9:40-10:20 State of the Chinese pet food market
Melody Shu, Tmall Global pet category leader, shares an overview of the Chinese pet market and of Tmall, one of the largest e-commerce platforms worldwide, and its parent company, Alibaba. She explains Tmall Global’s showcase of pet brands and the impact of Chinese pet food import regulations.

 

Shu is Tmall Global’s pet category leader with eight years of e-commerce experience. She is one of the entrepreneurs of Tmall Global's pet business, starting from scratch. With her efforts, Tmall has become one of the top leading platforms in pet industry. Shu has hands-on experience in the pet industry and has helped many brands enter and expand their businesses in China.

 

10:20-11:00    Update on China’s pet food production and the influence of new pet food regulations

Wang Jinquan, Ph.D., associate professor with the Feed Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, provides the latest data on the country’s pet food manufacturing facilities and production, and reports on the influences of new pet food regulations that took effect in May 2018.

 

Wang is a member and advisor of the committee of pet food regulation and helped draft the Ministry of Rural and Agricultural in China’s pet food regulations. He is also a team leader of the Petfood Quality and Safety Standards setting Project. In addition to publishing a book, he also serves as a consultant with several big pet food manufacturers in China. Wang was a visiting scholar at the University of Guelph in 2007. He earned a bachelor’s degree in animal husbandry and nutrition and a master’s degree in animal nutrition from Shenyang Agricultural University, then a doctorate in animal nutrition and feed sciences from the department of Graduate School of CAAS.

 

11:40-12:20    Launching your pet food brand in China: strategies and tips for success

Jerel Kwek, co-founder and CEO of Addiction Pet Foods, offers practical insights for foreign brands to enter the Chinese market, covering topics such as adhering to product nutritional standards, registering products, meeting labeling standards and selecting marketing channels.

 

Addiction Pet Foods is New Zealand's largest dry pet food plant and the only dry pet food company accredited to export the full range of proteins into China. Kwek has extensive experience in pet food product development, food safety, manufacturing and marketing. He dropped out of Wharton Business School to set up Addiction to help his Golden Retriever Zack recover from debilitating food allergies. Addiction exports to over 15 countries and has offices in China, New Zealand, U.S. and Singapore.

 

12:20-13:00    How egg products support all the latest trends in pet food nutrition, production and marketing

Will Henry, director of technology/R&D for Extru-Tech, and Ingmar Middelbos, Ph.D., senior technical services manager for IsoNova Technologies, share results of recent research studying egg-based ingredients, their nutritional benefits and processing efficacy and challenges.

 

Henry has a bachelor’s degree in engineering (CCC 93, KSU 95). He has been an integral part of the pet food extrusion industry for more than 20 years. For the past 12 years, his focus has been in the area of research, both in the refinement of the single screw extruder production architecture and the development/investigation of new product development for the pet food market.

 

At IsoNova Technologies, Middelbos is accountable for research and development activities in egg products, including new product development from concept through scale-up, product improvements via process improvements and customer requests and concept development to demonstrate value of existing and new portfolio products. Middelbos holds a doctorate and master’s degree in companion animal nutrition from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, as well as a master’s degree in animal husbandry with an agricultural economics minor from Wageningen University.

 

Emma Bermingham, Ph.D., senior scientist with AgResearch, presents research looking at various novel, fibrous ingredients to understand their impacts on the composition and function of the gastrointestinal microbiome, fermentation end products and fecal health of cats and dogs.

 

Bermingham obtained a bachelor of applied science honors degree in animal science and doctorate from Massey University, based at AgResearch. She undertook several post-doctoral positions including at the Waltham Centre of Pet Nutrition. In 2007 she returned to AgResearch to investigate the effects of diet on intestinal health, and in 2009 was appointed senior scientist responsible for conducting commercial and applied nutritional research for companion animals. Bermingham’s research interests include the effects of diet on intestinal health for companion animals, focusing on intestinal microbiota.

 

Juan Gomez-Basauri, Ph.D., global director of the companion animal business for Alltech, reviews known mechanisms of inflammation in dogs and provides new data on emerging beneficial nutrients and dietary factors to reduce oxidative stress, enhance gut health and inform specific inflammatory biomarkers.

 

Gomez-Basauri is responsible for Alltech’s pet food business, food ingredients and human health technologies. Gomez received a bachelor’s degree from Universidad Federico Villareal, a master’s degree in food science from Leeds University and a doctorate in food science from Cornell University. Gomez held a post-doctoral position at Cornell University before joining Ralston Purina International as director for research and technology in Peru. He is the past chair of the AFIA Nutrition Committee, a member of the American Dairy Science Association, the Institute of Food Technology, the New York Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

 

15:50-16:30    New social media has changed Chinese pet food brands

Wang Tianfei, president of Petking Pet School and consultant to Chinese pet food companies, introduces a new phenomenon in China's pet food industry: the use of new social media and technologies such as WeChat and TikTok to increase pet food sales, adopt new product ideas and continue the domestic market’s rapid growth.

 

In addition to president of Petking Pet School and a consultant to Chinese pet food companies, Wang is also an author of pet nutrition course textbooks, a senior pet nutritionist and chief advisor of multiple pet food manufacturing companies.

 

Dejan Miladinovic, a Ph.D. candidate and head of the Center for Feed Technology at Norwegian University of Life Sciences, explains emerging technologies that can help with overall use of functional molecules from novel raw material sources and contribute to improved pet health and sustainable production.

 

Miladinovic has been working at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences since 2005, teaching courses related to feed and food technology. He obtained his master’s degree in feed manufacturing technology from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences and a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Oslo. Currently he is a doctoral candidate at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences. Currently, Miladinovic does the research related to characterization of single-cell-protein ingredients (microalgae and yeasts) and integration of enzymatic nano-components in the feed matrix.

 

17:10-17:50    Algal polysaccharides to improve gut health and immunity in pets

Virgil Meallet, DVM, technical director of Olmix Asia, shares results of a recent research project in collaboration with INRA (France) that highlighted the potential of in-feed marine macroalgal polysaccharides (a red algal extract from Solieria Chordalis) to strengthen animals’ gut biological defenses.

 

Meallet obtained his doctorate in veterinary medicine from Liege University. He has years of veterinary experience, starting as a mixed vet practitioner in rural France, operating on wounded hunting dogs and cattle, before moving to a referral hospital in Marseilles to acquire more acute internal medicine skills in nutrition and dermatology. Since 2012, Meallet is the technical director at Olmix. The core of the business is dedicated to the livestock industry, but the group is implementing innovative solutions for plant, animal and human care, including gut health and immunity.