Government approves lab grown meat for human consumption.

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US approves nation’s first ‘lab-grown’ meat — chicken made from animal cells.

For the first time, US regulators on Wednesday approved the sale of chicken made from animal cells, allowing two California companies to offer “lab-grown” meat to the nation’s restaurant tables and eventually, supermarket shelves.

The Agriculture Department gave the green light to Upside Foods and Good Meat, firms that had been racing to be the first in the US to sell meat that doesn’t come from slaughtered animals — what’s now being referred to as “cell-cultivated” or “cultured” meat as it emerges from the laboratory and arrives on dinner plates.

A manufacturing company called Joinn Biologics, which works with Good Meat, was also cleared to make the products.

Cultivated meat is grown in steel tanks, using cells that come from a living animal, a fertilized egg or a special bank of stored cells. In Upside’s case, it comes out in large sheets that are then formed into shapes like chicken cutlets and sausages.

Good Meat, which already sells cultivated meat in Singapore, the first country to allow it, turns masses of chicken cells into cutlets, nuggets, shredded meat and satays.

 

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https://edition.cnn.com/2023/06/21/business/cultivated-meat-us-approval/index.html

 

[acptulsa]

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/06/21/business/cultivated-meat-us-approval/index.html

That site doesn't need any more clicks from us.

Cultivated meat, also known as lab-grown meat, has been cleared for sale in the United States.

Upside Foods and Good Meat, two companies that make what they call “cultivated chicken,” said Wednesday that they have gotten approval from the US Department of Agriculture to start producing their cell-based proteins.

Good Meat, which is owned by plant-based egg substitute maker Eat Just, said that production is starting immediately. Cultivated or lab-grown meat is grown in a giant vat, much like what you’d find at a beer brewery.

Wednesday’s move follows a series of previous approvals which have paved the way for sales of cultivated meat in the US.

Last week, Good Meat and Upside said they had received approval for labels for its product from the USDA. In March, Good said it had received a so-called “no questions” letter from the Food and Drug Administration. That letter states that the administration is satisfied that the product is safe to sell in the United States. The FDA issued a similar letter Upside Foods in November.

The nascent cultivated meat sector is being overseen by both the USDA and the FDA.

Good Meat, which has been selling its products in Singapore, advertises its product as “meat without slaughter,” a more humane approach to eating meat. Supporters hope that cultured meat will help fight climate change by reducing the need for traditional animal agriculture, which emits greenhouse gases.

The company had previously announced that it was partnering with chef and restaurateur José Andrés to bring the item to a Washington, DC restaurant. It is working with his team on a launch but doesn’t have specific information on timing at this point, according to a company spokesperson. As production ramps up, Good Meat may consider partnering with other restaurants or launching in retail, he added.

The regulatory hurdle cleared Wednesday is called a “grant of inspection,” which is issued by the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service. Applications for such a grant “are approved following a rigorous process, which includes assessing a firm’s food safety system,” an FSIS spokesperson said Wednesday.

“This announcement that we’re now able to produce and sell cultivated meat in the United States is a major moment for our company, the industry and the food system,” Josh Tetrick, co-founder and CEO of Good Meat and Eat Just, said in a statement Wednesday.

Upside founder and CEO Uma Valeti on Wednesday called the approval “a giant step forward towards a more sustainable future,” adding that it will “fundamentally change how meat makes it to our table.”

Upside is planning to introduce its product at Bar Crenn, a San Francisco restaurant, but did not share a launch date yet. Selling at Bar Crenn should help Upside learn more about how chefs and diners feel about the product, a representative said. Eventually, the company plans to work with other restaurants and make its products available in supermarkets.

For now, Upside is holding a contest to allow curious customers to be among the first to try the product in the US.

 

[AngryCanadian]

A meat i will avoid

 

[unknown]

Good point, normally I never link CNN.

 

[unknown]

https://www.eviemagazine.com/post/usda-approves-sale-lab-grown-meat-2-companies-backed-bill-gates

USDA Approves Sale Of Lab-Grown Meat From 2 Companies, Both Backed By Bill Gates

 

[PAF]

[SNIP]

As indicated by a 2011 study, cultured meat can offer many advantages over conventional meat: It would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 78-96% and require 7-45% less energy and 82-96% less water. However, more recent research suggests that over the long term, the environmental impact of lab-grown meat could be higher than that of livestock. Unlike the previous research, these studies considered not only the nature of the gases emitted, but also the energy costs of the infrastructures required for cell culture.

Animals have an immune system that naturally protects them against bacterial and other infections. This is not the case for cell culture, and in a nutrient-rich environment, bacteria multiply much faster than animal cells. To avoid producing a steak made up of more bacteria than meat, it is essential to avoid contamination, and that requires a high level of sterility.

In the pharmaceutical industry, cell cultures are carried out in highly controlled and sanitized “clean rooms”. Sterility is most often guaranteed by using disposable plastic materials. This significantly reduces the risk of contamination, but generates plastic waste, whose level in ecosystems is already alarming. Some of the culture materials are made of stainless steel and can thus be steam sterilized or washed with detergents, but these treatments also have an environmental cost.

While few studies have been done on the environmental impact of the pharmaceutical industry, the available data suggest that its carbon footprint may be 55% higher than that of the automotive industry.

Importantly, we should not forget that livestock fulfils many functions other than just the production of meat. It contributes to the recycling of large quantities of plant waste that cannot be consumed by humans and produces fertilizer. Furthermore, pastures capture and store carbon. What will replace them if meat is produced by cell culture? This means that it is extremely complex to evaluate the long-term environmental cost of a transition from conventional to cultured meat.


Anabolic hormones and endocrine disruptors: significant risks

In animals, muscle volume increases slowly, and it takes time for muscular satellite cells to multiply. To obtain what an animal produces over several years in just a few weeks in vitro, it is necessary to continuously stimulate proliferation of the satellite cells with growth factors, including anabolic sex hormones.

These hormones are present in animals and humans, as well as in conventional meat. They stimulate protein synthesis in cells, resulting in increased muscle mass. They can therefore be rightly described by industry as “natural growth factors”. However, overexposure to them has established deleterious effects. In Europe, the use of growth hormones in agriculture has been prohibited since 1981 by directive 81/602. This ban was confirmed in 2003 by directive 2003/74 and validated by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) in 2007. What will the final concentration of these hormones be in cultured meat?

In addition, a growing number of studies have documented the toxicity of commonly used plastic products. Endocrine disruptors, compounds that can interfere with the hormone system and disrupt it, can be transferred from plastic packaging to food. Unsurprisingly, the same phenomenon has been documented in cell cultures grown in plastic containers by in vitro fertilization.

Unless the use of plastic in the production of meat by cell culture is tightly controlled, the meat could be contaminated with endocrine disruptors and other substances before it is even packaged.


Healthy and sustainable nutrition also means education

Cultured meat is presented today as a high-tech product that has the potential to be both ecologically and morally responsible. But it can only become an alternative to traditional meat by conquering the world market – in other words, by being affordably priced for consumers and profitable for producers, and that requires high-volume, low-cost production techniques. Will the impacts on health and the environment still be taken into consideration with the transformation of the scale of production?

It’s also important to remember to that high consumption of meat is detrimental not only to the environment but also to human health. However, many consumers are not aware or decline to accept such conclusions.

To achieve a diet that is both sustainable and healthy, it is therefore essential to improve information and education to stimulate an informed debate on the crucial issue of meat consumption.


Full article with lots of cross-reference links:

https://theconversation.com/cultured-meat-could-create-more-problems-than-it-solves-127702
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[ClaytonB]

AI's take on lab-grown meat:

Mmmm, it looks so delicious. It must be way better than natural, just look at those beautiful nitrile gloves!