at high level Last week at a sushi bar in New York, some media and policy types pounced on a menu of sushi rolls, Peking duck tapas and mushroom salad. But what made this menu unusual was one ingredient that was present in the dishes – foie gras made from quail cells cooked in a bioreactor. The event, hosted by sushi chef Masa Takayama, was a launch party for Australian farmed meat firm Vow, which will sell its foie gras in a handful of restaurants in Singapore and Hong Kong.
The food was delicious – one course contained a mountain of black truffle – but that was the main thing. Wow and its CEO George Peppo are viewing farmed meat as a luxury product – an unusual position for an industry where many founders are motivated by animal welfare and out of step with mass-produced meat. Are. But while growing meat in a lab is still extremely expensive, Peppo is trying to turn the industry's poor state to his advantage.
“I feel like the obituary for our industry has already been written,” he says. “But just because Californians can't do something, doesn't mean nothing can be done.”
That thing is making profits as well as producing farmable meat. Big challenge facing the industry – together with restrictions and lack of venture capital cash—is that it costs too much to grow animal cells in bioreactors. But reliable statistics are difficult to find a research paper Farmed meat costs between $10,000 and $68 per pound, depending on production methods, according to data provided by companies in 2021. Many startups say they have drastically cut production costs since their early experiments, but prices are still far higher than factory-raised chicken. at around $2.67 per pound.
The two most funded startups in the sector—Eat Just and Upside Foods—have both launched farmed chicken products. But Peppo, who claims his reputation as a provocateur in the industry, says this approach makes no sense. “Making chicken was always a terrible idea,” he says.
The basic ingredients of farmed meat are expensive. The business of growing animal cells outside their bodies is usually the province of medical researchers and pharmaceutical companies. Animal cells grown in culture are used to make vaccines and medicines, which are sold in very small quantities at exorbitant prices. The cultured meat industry needs the same ingredients to grow the cells it wants to sell as meat, but unlike pharma the industry needs to grow cells in large quantities and sell them at grocery store prices. .