Parag Acharya joined Department of Food and Market in NRI, University of Greenwich, UK in 2020. He has 14 years of industrial R&D experience in food FMCG and biotechnology before returning to academia. He led food innovation projects for Unilever and has successful track record of developing plant-based product and process technologies for brands like Knorr and Hellmann’s. As a part of Food and Nutrition Sustainability Initiative (FaNSI) in NRI, Parag is leading climate-smart food research and innovation program with particular interest in alternative protein-based food.

Parag championed several multi-partner public-private collaborations (funded by EU-FP7 ITN, TKI-Agri Food, BBSRC-CTPs, GCRF, STFC Food Network+ etc.) and published 23 peer reviewed publications (h-index 11 and 459 total citations). He is representing NRI in the Growing Kent and Medway project (funded by £17.8million UKRI Strength in Places grant) to set up a regional agri-food innovation cluster, leading the development of Medway Food Innovation Centre and PI for projects on alternative proteins.  

Education

• PhD (Bioorganic Chemistry): Uppsala University, Sweden, 2003
• M. Sc. (Chemistry): Visva Bharati University, India, 1996

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