How will clean meat change our food industry? Is clean meat the future and if so, how will clean meat change our way of living or are we ignoring it to satisfy our hunger for meat?
A documentary about clean meat, it´s production and the question, if we really want to change our lifestyle into a sustainable one. In the Netherlands cultured meat is a public interest, but it seems still very complicated to bring it to market.
Are we missing the train? At least 50 billion animals are slaughtered every year to satisfy our desire for meat. Almost a fifth of the CO2 emissions on earth come from livestock. It turns out to be extremely difficult to eat less meat: many people just like meat and the global demand for it is still increasing.
That was the reason for entrepreneur and cultivated meat pioneer Willem van Eelen to come up with ‘in vitro meat’. After his death, daughter Ira received a phone call from Silicon Valley last year. Josh Tetrick, CEO of the young company Just invited her to come and eat cultured meat in the kitchen of their laboratory in San Francisco.
The company bought her father’s patents and is now starting to actually produce and sell cultured meat. But the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport regards cultured meat as a so-called “novel food” and thus delays the introduction of cultured meat. With this resistance, changing our global meat production and consumption becomes a race against the climate clock.
On the other hand, meat from cultivated stem cells is ultimately sustainable, as less land, water and energy are required for production. According to the makers, it is also completely food safe and no animals need to be slaughtered for it. In short: cultured meat is a reality. It is there and we can make it. The question is: do we really want it?
