Australian pulse crops could be used to supply nutritious food for the defence force and aged care, helping diversify markets and benefiting domestic industries.

Wilson International Trade director and Queensland pulse grower Peter Wilson presented at the University of Western Australia’s Institute of Agriculture 20th Annual Industry Forum on July 8.

Mr Wilson said industry needed to begin sourcing new markets, rather than competing with others, and could turn its focus away from supermarket supply and target food supply for institutions such as prisons, hospitals, aged care and the defence industry, which were worth up to $50 billion a year across Australia.

He noted many of these had nutritional benchmarks and said agriculture had a role to play in not only providing for institutions but also to reduce their costs.

“There’s really quite large institutional demand out there that could be influenced, because pulses being added into the rotation or the ration of the diet can hit the nutritional requirements which are largely regulatory,” he said.

“If you’re an aged care facility, you’ve got regulatory requirements, you must feed people properly — and no one’s got any money.

“Pulses have a role to play in reducing the cost per meal in aged care and hospitals, the defence force, prisons, all those sorts of places.”

Across the aged care sector between 220 and 330 million meals are provided each year, worth between $1.5 billion and $3.5 billion in food system value and could be catered for with a mix of lentils, field peas, chickpeas and faba beans.

Mr Wilson said it was an opportunity to redesign the food system and maximise domestic markets while ensuring nutritional and regulatory needs were met.

“Hospitals, police, military, prison system, as well as aged care . . . it’s a significant slice of the business that runs parallel to the broader food system,” he said.

“There’s no reason why we can’t put several million tonnes of pulses into genuinely value-added hands.”

Australia produces between three and five million tonnes of pulses annually, with WA producing 120,000 tonnes last year.

“The pulse industry isn’t going to take on the red meat industry . . . if it comes down to cost per point of protein, soybeans win, so then what we have to do is demonise soybeans as our other vegetarian protein because they’re grown in Brazil,” Mr Wilson said.

“If we have to exist by demonising another commodity, then we’re not going to survive.

“It’s about complementarity and it’s about using a bit of ambush marketing.”