Private cultivated-meat research can only take us so far
The nascent cultivated-meat industry is in a funding drought. For those who don’t know, cultivated meat is grown from livestock cells, without slaughter. It offers a number of animal welfare, public health and environmental benefits. Given this drought, I was thrilled to see some private investment in an American facility researching cellular agriculture, while remaining aware significant public funding is necessary to unlock cultivated meat’s full potential.
GEA, a German company, opened its New Food Application and Technology Center in Janesville, Wisconsin on July 17. Among other things, the $20-million facility includes pilot-scale infrastructure for cell cultivation, precision fermentation and plant-based food processing. It expands on an existing GEA campus at the same location. The facility will actually be the company’s second such center. The first was opened in Hildesheim, Germany a couple of years ago.
“The food industry is at a crossroads,” said the CEO of GEA, Stefan Klebert, in a statement. “To feed future generations sustainably, we must turn vision into scalable reality. Our new center in Janesville is a key milestone on our shared journey — both for our customers and for us as a company. With this investment, we are helping our customers scale up the production of novel foods such as precision-fermented egg white and cultivated seafood.”
In North America, GEA boasts 1,600 employees at 16 locations engaged in testing, training, service, sales and manufacturing. The Janesville center will add more high-skill jobs, including those in scientific and engineering roles, to the total of 74 employees already working at the company campus there. Further, construction of the facility supported approximately 500 contractors and subcontractors, and will continue to boost the region’s economy.
“This facility reflects how Janesville’s rich agricultural and industrial heritage can intersect with cutting-edge innovation,” said Jimsi Kuborn, Economic Development Director for the city of Janesville. “It not only honors our community’s roots, but also creates new opportunities for partnerships, workforce development, and sustainable growth. This project is a model for what’s possible — not just for Janesville, but for the entire Midwest and beyond.”
As great as these kinds of private investments in cellular-agriculture research are, they are no substitute for robust public funding of the same, for a variety of reasons. Private research generally isn’t shared, requiring a duplication of efforts, as each group of scientists is forced to ‘reinvent the wheel,’ so to speak. Beyond this, cultivated-meat development is a long-term process, generally a poor match for private interests seeking a quick return on investment.
A mature cellular agriculture could help relegate battery cages, gestation crates and livestock trucks to a less-compassionate past. Since animals aren’t required for cultivated-meat production, the risk of zoonotic viruses making the jump to humans and causing a global pandemic would be greatly reduced. Similarly, scientists believe the new protein will eventually require a fraction of the greenhouse-gas emissions needed to create slaughtered meat.
Political leaders who care about animal welfare, public health and environment — which should be all of them, in my view — should support a massive increase in state and federal funding for cellular-agriculture research. Such resources will help overcome the remaining technological hurdles to mass production of cultivated meat at a competitive price. Let’s build public research centers dedicated to this goal at every agricultural college in the United States.