Victor LAFONT and
Rosanna MANIGLIO
Eating meat is not
environmentally sustainable: according to researchers all over the world. Now
an Israeli startup wants to sell you artificial chicken meat. Are you ready?
Strong demographic growth
around the world is leading to increased meat consumption. More and more
natural resources such as water, land and grain are being drained to support
and feed livestock. Today 70% of all farmland is dedicated to livestock and its
food. Moreover, nearly half of the world’s grain production is used to feed
livestock and not humans, even though an animal consumes much more food than it
produces. In fact, we could feed more people with a cow’s food than with its
meat. Today, raising livestock is an
absurd and counterproductive system.
One of the environmental
issues of the 21st century is to find solutions to eat differently. One
important trend of the past several years is veganism: not eating any animal
products, including meat, milk, or eggs. But not everyone is ready to become
vegan. Now the Israeli startup “SuperMeat”, claims to have found another
solution and intends to revolutionize the food industry. It has developed a new
technique to produce artificial meat grown in a laboratory instead of on an
animal.
Experiments on cultured
meat had already been conducted some years ago, with beefsteak made from stem
cells, but the meat produced was not convincing, and making a single steak cost
around 250,000 € per portion.
Thanks to a new process,
starting from chicken cells (see Protocol), SuperMeat has managed to produce
small quantities of artificial chicken meat, which it claims has “a taste and
appearance similar to a real piece of meat”, at a cost under 5 €/kg.
SuperMeat promises us a
better life with their “environmentally friendly” industry which would require 99% less land, 90% less water and
create 90% less greenhouse gas emissions.
It invites us to “join
the revolution” and “make history” by contributing to the financing of its
industry. The startup needs at least $500,000 to develop a full-scale
prototype, and the final device will probably cost $2.5 million. Meanwhile, the
firm already plans to provide supermarkets, restaurants and even households with meat-production equipment by
2021.
SuperMeat’s solution
seems to be a good alternative to raising livestock: it’s green, ethical,
inexpensive and can be set up quickly. But, when you think about it, doesn’t
SuperMeat represent a threat to our consumer society? If SuperMeat becomes a
monopoly -- the only firm offering meat -- it will be feeding most of humanity.
So it will have total control of the meat market and could decide to
significantly raise prices, speculate on natural resources, or ruin companies
who produce meat in a traditional way. What appears to be an effective solution
to a crucial environmental issue could create some serious societal and
economic problems.
Perhaps SuperMeat’s
solution is too extreme. Why not return to a more eco-friendly way of
production? After all, it might be more appetizing.
