What we're doing right

Test-tube livestock

5th January 2008

Meat straight from the lab to your plate

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Burgers and other meaty meals create huge environmental problems: 70 per cent of deforestation in the Amazon is for cattle pasture, animal waste contaminates rivers and other water sources, and the belches and farts from livestock release about 37 per cent of planet-heating methane emissions – equivalent to the same impact as the entire world’s transportation sector.

But teams of scientists in the United States, Norway and the Netherlands may have a solution: in-vitro meat grown from cell cultures. They are working on feasibility estimates to be released in the spring of  spring.

Farming fewer livestock has unambiguous benefits. But will we actually be able to stomach test-tube protein? The public hasn’t warmed to the idea, and nobody has been able to grow enough meat in a lab to give it a proper taste test. But the In Vitro Meat Consortium still hopes to produce processed meats within a few years, and higher-quality cuts by 2020.

Growing meat in a lab is very expensive – making 2.2 pounds currently costs up to $20,000. And the original cells used to seed the meat still have to be extracted from live animals. The biggest challenge to this ‘green’ innovation may be creating in vitro victuals that mimic the real thing enough to be palatable.

Published in The Green Report in The Globe and Mail

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• Tags:
• Climate Change
• Farming
• In Vitro Meat
• Livestock
• Methane
• The Way We Eat

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