Category: Podcast

Hafliði Halldórsson, manager of the Icelandic lamb marketing agency, and Óli Þór Hilmarsson, project manager at Matís, are the interviewees in Matvælin this time, but earlier in the year they completed research on the utilization rate and chemical content of lamb and by-products.

The project was carried out by Matís and the marketing agency Íslenskt lambkjöt in close cooperation with production centers in both the north and the south. The project was launched so that it would be possible to provide new and reliable data to replace the 20-30 year old data that was normally relied on and had become obsolete. The lack of new and up-to-date data on utilization and nutritional value led to a high level of marketing efforts for lamb meat and side products both on the domestic and export markets.

It is both fun and informative to listen to these professionals talk about the issue that is clearly dear to them. The episode is available on all major podcasts, but you can also listen to it in the player below.

Sophie Jensen, project manager in Matís' professional group that deals with biomaterials, has worked on most of the plastic-related projects that have been done at the company.

She is a real source of wisdom in matters related to the plastic problem in society, environmentally friendly solutions when it comes to packaging materials for food, ways to reduce plastic in homes and the effects of plastic on people.

This episode is particularly informative and deals with an issue that affects us all – plastic!

You can listen to the episode in the player below or on all major podcast stations.

Sæmundur Sveinsson is genetics manager at Matís and in this episode of Matvælin he talks about salmon genetic analysis and projects related to it.

The Atlantic salmon is a remarkable organism and its life cycle has very interesting implications for the genetics of the species. The wild Icelandic salmon population is very different from farmed salmon, and it is extremely important to know the characteristics of these species well in order to be able to maintain diversity even though environmental conditions change, including global warming.

In the episode, Sæmundur discusses the life cycle of Icelandic salmon and its genetic diversity depending on the water area, genetic analysis of salmon from sea hog farming and genetic analysis of salmon for so-called fish farming, to name a few. Sæmundi's song deals with these issues in an easy-to-understand and fun way, so it's safe to recommend listening to everyone!

The episode is available in its entirety on all major podcasts and in the player below:

Hildur Inga Sveinsdóttir, project manager at Matís is an interviewee in this episode of Matvælin, Matís' podcast about research and innovation in food production.

It talks about the value hidden in raw materials that we can get out of food processing, but which are not the main material we are working with; so-called side ingredients. She connects all of this with the European collaborative project Accelwater, which she is currently working on.

Iceland has long been at the forefront of the utilization of secondary raw materials, and one of the raw materials that is interesting to evaluate both with an opportunity for value creation and environmental issues in mind is water from, for example, fish processing plants and farm farms. The Accelwater project is about finding solutions to make use of the value of process water and the best use of water in the fishing and farming industries.

Hilda's passion for delivering the content of the Accelwater project clearly and reliably shines through in this interview, and listeners can therefore expect an informative and refreshing listen.

The show is available on all major podcasts and also in the player below.

Sæmundur Sveinsson, head of genetics at Matís, is an interviewee in this episode of Matvælin, and he talks about genetic research and breeding of Icelandic livestock species in a way that everyone can understand and keep their attention!

In Iceland, some livestock stocks are specifically Icelandic, while others are imported. Cattle, horses, sheep and goats are entirely of Icelandic stock, and this means that Icelandic operators are the only ones in the world who breed these four types of livestock.

At Matís, we have mainly worked with three species, i.e. cattle, horses and sheep and research on these populations is discussed here.

The episode is available in its entirety on all major podcasts and in the player below:

Snorri Páll Ólason is an interviewer in Matvælin this time. He discusses his master's project, Hákarlsverkun, which was done in collaboration with Bjarnarhöfn tourism, the largest producer of best shark in Iceland with a grant from the Food Fund.

The tradition of shark eating in Iceland is rich and can be traced back centuries. Despite this, very few scientific studies have been conducted to examine or improve the mechanism of action of these foods. Snorri, together with several of Matís' staff, worked on improvements there.

The conversation with Snorra is light and fun as he goes over, for example, the culture surrounding shark eating, the science behind the fact that working on sharks is necessary since the process of curing is both a preservation method and a detoxification process, persistent myths about curing and much more.

Listen to the full episode on all major podcast stations or in the player below:

Ólafur Reykdal and Eydís Ylfa Erlendsdóttir are experts in the Icelandic database on the chemical content of foods, which is always called ÍSGEM. They are interviewees in this episode of Matvælin, Matís' podcast about research and innovation in food production.

In the episode, they discuss the history of ÍSGEM and the purpose of the database, whose history can be traced back to 1987, when the nutrients of various foods were recorded for the first time in Iceland. They also discuss the value of ÍSGEM and discuss why it is important that people in Iceland have access to verified, quality-assessed information about food and nutrients in open access.

They also discuss how the data can be accessed and used, what the current state of the data is, where the opportunities lie and, not least, how the base could be added to and expanded so that it becomes a universal information source for food.

Listen to the full episode here: