CBC celebrated its 100th anniversary in January 2025. The Chemicals & Materials Division (CM Division), which has the longest history in the company, has been involved in the planning, development and sales of various chemical products. Did you know that the division is also working on future-oriented initiatives in the food industry?

In this article, we will introduce the group within the CM Division that handles food-related businesses. We will cover the group’s initiatives and the market potential of “pea protein” handled by the group, which is expected to grow going forward.

Providing Foodstuffs, Additives and Packaging Materials to Food Manufacturers

Group 4 of the CM Division, based in Tokyo, specializes in “foods and packaging.” It purchases foodstuffs, additives and packaging materials, which they sell primarily to domestic food processing manufacturers.

The products handled by the group can be broadly divided into three sectors: foodstuffs, food additives and food packaging materials.

In the “foodstuff” sector, the group handles ingredients that are widely used in the food and beverage industry, such as frozen fruits, tomato paste and tea leaves. In addition to the lineup that responds to growing health consciousness, such as functional food ingredients, the group also handles ingredients such as oligosaccharides and dietary fiber. It offers not only ingredients from overseas but also a wide selection of domestically produced products including sugar, fruit juice and tea leaves.

In the “food additive” sector, the group sells various ingredients used to preserve and process foods, such as preventing food oxidation and adding nutrition to foods. Additives are necessary to stabilize food quality while bringing out its flavor. For instance, citric acid is used to prevent food from deteriorating, and carrageenan is used to give ice cream its smooth texture.

In the “food packaging material” sector, the group handles containers and films to properly protect and safely distribute food and beverages. It handles materials for various applications, such as plastic containers and paper cartons for lactic acid beverages, or films for plastic containers, all while also focusing on reducing the environmental impact of the packaging.

Group 4, which specializes in “foods and packaging,” originally consisted of the “Food Group”, the “Packaging Materials Group” and the “Chemicals Group” handling additives, and each group operated as separate departments.

However, it is often the case with “foodstuffs”, i.e. the food manufactures that are the target of the sales activities of these groups, that both the contents of the products and the “packaging materials” used to wrap them are collectively handled by the same department. Therefore, sales activities to the same company or department were conducted by different groups within CBC. The three groups were integrated about eight years ago to improve this situation.

Integrating the functions of these groups has made it possible to propose comprehensive solutions from foodstuffs to packaging materials, enabling the group to respond flexibly to customer needs.

Pea Protein Attracts Attention as a Sustainable Source of Protein

“The First Step is to Get People to Use Peas”—A Strategy for Developing New Markets

CBC has been the sole distributor in the Japanese market of “PISANE™ ”, a pea protein produced by Belgian company Cosucra Groupe Warcoing S.A. since about 20 years ago, and CBC has been promoting sales and PR activities to expand the domestic market.

Peas are mainly produced in Canada and France, and are more familiar to Western consumers than soybeans. In Japan, the market for pea protein remains small due to differences in daily eating habits.

In order to sell pea protein more widely, it is necessary to develop the domestic market and generate demand, which calls for the creation of new products utilizing PISANE™.

CBC has been deepening relationships with various manufacturers and research institutions in parallel with sales activities targeting existing customers. Sales activities of pea protein include participating in trade shows and providing samples of PISANE™ to research institutes interested in the product and manufacturers developing new products. In order to create new hit products and generate new demand, the group is promoting initiatives with an awareness of “getting people to use PISANE™ even in small amounts as a first step.”

However, sales activities for peas require efforts to “create a market from scratch,” whereas soybeans, which already have a large demand, “do not need to develop a market.” The reason for taking on such difficult and time-consuming sales activities is that “it allows us to take advantage of CBC’s strength,” says the representative of Group 4.

Creating New Business by Leveraging Our Proximity to End-Users

According to the representative, the strength of Group 4, which handles a wide range of products including foodstuffs, additives and packaging materials, is “our proximity to end-users due to the nature of our products.”

The products handled by other groups in the CM Division are mainly ingredients that undergo multiple processes before they become final products. On the other hand, most products handled by Group 4 are provided directly to food manufacturers. Group 4 is different to other groups in the CM Division in that it is close not only to upstream logistics but also to consumers (end-users) and major food manufacturers that have direct connection with consumers.

One of the major advantages of this proximity is being able to directly hear the real voices of customers. By being exposed to issues that are unique to food manufactures facing consumers and industry trends, it is sometimes possible to create new initiatives.

For instance, Group 4 has started selling bioplastic raw materials and reusable composite plastic materials in recent years as part of its initiatives.

This initiative is in response to the need of domestic food and beverage manufacturers to address environmental issues, combined with the technical information CBC has acquired through its overseas expansion. CBC is also strengthening its own efforts to address environmental issues, such as by investing in companies in the plastic recycling space.

The future goal of Group 4 is to develop value-added proposal activities rather than simply providing products, by sharing with customers overseas trends obtained through purchasing materials from all over the world. The group will make the most of its strength—being close to end-users—to create markets that go beyond conventional business models and take on new challenges that reflect the times we live in.