Food supplements from shrimp shells

The next stop took our group from Dalvik to Siglufjordur, a journey of approximately 60 kilometers, to visit Genis, an innovative Icelandic biotechnology company pioneering the development of pharmaceutical chitin derivatives. Genis has been developing food supplements that targets chitinase-like proteins which combat inflammation and tissue regeneration. Fellows were welcomed by Jón Garðar, chief operating officer of Genis. Jón described the company’s structure and introduced the products currently on the market and in development. He explained the goals and the future strategy of Genis. FTP fellows engaged with Jón in an interesting discussion on the side effects of food supplements, the process of creating pharmaceutical food supplements from shrimp shells, and lessons learnt from the development of the product. Fellows were very interested in the Genis model as it uses by-product discards from shrimp fisheries and were keen to see whether this company could create a prosperous market for this by-product in the future.