By Staff Writer: Jerri Clewis
The increasing need for more meat has led to the creation of a new industry, one dedicated to finding new ways to create “lab-grown” products, sometimes called “cultivated” or “cultured” meat, that won’t require the raising or killing of animals.
It’s an admirable pursuit to seek alternatives in an age where people are growing more aware of the health and well-being of livestock, but the burgeoning industry is already facing several hurdles. Just this month, the Alabama Senate approved legislation banning the sale of meat produced from cultured animal cells. Florida, Arizona, Tennessee, West Virginia and other states are taking their own measures against lab-grown meat products.
Why? A few reasons.
For one, lab-grown meat is complex, not to mention incredibly expensive to make, and it doesn’t always yield a product recognizable to the meat people commonly ingest. Just producing lab-grown beef is difficult, although that hasn’t stopped several companies from attempting to cultivate it. Chicken seems to be the more stable option, helped by California being the first state in 2023 to approve the sale of chicken made from animal cells.
Since then, the two restaurants serving cultivated chicken have removed the product from their menus, according to a report from Wired. That may change as there is talk of bringing the chicken back in the future.
Secondly, people take issue with the practice. Half of the adults in the U.S. are unwilling to try the products, and the majority of those find the idea of cultivated meat “weird”, a recent poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found. It seems many feel uncomfortable with the unusual methods behind these new meat products, which are usually grown inside metal tanks from pre-existing cells.
The cultivation process has also caused some states to prohibit lab-grown meat from being labeled as a “meat” product without additional labels, according to Fast Company. In a stricter case, Kentucky, a state where the cattle industry is important to the economy, passed legislation in 2019 that deemed a food misbranded if it’s labeled as meat despite containing cultivated animal cells.
Another problem is that the more environmentally friendly option poses a risk for farmers, ranchers and traditional meat companies by offering new competition in an already competitive market space.
Still, supporters of lab-grown meat consider it a worthwhile goal since the products would reduce animal cruelty by reducing the need for slaughtered livestock. The products may also help reduce climate change because traditional livestock production accounts for about 14.5 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to the United Nations.
Currently, only the United States and Singapore allow the sales of lab-grown meat, but the future remains to be seen as determined companies continue to try and revolutionize how we get our favorite meat products.