2025.2.21
From Umami to Impact: How Ajinomoto Aligns Growth with Global Sustainability Goals
At Cadira Capital Management, our mission is "Connecting the Investment Chain and Beyond". Collaborative relationships with internal and external stakeholders are essential to achieving our mission. We therefore seek to deepen the relationship of trust with our stakeholders by disclosing specific details of our activities, including dialogue with the companies in which we invest.
This month, we'll report on our dialogue with Ajinomoto Co., Inc.
Ajinomoto is the largest seasoning manufacturer in Japan. The company operates across diverse business areas, leveraging amino acids for processed foods, frozen foods, biotechnology, animal feed, and semiconductor insulation materials. Ajinomoto was also an early mover in global expansion and now operates in over 130 countries and regions, holding a significant market share in the seasoning industry, particularly in Asia.
In 2020, Ajinomoto established a new group vision and set outcome-based goals for 2030: "Help Extend the Healthy Life Expectancy of 1 Billion People" and "Reduce Our Environmental Impact by 50%."
The company aims to achieve the first goal by expanding the reach of umami seasonings and increasing the number of consumers benefiting from reduced-sodium products or protein-enriched products. At Cadira Capital Management, we believe that this KPI not only reflects Ajinomoto’s unique strength in AminoScience® and its efforts to address social challenges but also contributes to economic value creation by expanding the number of consumers served and increasing product unit prices. Accordingly, we track and manage its progress closely.
As of FY2024, the number of beneficiaries has reached 940 million, bringing the company closer to its 2030 target. Given this progress, we engaged in discussions with the company regarding the possibility of setting a new goal. Specifically, we explored whether to further increase the number of people benefiting from extended healthy life expectancy, whether to adopt a different KPI given the rising revenue contribution from non-food segments, or whether to establish KPIs for Ajinomoto’s emerging businesses, which, despite their smaller scale, offer unique and additional impact.
At Cadira Capital Management, we are paying attention to two products that demonstrate high additionality (the extent of incremental contribution to impact) within Ajinomoto’s initiatives. The first is biostimulants, agricultural materials that enhance the natural resilience of plants. Biostimulants is expected to help mitigate environmental stress, improve crop yields, and reduce environmental impact. Based on current sales volumes, estimates suggest that Ajinomoto's biostimulants could contribute to food production equivalent to feeding 50 million people annually in the case of wheat. The second is amino acid lysine supplements for cattle, which, when mixed into feed, reduce methane emissions from cows’ burps, potentially cutting CO₂ emissions by one ton per cow. As these biostimulants and amino acid lysine supplements align with Ajinomoto's efforts to address social challenges, we will continue to monitor their progress closely.
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