In forty years, will fake meat be what’s for dinner?
Don’t know about you guys, but the idea of eating meat that was created in a tube sort of grosses me out. Still, that’s exactly what some are speculating will be the future of our flesh-eating ways. CBC News reports that meat “grown” in a laboratory might become the norm by 2050, when the world’s population is estimated to reach more than 9 billion.
With more urbanization, there is increased demand for food that comes from animals. On the flip side, the agricultural resources needed to produce those products are dwindling, which will ultimately translate unto high prices.
From the article:
The growing of animal muscle in vats to produce artificial, cultured or “in- vitro” meat, is one possible way to help meet demand, it said.
“From a technological point of view … its development is generally held to be perfectly feasible,” the report said. It acknowledged the public may be slow to accept cultured meat. But such a product could be made healthier and more hygienic than “traditional” meat, the paper argued, and it could also reduce the amount of greenhouse gas emissions produced by livestock.
Some scientists are looking forward to this new potential market with bated breath because it will lessen the methane produced by real, live animals. (But they’re the same people who make a big stink about cow farts and sheep burps.)
Still, the biggest hindrance to these developments will be public skepticism, and with good reason. There’s plenty about the current state of the meat business that ought to perplex (and in some cases frustrate) the eaters in the world. For instance, there’s the fact that meat you pick up in the store bears such little resemblance to its origins, you might as well be eating geometry—what with all the rectangles, cubes, and cylinders.
Whatever happened to meat that actually retains its animalistic constitution? Nothing’s better than a giant turkey leg at the state fair. You know, the kind this guy is clearly enjoying.
—Seth Putnam
If you are aware, label reading is a must before buying
anything you want to ingest….ywe are not getting what
we think we are going to eat that will be good for our
bodies or health…….and I am serious about this fact ! ! !
Hey, the microwave has proliferated western culture to the point that there are more microwave ovens than there are gas or electric ovens if you include break-rooms in places of business. And yet, microwave cooking has been proven by Dr. Hans Hertel to decrease hemoglobin values in humans ingesting food cooked in a microwave.
Vat-grown meat will probably have some other effect on our health and will be, as was the study by Dr. Hertel, covered up. Soylent Green, anyone?
Food, outside of its role as a cultural artifact, is a source of energy and the economics of food are subject to the same constraints as energy. Extraction and distribution costs will determine if this stuff can compete with natural meat or other sources of protein. Will running a vat ranch create cheaper protein than cutting down forests for grazing cattle or simply not eating meat? Seems dubious to me. Processed food these days largely benefits from cost savings from industrial farming, not from growing carbohydrates in vats. I’d imagine that if meat became too expensive to eat for most… Read more »
Just say no to Frankenmeat!
I believe there was a similar initial aversion when margarine was introduced, but we got over that, unfortunately. Do we know yet if this will be more energy efficient than pasture-raised meat?
By the way, it’s “bated breath.” Think abatement, not baiting a line.