• An ecosystem involving multiple stakeholders will be very much indispensable to the healthy long-term growth of impact investing in China, according to Tao Zhang.
• The latest investment in Starfield signals an increasing focus by the group to tackle the huge environmental impact in food production
• Zhang believes millennials in China can be geared towards alternative meat and related products.

Cross-border impact venture Dao Foods International, which aims to introduce environmentally friendly plant-based and clean meat in China, announced on 12 March its latest impact investment in Starfield Food and Science Technology Limited, a food technology company headquartered in Shenzhen, in partnership with New Crop Capital (NCC). 

Dao Ventures, a cross-border impact investment, advisory and accelerator group with co-headquartered offices in both China and the United States, was co-founded by Tao Zhang. He also founded China Impact Fund (CIF) with the backing of a Hong Kong-based family foundation and several high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) in Mainland China. CIF is considered as China’s first impact fund specialising in supporting environmental small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

So far, the Dao Ventures consortium, along with its philanthropic affiliate Green Startups Accelerator, has invested in, assisted and provided a variety of services to over 1,000 SMEs and accelerated over 100 ventures. It has also made and/or facilitated investments of over $200 million in addition to providing over 40 seed grants of $500 to $20,000 to impact ventures across the United States, Canada, Israel and China.

Since August 2019, Dao Foods has been hosting Boot Camps across China to catalyse sustainable plant-based protein food entrepreneurship and has also announced the establishment of the China Next Gen Good Food Incubator to more effectively identify, nurture and support entrepreneurial projects like Sta...

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