At AgroGrINTech, a Portuguese startup, it kicked off with a pilot unit in Pedrouços, in Maia, that transforms pineapple waste into high-value ingredients for aquaculture. The unit produces bromelain, an enzyme extracted from the fruit’s leftovers that, when applied in the production of proteolytic hydrolysates, contributes to improving digestibility, health and growth of farmed sea bass and gilt-head bream. The enzyme’s anti-inflammatory, digestive and antioxidant properties also open doors to other industries, such as pharmaceutical, food and cosmetics.
Investment in the unit totals around 1.2 million euros by the end of 2026, drawn from funds from the Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR) and private investment, and the greatest achievement, according to the company, was proving that the process is scalable: in moving from the laboratory to the pilot unit, the extraction yields validated in the lab were maintained, thanks to line optimization. “This optimization, still within the PRR framework, allowed quadrupling the productive capacity forecast for 2025. The unit went from 50 kilograms to about 200 kilograms of bromelain per year, from about 120 tonnes of pineapple by-products,” explains Débora Campos, CEO and founder of AgroGrINTech. From the same process, pineapple flours are produced, which allows utilizing virtually all of the by-product, in a zero-waste model.
Pineapple was not chosen by chance. It is one of the fruits richest in bromelain, concentrated precisely in the parts that are normally discarded, such as the peel and the core. The company itself was born out of the need to find a destination for the waste that a Portuguese company produced daily in large quantities. “Bromelain has anti-inflammatory and digestive properties that improve the absorption of nutrients and the health of fish, with significant benefits for aquaculture,” says Débora Campos.
The unit was developed within Pep4Fish, a project led by the ETSA Group that uses by-products of the food industry to create more sustainable feeds for sea bass and gilt-head bream and that integrates the Blue Bioeconomy Pact, one of the PRR mobilising agendas. With the process scaled, AgroGrINTech now enters the commercialization phase: after selling small test batches to the food industry, it aims to close its first supply contracts in 2027 and open at the beginning of this year a fundraising round for commercialization and internationalization, which should also strengthen the team, currently six people.
