There is often little common ground to be found in the many and varied trend reports compiled across the globe each January.
But while this year’s selection of forecasts is as unpredictable as ever, there is one upcoming trend many appear to agree on – the emergence of ube.
Already ubiquitous across its native Philippines, trend watchers believe the bright purple yam could be set for international adoption, with Forbes describing the colourful tuber as “the uber ingredient of 2023” and forecasting agency WGSN suggesting ube is “poised to become a super-influential flavour across food and drink categories worldwide”.
Pronounced ‘oo-beh’, ube is often likened to sweet potato or pumpkin, though its rising popularity – and increasing presence on social media – is largely linked to its use as a dessert component. Offering a nutty, subtly vanilla-like flavour, WSGN suggests a rise which began in hipster bakeries – see Miami-based Manila Social Club’s $100 ‘gold-ube donut, adorned with icing made with Cristal champagne and filled with an ube mousse, champagne jelly, and covered with 24k Gold’ – could now be about to go globally mainstream.
In evidence, everyone from Starbucks to Hilton has now jumped on the trend, while US grocery chain Trader Joe’s has introduced a sought-after limited edition range of ube products, including gluten-free Ube Mochi Pancake & Waffle Mix and Ube Mochi.
Behind the colourful Intagram posts and Tik Tok cookie videos, however, speculation is mounting about the impact ube’s moment in the spotlight could be about to have on the Philippines farming community.
In October, the country’s Usapang Agribiz: Purple Yam Forum explored the numerous challenges facing purple yam farmers in the face of rising international demand. The industry still cannot take advantage, warned Dr. Anabella Tulin of Visayas State University, because of several limitations, including a single ube harvest period per year, uneven crop quality and a lack of farmer-to-market opportunities.
Her concerns follow the 2021 release of the UN World Food Programme’s first ever Climate Change and Food Security Analysis (CCFSA) study of the Philippines, which warned of the need for a significant overhaul of the country’s farming sector due to the mounting impact of climate change.
Fears for farms
The Philippines already experiences more tropical cyclones than any other nation in the world, leaving coastal communities – such as Bohol Island, Visayas, the largest producer of ube – at risk of flooding and rising sea levels. Inland farming populations, meanwhile, face their own issues in rising temperatures, drought and crop failure. The overall picture, the UN warns, is deeply concerning for the nearly 10 million Filipinos working in the agriculture sector – and the more than 109 million Filipinos they feed.
“The agriculture sector is at the forefront of the climate crisis and farmers and fishers need urgent support,” said WFP representative and country director, Brenda Barton. “We need to get ahead of climate change by acting collectively to protect the lives and livelihoods of farmers and millions of others who work in the sector. By supporting them, we contribute to better food security for all Filipinos.”
Barton’s concerns are neither new nor unexpected. As far back as 2019, the Filipino brand Good Shepherd, famed for its purple ube jam, was forced to shift to use of white yams, citing climate-related constraints in production of the purple version.
“Due to changing climate, our ube farmers are having difficulty growing ube,” it said in a Facebook post. “It has been our struggle in the recent years to find a stable supply. And in the past weeks there were none.”
More recently, FEATR, a channel dedicated to food, travel and Filipino culture, released a documentary entitled Is Ube Being Stolen from the Philippines? The message? Behind the global clamour for Instagrammable purple pastry lie concerns about the unstable supply of a food with a strong cultural and indigenous identity.
Today, a number of government-led programs have been set up to help local farmers improve the quality of their ube crop, while the UN has called for examination of new crop variants which could be better suited to the Philippines’ changing climate.
For the moment, however, as exponentially increasing global demand risks outstripping supply, responsible food fans may want to look elsewhere for their next Instagram post.