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Thu, 9 Apr 2015 15:09:44 +0100
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"Morgan, Nancy (TCIC)" <[log in to unmask]>
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Forum on national and international markets for livestock and meat products <[log in to unmask]>
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Shared by a concerned livestock colleague.

[cid:image001.jpg@01D072D7.35E57670]
De : Morgan, Nancy (TCIC)
Envoyé : jeudi 9 avril 2015 08:40
À : [log in to unmask]; SNEA-Professional-Staff-List; Oueslati, Afef (FAOSNE); Mechri, Aicha (FAOSNE)
Objet : A hamburger that costs $400,000...but (I think) is the wave of the future!

This is fantastic and exciting research which really could change the face of the global meat industry.

I would eat an artificial hamburger...but perhaps not at $400,000!  Would you?   Of course, Americans like their steaks which would be hard to replace. The following statement  is also quite revealing: "According to one assessment, a vegetarian diet uses nearly three times less water than a non-vegetarian diet, and 2.5 times less energy.

Nancy


The Land, Saturday 4 April 2015
http://www.theland.com.au/news/agriculture/cattle/beef/a-new-culture-for-beef-tissue/2727971.aspx?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter

A new culture for beef tissue

By: Matthew Cawood

Making meat in laboratories might eventually mean that the world only needs a global cattle herd of 40,000 head, the medical pioneer behind 'cultured meat' said in Darwin last month. Those animals would be there to provide the genetic material for the "biofabrication" of beef - growing meat from stem cells - a process that has the potential to supply the meat requirements of 40,000 people from one 25,000-litre vat of growing medium.

This was the confronting prospect that Dutch tissue manufacturing pioneer Dr Mark Post laid out before the 500 delegates at the Northern Territory Cattlemen's Association (NTCA) conference in Darwin last month. In essence, Dr Post's message was that meat doesn't have to be grown in animals - and he's produced the hamburger to prove it.

Lab-grown future

The lab-grown hamburger, according to the chefs who tasted it in 2013 and Dr Post's own admission, was dry and tasteless and cost $400,000. But it represents a future that the world's largest meat packer, JBS, is considering making a side bet on. Dr Post told Fairfax that JBS had approached him and expressed an interest in funding his work. If JBS doesn't, others will. The science of growing meat tissue is already proven: what's left is the (considerable) detail, like how to add fat and make the product palatable, and bring costs down compete with meat sourced from animals.

Humans desire meat, Dr Post told the NTCA conference: it's one of the things that made us human. Over the past 35 years, despite considerable exposure to the ideas of voluntary vegetarianism, the ratio of vegetarians to omnivores in developed countries hasn't changed. But we don't necessarily need to get our protein from meat, Dr Post added - two billion people live healthy lives without meat protein, and meat, especially beef, comes at an environmental cost.

The detail around Dr Post's facts on the environmental cost of beef - water use, greenhouse gas emissions, the relative inefficiency of producing beef protein - could be challenged, but he articulates a growing argument that beef production is not the best way to feed a growing human population. According to one assessment, a vegetarian diet uses nearly three times less water than a non-vegetarian diet, and 2.5 times less energy.

Growth of cultured beef idea

Dr Post's interest in cultured beef arose from his work in growing new human tissue for medical applications. He realised that those technologies could be used to grow meat for human consumption. When he looked at which application could provide most value for the most people, meat production won. "This could have much greater impact than any of the medical work I'd been doing over 20 years - in terms of environmental benefits, health benefits, benefits against world starvation," he told Nature in 2010.

Dr Post's process involves growing meat tissue from stem cells. One stem cell has the potential to make 10,000 kilograms of tissue. The multiplying cells form small strings of fibre. The 2013 hamburger was made of mashed-together fibres. They were solely muscle tissue, which partly explains the dryness of the hamburger, but in vitro production of fat cells to add juiciness is also being done.

The attention is being focused on Dr Post's scientific work, but he thinks it all lives or dies around moral questions. "Technically, we will become capable of producing full cuts of meat," he told Fairfax. "The question is whether consumers are convinced by the potential benefits of this product. Right now we have no choices - the alternatives to beef are all inferior. But I'm not sure, based on ethical choices, whether they can co-exist."

Dr Post eats beef. But in 50 years, he wonders, if there are alternatives to beef. "Will we be willing to allow the killing of animals for food? Are we in the long run willing to put up with methane exhaust from ruminants? These are very high-level questions, but I think they are important ones that are going to play if there are alternatives."

IMPORTANT The information contained in this email message and any attached files may be confidential and may also be the subject of legal professional privilege. It remains the property of the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR). If you are not the intended recipient, any use, disclosure, retransmission or copying of this email is unauthorised. If you have received this email in error, please delete the email and any attachments and notify the sender.

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