Sylvain Charlebois is a professor of food distribution and policy and the director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University.
Leonardo DiCaprio has just used his A-list magic powers yet again by investing in two American cultured meat start-ups, Aleph Farms and Mosa Meat, which use animal cells. The actor was also an early investor in a vegetable protein company, even before the plant-based phenomenon was a thing. That company was Beyond Meat, now worth more than $8-billion. He saw it coming before the rest of us.
It’s a fascinating concept: the thought that one day, before long, humanity will no longer need to raise livestock to enjoy animal protein. In just a few years, we could potentially grow meat in labs, and even on our kitchen countertops, in small stainless-steel bioreactors. Meat recalls, as well as the supply shortages and COVID outbreaks packing plants faced during the pandemic, could potentially be things of the past. The idea of slaughtering animals could be seen as ancient and barbaric. The pandemic has turned more than four million Canadians into new pet owners, and pet ownership can change how humans feel we should treat animals. Slaughtering anything will become, for a growing number of consumers, a repulsive concept.
As of last year, it’s legal to sell cultured chicken in Singapore, and many other countries are considering the idea. A McKinsey & Co. report recently suggested that the cultivated meat market around the world could reach US$31-billion by 2030. Forecasts are also suggesting that the production price will drop significantly over the next nine years, from over US$10,000 a pound today to about US$2.50 a pound, a staggering 4,000-fold reduction. For climate change advocates, this will be a godsend.
Cattle consume about 25 calories of plant material for every calorie of edible protein they produce for the market. Even chickens, which have the most efficient plant-to-meat ratio, will eat nine to 10 calories of food for every calorie of edible protein produced. Cultured meat would offer a four-to-one ratio, less than half the ratio required by chickens. Comparisons aren’t even close. And while the Western world is slowly pricing in the cost of carbon, our new distribution and production economics will be the incentive for more sustainable production of animal proteins.
The science needs work, though. There are currently more than 100 different research projects on cultured meat around the world, funded by venture capitalists and philanthropists, yet cultivated meat companies have repeatedly missed product launch deadlines. Creating the right product is challenging for a variety of reasons.
Putting our environmental enthusiasm aside, shifting our collective attitude toward accepting cultured meat won’t be easy either. Food is cultural, and culinary traditions have given meat a privileged role over centuries. Allowing labs to replace farms won’t be a natural shift. Most important, land occupancy will become a critical issue when converting to more lab-grown food. With fewer animals to feed, we must question how to use our farmland over time. More cultured meat in our diets may mean fewer farms and farmers, compromising our rural economy’s chances of future prosperity. That’s certainly a challenge, especially here in Canada. Expect some lobby groups in livestock agriculture to push back, as we have seen with the plant-based movement of late.
Labelling will be another issue. The cost to produce cultured meat will eventually be lower than that of conventional meat products. This could make animal proteins more affordable with transparent pricing. However, as we are seeing with genetically modified salmon in Canada, which is 60 per cent cheaper to produce, consumers aren’t guaranteed to see prices drop owing to these modern technologies. A case needs to be made for informing consumers at retail with proper labelling. We should avoid what we’ve seen with genetically modified salmon, where grocers have publicly boycotted the product, but are likely carrying it in other more processed forms This is contemptuous and frankly dishonest toward the consumer.
Cultured meat has the potential to change our relationship with animal proteins. But as with other disruptive, revolutionary technologies that can assure the betterment of our planet, the change won’t come easily. Elon Musk understood a long time ago that to give the electric car its proper due and push aside the powerful car dealership networks, the influence of the oil industry and the incredible economic clout of car manufacturers, he needed to build a case for the e-car with the consumer, and he did. Mr. Musk simply became the communicator and dreamer the electric car needed and built an entire ecosystem to support an innovative technology. Fifteen years ago, many of us weren’t sure what to think of Mr. Musk, but look at Tesla today. The company is worth more than $900-billion.
If lab-grown food is ever to become a thing, the industry will need its own Elon Musk. Perhaps it will be none other than Leonardo DiCaprio.
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