science. You do a trial because you want to have a result. Once you have a result, you have half an answer and 10 new questions. So we did it at a small scale. We did it with mothers that have eaten Bleu Blanquer, only an experimental group, and we compared to the the average value of the breast milk in France. And we had huge differences. So now we did this trial. Double click, you need to go

SPEAKER_01 41:14

deeper.

SPEAKER_00 41:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:17

Fascinating. And are there any plans for, I mean, of course you're going to do, but with the veggie side as well, or are you immediately stepping to, okay, let's do a full meal?

SPEAKER_00 41:28

Now, on the veggie side, what I would like to do is to do a trial to see, because we, I spoke of oxidant, antioxidant value of the pulses, but we don't know if this, so give a good view of the health of the tomato, for instance, that all this antioxidant available for men, we don't know. I remember the first human trial I did in 2000. I was presenting results of trials we did before on milk and eggs at the Congress, and then a physician came and said, Pierre, you didn't prove anything. Maybe you have more omega-3 in eggs. That's what happens when men eat the egg. Maybe the omega-3 will be oxidized. Maybe they will disappear maybe they will use that energy you have to do a human trial wow human trial but he was true so we have to do it on the vegetal side also if not it will prove a better health for the tomato but not for men who eat tomatoes this will be the future and

SPEAKER_01 42:50

are you expecting differences also because people are talking about your own microbiome of course you're looking at the one of the babies that you ability to absorb because i can eat a carrot that has 20 times the barocarotene but if i'm not able to absorb that is that something you're worried about interested in excited or a combination of all

SPEAKER_00 43:12

that's that's the reason i want to to do at the end of my career i want to do a clinical trial with the whole meal because the the relationship between the animal and vegetal side the relationship between inflammatory process and antioxidant process are huge and it's difficult science is so reductionist yeah very good specialist of oxidation of the tomato and very good specialist of the inflammatory in the milk but put everything together that's life, that's health and to make a relation with the health of the soil and of the animals and the plants, that's the real life. And if we can check what are the results of changing everything from the soil, that's a noble goal. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 44:11

And hopefully we'll be checking in a few times. Until then, I want to be conscious of your time as well. And thank you so much for this update. Any final things you would like to share or should we be checking in soonish when the first results are coming in? And of course, when you're ready for a whole meal, come because that's going to be quite a research.

SPEAKER_00 44:31

Yeah, no, it's a good conclusion. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 44:34

Thank you so much again for your time and good luck with all the work.

SPEAKER_00 44:38

Yeah, thank you very much. Good luck for you too and thank you. Bye.

SPEAKER_01 44:47

Thanks again and see you next time.