No feathers, no farms – just science on a plate. By suspending chicken cells in a gel and using a specialized device to turn them into chunks of edible tissue, researchers in Japan have recently succeeded in producing chicken nuggets – without the chicken. At 2.8 inches (7 centimeters) wide and 0.8 inches (2 centimeters) thick, the square of chicken is believed to be the largest single piece of lab-grown meat.
To figure out what these cell-cultured nuggets might mean for our planet (and our dinner plates), we talked with David Lobell of the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability and the Center on Food Security and the Environment for the scoop on the future of lab-grown food.
1. There seems to be a lot of wariness about cultivated meats. Do you think these concerns are warranted?
I think it’s natural to be wary of eating new foods in general, especially ones that are cultivated in a lab. Similar in some ways to driving in a driverless car. As long as the track record over time is good, I think many people will slowly get used to the idea. But another source of wariness on cultivated meats is that they will always be too expensive to be eaten by a lot of people.
2. How could cultivated meats impact sustainability?
The environmental impact of meat depends a bit on how you measure it – for example, if you focus on greenhouse gas, then beef is clearly worse, if you focus on water pollution, then pork tends to be bad. Chicken tends to be less harmful, and therefore, if cultivated meat focused on chicken, it would be less impactful for the environment. Of course, there could be other benefits for concerns like animal welfare or disease risk.
3. Recent news has also suggested that the popularity of plant-based meat substitutes is in question. Do we know why?
The data I’ve seen suggests the main issue is still taste, followed by price. For some people, the highly processed or engineered nature is a concern. I agree that, historically, the taste is often disappointing, sometimes extremely. But recently, I’ve tasted more and more products that are quite impressive on taste. Many new technologies disappoint in the short term and then exceed expectations in the long term.
4. Could lab-grown products have a significant impact on food sustainability?
My short answer is probably not any time soon enough to really matter, at least for lab-grown meat. But I’d be happy to be proved wrong. There are some interesting products, like lab-grown pork or fish fats, that can be blended with other plant-based products and could have more impact in the next decade. I also think there could be significant impacts from other types of alternative proteins, for example, from fermentation. One interesting trend I see is products that mix alternatives and traditional meats, for instance, in blended burgers or nuggets. That may be a quicker way to scale than relying on purely non-animal products.
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