Cultured Meat

Cultured meat is the meat produced by in-vitro cell culture of animal cells, instead of obtaining from slaughtered animals. It is also called “Clean meat” as animals are not slaughtered for this meat.

Key Points

• It is also called lab-grown meat, cell-based meat, and synthetic meat. It is generally costlier than conventional meat due to its high production costs.
• The cultured meat is produced using the tissue engineering techniques which were originally used in regenerative medicine.
• The cultured meat concept first became popular in the early 2000s. The proof of the concept was first shown by Maastricht University (Netherlands) professor, Mark Post in the year 2013. He created a burger patty that was grown directly from cells.
• Several researchers and food companies around the world are working towards improving the product.
• At present, over 2 dozen firms are testing lab-grown beef, chicken, and fish. This number can increase in the coming years as the firms are targeting to enter the alternative meat market which is estimated to reach $140 billion by the year 2029 as per Barclays.

Singapore Approves Lab-grown meat sale

Recently, Singapore became the world‘s first country that approved the sale of lab-grown meat. The U.S. based start-up ‘Eat Just’ received the world’s first regulatory approval to sell its lab-grown chicken meat in Singapore.

Singapore, a city-state with a population of 5.7 million, produces only around 10% of its food and has set out ambitious plans for raising food production by the next decade using high-tech farming.

East Just

Established in the year 2011 as Hampton Creek Foods, Inc.; Eat Just, Inc. is a food manufacturing company in the US. It is headquartered in San Francisco, US. The company produces cultural meat, plant-based products, and egg alternatives. The company has raised over $300 million since its establishment.