ABOVE: Scientists versus farmers – lab-grown meat could soon be legally sold in Australia, but it’s not without opposition.
After a Sydney company’s application to produce quail, Australia’s food regulator is deciding whether laboratory-grown meat can be sold to consumers.
In a Sydney warehouse, with no animals, producers are trying to grow enough meat to feed tens of millions of people a year – scientists are growing the ‘cultured’ meat from cells.
However, it is currently illegal to sell cell-based meat in Australia.
In the first cultured meat application being assessed by the food regulator, this is something Vow Foods wants to change, with a bid to grow quail for consumers.
In its application to Food Standards Australia New Zealand, the company wrote, “The conclusion that Vow-cultured quail is safe for human consumption is based on a thorough safety assessment.”
Sydney based start-up Vow Foods has global ambitions, aiming to produce hundreds of thousands of tonnes of meat by 2030.
Vow Foods co-founder and chief executive officer George Peppou said, “By the end of the decade, we want to be producing on a similar order of magnitude to the Australian beef industry, to export to global markets.”
Why quail?
“It’s easy to grow for one and tastes really good,” Mr Peppou said.
Vow has its eye on seafood and other game animals too.
“We’re not making beef or lamb or pork or chicken – we’re basically inventing new forms of meat that solve problems that animals can’t,” he said.
“We have a long way to scale until we’re even producing as much as a medium-sized commercial farm.
“What we’re doing is so difficult, it’s almost not worth being anything other than ambitious.”
With plans to increase production from tens of kilograms of meat a day to 200kg a week by June, ambitious may be an understatement.
However, Vow’s plans are not without opposition.
NSW Farmers Association said there were genuine concerns about the safety of synthetic food – often publicised as a replacement for natural food.
Head of policy and advocacy Annabel Johnson said, “We’re talking about what’s real – food grown by farmers – and the artificial ‘alternative’ that’s grown by a scientist.”
“People need to know that the food they’re feeding their families is safe, and certainly the natural foods farmers have grown for thousands of years are safe to eat,” Ms Johnson said.
Cell-cultured chicken nuggets at Singapore restaurant, Madame Fan. Photo: GOOD Meat Facebook
Industry research body Meat and Livestock Australia also has major reservations about both cell-based and plant-based industries.
Managing director Jason Strong said: “I think the issue we broadly have is that they promote themselves dishonestly by denigrating our products – by criticising the environmental credentials, nutritional values, sustainability of our products –with either no facts or unfounded claims.”
Mr Peppou said the opposition to cell-based meat is in part driven by Australia’s deep cultural links with farming.
“Anything new tends to be met with resistance and we’re no exception to that,” Mr Peppou said.
“I’m sure there will be objections.
“Fortunately, the food regulator is really only interested in risk assessment of a food and does that present a risk to human health.”
Globally, the cell-based meat industry is gaining pace.
In 2020, Singapore became the first country to allow lab-grown meat to be sold to consumers.
Then in November 2022, the US Food and Drug Administrator gave approval for living cells from chickens to be used to grow food, while other countries including Japan have indicated support for cell-based meat.
The public will be able to make submissions to the Australian food regulator from August 2023 and, if approved, the product could be on the shelves by mid-2024.
First appeared on SBS News