Lab-grown chicken developed by UPSIDE foods is the latest cell-cultured meat to be launched to market in the US.
More and more start-ups are seeking approval, including in Australia.
The sector is rich with investors, even promising proteins from thin air (which genuinely sounds hopeful and is positioned as natural and non-GMO).
UPSIDE’s lab-grown chicken is to be served in high-end restaurants, to gain cache and a touch of class from the image of celebrity chefs and fine dining. It’s a strategy that has worked before.
In 2018 the strategy was used for the Impossible Burger which gained international PR from Air New Zealand’s endorsement of its innovative lab-grown blood.
It was only offered to business class passengers and on selected flights and The Impossible Burger benefited from its association with Brand New Zealand as natural, clean, green and progressive.
Air New Zealand was criticised for failing to support New Zealand producers in it’s rush to look innovative and climate-aware with fake meat. Kiwi manufacturers of plant based foods had missed out on a chance to showcase their natural, GE-free vegetarian products. Kiwi producers of natural, grass-fed, GE- free lamb and beef, also argued they had missed out on showcasing their point of difference to premium customers.
Soon after, the Impossible Burger was featured as a lesson for New Zealand in the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Enterprise (MBIE) review of risks and opportunities for novel proteins and food innovation.
The conclusion by some in the food industry is that we have a problem and must meet the challenge of synthetic food by doing the same. The whole focus seems to lead to investing in innovative biotechnology for fake meat and milk alternatives.
But is it correct to argue that the only solution to the trend for plant-based, ethical and sustainable diets is biotechnology and synthetic food products?
It is clear today that in contrast to more technologising of food, the opportunity for New Zealand farmers and producers is to leverage the assets of Brand New Zealand by keeping it natural.
Some food exporters have gone further to ensure lab-grown meat doesnt harm people, farmers or the environment. In March of 2023, the Italian government supported a bill that bans lab-grown “foods”. There are calls for US state governments do the same.
Things have changed.
Tension is growing between nature-friendly and technology-friendly responses to multiple challenges. There is panic that those industries controlling the Market are blocking the change people want to see.
There is more urgent need for authentic action on climate change. The delaying tactics and promise of future technology to fix things are being seen to be overly optimistic or hollow.
The evidence is growing that we have market failure. The transition to farming sustainably, with organic and agro-ecological science needs to be subsidised. The alternative future is that industrial and intensive agriculture continue to dominate the scene.
The likelihood is the future holds both.
Futurist Melissa Clark-Reynolds monitors trends and signals and says that contradictory trends will exist in parallel. In a way they already do she says, ‘the future is already here’ but just not equally distributed.
One problem is the commercial drivers are taking New Zealand to the ‘technology’ option. If we want to preserve opportunities for the future we need to focus on science and research for the ‘nature’ option too.
Saying No to a farm-free future
Today, there is a greater threat to farmers than the impact of the consumer move away from animal products.
That threat is defined by a mindset that considers the answer to the question ‘how to meet demand for sustainable, ethical food’, is synthetic milk and lab-grown meat.
The debate is happening internationally. UK writer George Monbiot has a long history of environmentalism but sees the end of farming as necessary to save Nature.
The publication of “Saying ‘No’ to a farm-free future” by Chris Smaje is one response to this vision of a mix of technologised food and re-wilding of nature.
Regulation of Lab-Grown Meat.
Today, it is unlikely Air New Zealand will want to promote the lab-grown chicken in business or economy.
The downsides of lab-grown meat are better understood. It looks significantly less-sustainable than hoped.
There is reliance on pharmaceutical-grade inputs, including bovine fetal growth medium that add to the yuk factor and risks of food safety.
One of the scientific discoveries about our relationship with food is the importance of the gut biome to human health. There are questions about the effect that GE food and highly processed lab-grown products will have.
There is no way of telling as far as the new lab-grown chicken is concerned as the research has never been done. Most likely the only people to know if there is any discernible effect would be the people eating the product in fine restaurants, or at the Cop 27 meeting where it was once served to delegates.
The US Food & Drug (FDA) already signed off on the product last November. It had reviewed the application which outlined the lab process and strict measures to self-regulate the safety of the product. These include screening against viral contamination, creation of prion-like disease, and other risks to ensure the product was similar in specification to chicken meat.
The FDA had no more questions. In fact the the FDA and manufacturer seem to agree that the lab-grown meat is so much like real chicken that it needs no further consideration for regulation. Its launch to market is based on the regulatory concept that it is ‘substantially equivalent’ to real chicken. Humans have been eating chicken for years, so lab-grown chicken is much the same and can be “Generally Regarded as Safe”.
This failure in the US system for proper regulation of lab-grown food and Gene Edited food has relevance for other countries. There is international industry pressure to relax regulation and do the same or risk ‘being left behind’. Food Standards Australia NZ (FSANZ) has approved scores of imported GE food products using substantial equivalence as the starting point for evaluation, which is supported by industry. Consumer and independent scientific concerns about this are rejected.
It’s the same issue in the debate about testing and labelling of Gene Edited food from CRISPR. Independent scientists, and the European Union Ministers of Environment support the need for the use of GE processes to trigger close scrutiny of what has been produced.
Process-based regulation allows for whole-genome sequencing and ‘omics‘ to evaluate safety.
The argument from industry against this is that it is unfair on Gene Editing which is proven safe and therefore only the end product need be considered. And if the end product can be assumed safe because it is substantially equivalent to conventional food, other safety issues risk being ignored.
In this version of the future of food, synthetic lab-grown chicken and Gene Edited products would escape proper regulation.
The concern is that novel foods will be assumed to be much the same as the food we have been eating safely for hundreds of years. No questions asked.
Jon Carapiet: Born in Ghana and educated at Cambridge and Auckland Universities, Jon is a consumer researcher and advocate, photographer and writer. Jon started talking about valuing and protecting Brand New Zealand in the early 2000’s and is spokesman for GE-Free NZ (in food and environment). Twitter jon@brandnewzealand
Why does no one talk about the environmental impact on lab grown protein. Do people think the gasses that run the fridges, plastics that cover most laboratories right down to the chairs, ICT from plastics etc etc etc – just so much that has been produced that doesn’t last long in industry thanks to oil. I’d love to see a comparison.
If you follow through on many of the knee jerk reaction of the Greens to many situations their solutions while looking good at first lead to a worst situation .I believe this will be the case with EV vehicles free range chickens and many of their social platforms .
Do they not use refrigeration in the animal products industry? Is there no environmental impact from farming animals? The obvious answer is less processed food & more plants in our diet if we want something sustainable & healthy (meat is a processed food, first in the animal then in the butchery).
Supply & demand regarding the cost of production & the sale price of different food items is the most likely way that people’s food choices will change over time as people don’t like being told what to eat.
Point of sale is not my narrative as all products need it but in fairness meat doesn’t have to. My narrative is production. Anyway plants are heavily processed in shite loads of products as well. There doesn’t have to be environmental impact from meat farming – we are learning to mitigate it and in fact benefit the environment in dual farming practice’s. I think the last sentence I agree with and meat is neat but so are plants. Balance is recommended.
Of course, it’s not really lab grown meat. That’s just spin: It is factory grown meat.
So where does this ‘meat’ get its ingredients? I’m told by my biologist friend that it’s essentially a fermentation process using grains as the feedstock.
Hmmm so where do the grains come from? 😉 That’s right folks! Intensive arable farming.
“Eating safely for hundreds of years”? I guess that depends on how much red meat you actually consume. Then there’s the whole ecoli issue which is not about meat per se but how we farm it (in massive lots and feeding them meat products in some countries).
If you are going to ban lab grown foods because of their impact how about being consistent. There’s nothing natural about undrinkable water and rivers full of shit and fertiliser either.
I would prefer real meat myself but can’t say I hated the impossible burger.
gotta say I’m a bit of a fan of the vegie burger from burger fuel.
Well we really didnt get a good explanation ..thanks to the Belgians for the microplasma bovis imports during 2015-2016 we all have oncoming ailments to deal with
It’s all yuck. You couldn’t pay me to eat this shit. All these unnatural meat “substitutes” are unfit for human consumption. Anyone promoting this stuff (e.g. Bill Gates and the WEF) have ulterior motives (i.e. depopulation). I can’t believe that the Green Party, who were are all against GMO’s (which this technology relies upon), are silent on this issue.
As I said, a huge polar shift is coming. The right will be opposing GE/synfood, etc, and the left will support it.
Bring it on.,
Thanks for this John.
GM is about increasing profits, not feeding people.
“The real causes of hunger are poverty, inequality, and lack of access to food and land. Too many people are too poor (about 2 billion survive on less than $1/day) to buy the food that is available (but often poorly distributed) or lack the land and resources to grow it themselves. Because the true root cause of hunger is inequality, any method of boosting food production that deepens inequality is not only bound to fail to reduce hunger but exacerbate it….
Furthermore, attacking inequality head-on via true land reform holds the promise of productivity gains far outweighing the potential of agricultural biotechnology. Whereas industry proponents will often hold out the promise of 15%, 20%, or even 30% yield gains from biotechnology, smaller farms today produce from 200% to 1,000% more per unit area than larger farms worldwide (Rosset, 1999). Land reforms that bring average land holdings down to their optimum (small) size from the inefficient, unproductive, overly large units that characterize much of world agriculture today could provide the basis for production increases beside which the much-ballyhooed promise of biotechnology would pale in comparison.
It is critical to understand that most innovations in agricultural biotechnology have been profit driven rather than need driven. The real thrust of the genetic engineering industry is not to make agriculture more productive but rather to generate profits.”
Read
Genetically engineered crops, separating the myths from the reality – Miguel A Alteiri
on-line in http//bst/sagepub.com
NZ business criteria is will it make money?? Air NZ being up with the latest – where would they end their agreeable ways when there is advantage? Picture a logo for NZ business – Mr Magoo with great big glasses for myopic eyes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3Kfd1glU0E
Too many people, finite world.
Humanity is like a yeast culture producing alcohol. Eventually the culture”s love of living in it’s own shit kills the organism.
This grotesque filth must be banned.
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