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In order for people to eat meat, animals must die. More and more people are becoming aware of this in everyday life and at least giving up the daily piece of meat. Also because, in some cases, there have long been good alternatives that one or two meat lovers dare to try.
In 2019, for example, pea burger patties from start-up Beyond Meat sparked a real hype and have long been found on restaurant and bar menus. There are also tasty alternatives on the sausage shelf.
They are often based on plant products such as soy, the production of which is sometimes associated with damage to the environment because forests need to be cleared or long transport routes are involved. For years, companies have therefore been working on a completely different approach: they produce meat in the laboratory. Singapore is now the first country in the world to approve such a product for the food market.
Mixed with vegetable proteins
The country allows US start-up Eat Just to offer lab-grown chicken in the form of chicken nuggets for sale. However, it is not a pure meat product. Animal cells grown in the laboratory were mixed with plant proteins to reduce costs. The exact relationship is unclear.
Approval took two years and was granted on November 26, 2020, Eat Just explained. Seven experts have tested and reviewed production in more than 20 production runs in 1200 liter bioreactors. Auditors included food toxicologists, bioinformaticians, nutritionists, epidemiologists, food scientists and technologists, as well as experts in public health policy.
Singapore’s food authority confirmed the approval and pointed out that the country has introduced its own set of rules for “novel foods”. In recent years, the high-tech city-state has become a hub for numerous start-ups that rely on sustainable food production.
It is based on live chicken cells
Meat in the laboratory is always produced using a similar process. As with Eat Just, it is based on cells from a living animal, which are taken in a biopsy, or on cell lines established by the laboratory. The cells are supplied with a nutrient solution in a bioreactor which creates optimal conditions for growth. There the cells multiply and can then be turned into meatballs or nuggets.
Creating the structure of a clean, unprocessed piece of meat is still a challenge. And it’s expensive to produce, mostly due to the expensive nutrients needed for cell growth. A laboratory burger unveiled in London in 2013, which had been raised from muscle cells of a live cow, cost around € 250,000. This is another reason why Eat Just has added plant-based proteins to its product.
The company said the price of its product would be roughly the same as chicken in an upscale restaurant, and that it would be lower than conventional chicken over the next few years. A specific number is not known. Consumer acceptance of laboratory meat depends not only on price but also on taste.
Selling at the restaurant, then at retail
There is already a restaurant that will offer the product, Eat Just explained. The menu should include croquettes as “cultured chicken”. “We will go from one restaurant to five to ten and eventually retail,” said Josh Tetrick, head and co-founder of Eat-Just. He then hoped for approval in other countries.
“We hope and expect the US, China and the EU to take up the matter,” said Bruce Friedrich, CEO of the Good Food Institute, a non-profit organization that deals with alternatives to meat, “Technology Review” . “Nothing is more important for the climate than moving away from industrial animal husbandry.”
Global meat consumption is seen as a driver of climate change, mainly due to the enormous land use for factory farming and related emissions, including methane.
According to the 2020 Food Report of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture (BMEL), for which a thousand people were interviewed from December 2019 to January, the percentage of those who consume meat or sausage every day in the country fell from 34 to 26. percent since 2015.
The crown scandal at the Tönnies slaughterhouse in the middle of the year, which also focused on the poor conditions of employees, may have lowered the values again. However, meat consumption continues to grow strongly around the world.
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