In vitro meat and the environment

n regards to my last post on “in vitro meat”, this post will focus on academic research that has been conducted on the topic as well as the ongoing debate around it.

Although the first article on cultured meat was first published in 2005 under ‘Tissue Engineering’, the idea of growing meat has been around for a while. In 1932, Winston Churchill, published his book “Thoughts and Advendures” (1932) and stated: “Fifty years hence, we shall escape the absurdity of growing a whole chicken in order to eat the breast or wing, by growing these parts separately under suitable medium.” Hi thoughts were avant-gardist but portrayed today’s reality!

How does it work?

Cultured meat is grown with the use of stem cells. The tissues and stem cells from leftover animals (non-living) are used to grow and produce muscles by injecting protein into the already existing muscle. In 2013, the first lab-burger was produced by Professor Mark Post from Maastricht University and consequently tasted in one of his London Conference.

In a 2011 peer-reviewed article, Tuomisto et al (2011) researched on the topic to gain a greater understanding of cultured meat and its environmental impacts. The findings suggested that the production of cultured meat had considerably lower impacts on the environment than conventional livestock farming. It was found that cultivated meat emitted 40% less Greenhouse gaz in comparison to the production of Atlantic salmon. Growing our own meat would take up 98% less land than what was needed traditionally for livestock farming and feed production. Furthermore cultivated meat would contribute to the reduction of methane emissions from cows, as its production no longer needs cows! 

Although these statistics sound promising, I believe there is still a high uncertainty of the long term reduction of environmental impact. Mattick etal (2013) argue that cultured meat might take out some traditional environmental costs but may introduce other new environmental issues. Indeed, the production of cultured meat will increase the use of industrial energy, through the burning of fossil fuel needed to produce the meat. This is not a peer-reviewed article so some assumptions remain questionable.

In all, I believe that alternative solutions to meat consumption are a big step forward. However, the question persists: Will people be attracted to this new product?

If you’re asking me the question, overall it sounds good but if I had it in front of me I would probably think twice before eating.