Credit Suisse says trillions of dollars will be spent on making food more sustainable — and picks the stocks to cash in

Harvesting winter wheat in Kirkland, Illinois.
Daniel Acker | Bloomberg | Getty Images

A raft of U.S. and global stocks in the food sector are set to outperform as companies address pressing issues like carbon emissions, malnutrition and waste, according to analysts at Credit Suisse.

Trillions of dollars need to be invested to address these issues, the investment bank said in a research note published June 8, and named 25 stocks that it says are enabling a more sustainable food system.

The challenges identified by the bank include the "double burden" of malnutrition, with almost 700 million people across the world undernourished and 40% of adults either overweight or obese, and the environmental impact of food production and food waste.

"In this report we review how food production and importantly consumption needs to change in order to address these challenges, the cost of which we estimate to amount to $13.6trn annually," the analysts, led by Eugene Klerk, wrote.

Here are a dozen of the bank's outperform-rated "sustainable food" stocks: