The future of cultured meat and its impact on livestock

As a consequence of weak academic research in this area, cell-based food has not yet proven to be as healthy or so nutritious compared to meat from farm animals due to a lack of data. Research in nutrition with digestibility approaches needs to be conducted to study the absorption of nutrients from cell-based food by the human digestive tract. Regarding interactions with the environment, only a few studies have been conducted so far with no clear conclusion. In addition, livestock farming systems have weaknesses but also benefits not considered yet in the comparison with cell-based food.

— 

THE PROBLEM TO SOLVE
The major challenges facing our evolving agri-food system nowadays are to provide enough food for a growing human population while protecting the planet, consumer health and also farm animals. To meet these challenges, sustainable ways of production should be developed. According to the FAO: “Sustainable diets are those diets with low environmental impacts which contribute to food and nutrition security and to healthy life for present and future generations. Therefore, sustainable diets are (1) protective and respectful of biodiversity and ecosystems, (2) culturally acceptable, (3) accessible, (4) economically fair and affordable; (5) nutritionally adequate, safe and healthy; while (6) optimizing natural and human resources”. Business sustainability is also important, which means organizing new business and management models to meet the sustainable development goals.

STATE OF THE ART
In this context, more and more FoodTech companies are proposing a disruptive technique based on in vitro food production: cell culture to produce “meat”, but this technology is still in the research and development stage. In addition, although the cell-based food technology is well developed by private companies, it is less present in academic research. Indeed, up to February 13^th, 2023, around 826 scientific publications were present in the Web of Science (including 108 in 2020; 180 in 2021 and 242 in 2022) with a high proportion of review papers (19%), while more than 25,000 articles were present in the press media. The authors of scientific research are mainly from the USA (200 articles), the United Kingdom (93 articles), China (73 articles), Germany (59 articles) and the Netherlands (55 articles). Most of the scientific articles deals with technical issues, with less focus on other challenges, particularly with environmental impacts (Hocquette et al., 2023). As a consequence of weak academic research in this area, cell-based food has not yet proven yet to be as healthy or so nutritious compared to meat from farm animals due to a lack of data. Research in nutrition with digestibility approaches needs to be conducted to study the absorption of nutrients from cell-based food by the human digestive tract. Regarding interactions with the environment, only a few studies have been conducted so far with no clear conclusion. In addition, livestock farming systems have weaknesses but also benefits not considered yet in the comparison with cell-based food. In terms of potential consumer acceptance, there is still a great uncertainty despite several studies since the motives and barriers for willingness to buy and eat cell-based food depend on many factors including cultural factors with various interactions between them.

THE FUTURE OF CELL-BASED FOOD
Some companies believe that cell-based food will initially be a niche market for high-quality products with expected animal and planetary benefits, to which the richest consumers (who also have the highest willingness to pay) are the most sensitive. However, in this scenario, the small deployment of “cultured meat” would never be such as to significantly reduce the environmental impact of livestock farming, which is one of the goals of this new technology.

In a second phase, if the dynamism of investors continues, if the cost of production decreases, and if government support is present, the development of the cell-based food sector would extend to the mass market, which may result in a decrease in livestock and in the number of farms and, consequently, in a desertification of the countryside (Chriki et al., 2022). On the contrary, urban employment for the production of cell-based food would increase. This would change the balance within or between countries, with highly developed urban regions in which the production facilities would develop, damaging the livelihoods and income levels of rural populations in territories traditionally dependent on livestock. The concentration of investment in a few hands is also likely to lead to an imbalance of economic power (Mancini and Antonioli, 2022). The development of cell-based food is likely to cause a shift from conventional meat production to a high-end market. Consequently, meat would become an expensive luxury product (Mancini and Antonioli, 2022).

Furthermore, some stakeholders consider “cultured meat” as a step towards the end of animal exploitation for a more sustainable and healthier lifestyle (Munteanu et al., 2021). This argument is unacceptable to the supporters of gastronomy and the culinary tradition of meat. More generally, the development of “cultured meat” could lead to a standardization of the meat product (like fast food) and to a loss of the cultural diversity associated with food. Furthermore, the pleasure of eating meat could also be greatly reduced or at least modified, which would go against the satisfaction of human well-being according to most gastronomes. In this scenario, the social network is likely to be changed as a consequence of a very low number of traditional farms and of a very low number of farm animals. The development of the cell-based food industry is also likely to change our food system, its organization (farm to fork) as well as our eating habits with less focus on culinary traditions.

Other authors argue that conventional meat and cell-based food could coexist with other meat alternatives. In this case, “cultured meat” could be incorporated into hybrid products with other alternatives that can provide sufficient nutrients to consumers. Similarly, meat alternatives may not compete with livestock farming or with other sustainable solutions, such as reducing of food waste and losses, because they maybe rather complementary or perceived as such. Nevertheless, it is very difficult to predict which food protein items will be the highest in demand in the coming decades, depending on the respective sensory, nutritional, ethical and environmental attributes of each meat alternative. Some authors argue that any alternative protein will not disrupt the meat industry market, but there are certainly niche markets for some animal products alternatives. They also argue that technological solutions alone are not sufficient to substantially reduce meat consumption when this consumption is too high and that additional measures are needed (Siegrist and Hartmann, 2023).

In this discussion, we should consider all benefits and weaknesses of livestock farming systems (and sustainability of these systems) which are nowadays listed according to five dimensions based on the methodology of Ryschawy et al. (2019): 1) production of food products which are safe and healthy for human consumption; 2) interactions with the environment (land and water use, greenhouse gas emissions, biodiversity, soil fertility, etc.); 3) opportunities of jobs (direct and indirect) with good conditions of work; 4) societal issues such as animal health and welfare, food consumption habits, cultural gastronomy, etc. and finally, 5) inputs necessary to produce food. The cell-based food technology should be assessed according to these principles.

CELL-BASED FOOD IS NOT (YET) A SUSTAINABLE FOOD WITH AN UNCERTAIN FUTURE
In brief, cell-based food raises many debates and controversies. It is not yet a sustainable food because it is still unclear if its (1) protective and respectful of the environment, (2) culturally acceptable, (3) accessible (since its price is still too high and its production very limited), (4) economically fair and affordable; (5) nutritionally adequate, safe and healthy; and (6) able to optimise natural and human resources. The technical aspects, although surrounded by great uncertainty, are the easiest to deal with, because they are based on factual observations. In order to become a credible alternative, “cultured meat” must offer real and proven added value compared to meat. This is not (yet) the case. Thus, “cultured meat” is at a crossroads with several possible scenarios.

The first scenario would be the failure of the development of cell-based food due to unfulfilled promises by start-ups, lack of support from public authorities and consumers who remain unconvinced. In this scenario, one may assume that the market for other meat substitutes may increase or decrease.

The second scenario is the opposite, based on ever greater investments, spectacular technical progress and support from governments and consumers, which would lead to a sharp reduction of intensive livestock farming replaced by cell-based food. This implies a sharp reduction in the cost of cell-based food. Thus, pragmatic consumers would adopt the product for economic reasons. In this scenario, only positively perceived extensive livestock farming would remain to produce a meat considered as a luxury product.

The third scenario is logically situated between the first two: livestock farming would remain largely present for consumers attached to meat and to the culinary history of their countries, while meat substitutes, including “cultured meat”, would develop for environmental and ethical reasons. Hybrid substitutes combining plant proteins and “cultured meat” are likely to develop first because of the still high cost of muscle cultures. However, the limited market penetration of “cultured meat” alone would be a major obstacle to solving the current ethical and environmental problems.

At present, the current scenario looks like scenario one in that “cultured meat” is not permitted, except in Singapore and more recently in the USA. Scenario two is clearly the least likely because of the highly significant technical, regulatory and social obstacles to be overcome. The question is whether it is possible to move to scenario three, a question that remains unanswered today because of the many technical, regulatory, political and social uncertainties and the lack of transparency from cell-based food producers.

Returning to the original issues (feeding the world while protecting the planet and the animals), reducing food waste, even by half, would be a huge step forward. Another simple solution would be to rethink livestock systems by strengthening the virtuous circle between animals, plants and soils according to the principles of agroecology.

WE NEED A MORE GLOBAL APPROACH OF OUR FOOD SYSTEM
In conclusion, it is clear that the cell-based food industry lacks research on any new sustainable model related to its development to tackle the various sustainable development goals and address interactions between them. It is also clear that such research and approaches are also poorly developed about our current food system. Indeed, the different dimensions of sustainability are rarely analyzed together including for current livestock farming systems. Any new business model should aim to connect the challenges of our society and of the planet to the private companies’ economic strategy and interests. For companies, this means to be able to simultaneously manage tensions between their short-term and the long-term objectives or between different sustainable development goals taken into interactions between them. In any case, however, when we analyse the potential sustainability of the “cultured meat” industry according to recent methodologies and concepts, it is clear that there is a need to confront and juxtapose environmental, health, social, economic and legal issues. So, while the development of cell-based food is highly focused on technical issues, it still lacks integrative approaches for the development of sustainable business opportunities.

References
1. Chriki, S., Ellies-Oury, M.-P., and Hocquette, J.-F. (2022). Is “cultured meat” a viable alternative to slaughtering animals and a good comprise between animal welfare and human expectations? Animal Frontiers 12, 35–42. doi: 10.1093/af/vfac002.
2. Hocquette, J.F., Fournier, D., Ellies-Oury, M.P., Chriki, S., (2023). Bibliometric analysis of scientific articles related to “cultured meat”. The 74th Annual Meeting of the European Association for Animal Production. Lyon – France, 2023.
3. Mancini, M. C., and Antonioli, F. (2022). “Chapter 19 – The future of cultured meat between sustainability expectations and socio-economic challenges,” in Future Foods, ed. R. Bhat (Academic Press), 331–350. doi: 10.1016/B978-0-323-91001-9.00024-4.
4. Munteanu, C., Miresan, V., Raducu, C., Ihut, A., Uiuiu, P., Pop, D., et al. (2021). Can Cultured Meat Be an Alternative to Farm Animal Production for a Sustainable and Healthier Lifestyle? Frontiers in Nutrition 8, 749298. doi: 10.3389/fnut.2021.749298.
5. Ryschawy, J., Dumont, B., Therond, O., Donnars, C., Hendrickson, J., Benoit, M., et al. (2019). An integrated graphical tool for analysing impacts and services provided by livestock farming. animal 13, 1760–1772. doi: 10.1017/S1751731119000351.
6. Siegrist, M., Hartmann, C. (2023). Why alternative proteins will not disrupt the meat industry. Meat Science 203 (2023) 109223. doi: 10.1016/j.meatsci.2023.109223.

About Dr Jean-François Hocquette
Dr Jean-François Hocquette is “Outstanding class Research Director” working at INRAE (the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment). His research interests concern muscle biology, genomics and consumer studies as relevant to muscle growth or beef eating quality. He was leader of the research team “Muscle Growth and Metabolism”, and Director of the Herbivore Research Unit and he is now president of the French Association for Animal Production. He has organized the World Congress of Animal Science in Lyon in 2023 (2,200 delegates).

About Dr Sghaier Chriki
Dr Sghaier Chriki is an Associate Professor in Animal Science at the Higher school of Agronomy called: ISARA (in Lyon, France), where he teaches animal science to agricultural engineering students. He is also a Researcher at INRAE. His research has been focused on meat quality, consumer expectations related to beef quality and potential acceptance of cell-based food. In 2022, he was selected as an Expert for a Technical Panel consultation on Cell-based food safety, organized by FAO and WHO in Singapore. https://www.fao.org/documents/card/en/c/cc4855en

About Dr Marie-Pierre Ellies-Oury
Dr Marie-Pierre Ellies-Oury is a Full-Professor at Bordeaux Sciences Agro (Bordeaux National School of Agronomic Sciences), where she teaches animal science to agricultural engineering students. She is also the scientific director of Bordeaux Sciences Agro. Finally, she is a Researcher at INRAE, where she conducts research on carcass and meat quality (particularly nutritional and sensory) and their modulation by breeding practices. She was also a member of the FAO Expert Committee on Health Risks Associated with Cell-Based Products (Singapore – November 2022).

Together, S Chriki, MP Ellies-Oury and JF Hocquette coordinated in 2020 the scientific handbook entitled: “Livestock for agro-ecology and sustainable food”, published by France Agricole Editions: https://www.editions-france-agricole.fr/site/gfaed/AGRO__gfaed.4464.42722__/fr/boutique/produit.html