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9 billion or so factory-farmed chickens are slaughtered in the US every year, billions more the world over. These numbers are apart from the number of sheep, goats, fish and more that are farmed and eaten around the world. The world population is growing and there is an increasing shortage of meat for consumption as the previous means of intensive animal agriculture which keeps the price of meat artificially low by operating at huge economies of scale, shifts the cost of production on to people, animals and the planet. And the increasingly environmentally conscious people are beginning to question the rationale of the damage to the planet as the animal industry deforests the land, releases hundreds of millions of tonnes of greenhouse gases every year, creates terrible working conditions at abattoirs, and necessitates abhorrent animal treatment on farms.
For the adventurous, the solution lies in lab-grown meat. Stem cells, usually harvested from live animals via biopsy, are placed in a bioreactor – a temperature- and pressure-controlled aseptic steel vat filled with a nutrient-dense growth medium that is made up of sugars and proteins. In these vats, the cells multiply and differentiate to form tissue. Then out comes an edible substance called “wet mass”, which is then processed in various ways to produce nuggets, ground beef and so on. For more complex cuts of meat such as lions or filet mignon, additional techniques are used to grow muscle and fat cells.
The adventurous hail this as the way forward for animals, the environment, and the planet. But the fact remains that the ultimate decider is the consumer....
will you eat lab-grown meat?
