Mark Post is a co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Mosa Meat, a European food technology company that grows beef directly from animal cells as well as co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Qorium which grows leather in a similar fashion. Mark Post is Professor of Sustainable Industrial Tissue Engineering at Maastricht University and has a background in tissue engineering, cell culture, life sciences and medicine. He has previously held academic positions at Harvard, Dartmouth and Eindhoven University of Technology.
What led you to investigate cultivated meat? Why do you believe it is important?
Together with Mosa Meat co-founder Peter Verstrate, I was part of a Dutch government-funded research project around cultivated meat in the early 2000’s. After that project ended in 2009 we jointly continued to work on the topic together, motivated by the potential of this innovation to help address some of the most pressing issues in food production including sustainability, food security and animal welfare.
In 2013 we introduced the world’s first cultivated beef burger, which marked a significant milestone in the field of cellular agriculture. It was a proof of concept for cultivated meat but also the starting point for a new industry, as there are now roughly 150 companies globally producing cultivated meat or seafood through cell culture, many of whom are showing great progress in product development and scaling up production capacity.
In the past 10 years global awareness has increased for the need to reshape the food system, while meat consumption has kept growing and is projected to keep growing in the next decades. None of the available solutions (vegan diets, plant-based meat alternatives, improvements to industrial animal farming) have managed to truly solve this problem, so we feel it is quite important to offer consumers the option of cultivated meat.
You unveiled the first burger made from lab-grown meat in 2013 – how has the technology of cultivated meat and its viability advanced in the last decade? What hurdles/challenges remain?
Mark Post: The technology behind cultivated meat has advanced significantly, for example by reducing the cost of cell feed together with partners in the animal feed sector, as well as removing fetal bovine serum (FBS), making the process more ethical and sustainable. Our team of 100+ scientists has published 20+ scientific papers about the progress we are making, sharing it with the academic community and wider industry. Another important step has been that we have demonstrated our production process at a larger and larger scale. Last year we opened a scale-up facility with the capacity to make up to tens of thousands of cultivated hamburgers per year.
There has also been great progress in making a tastier product, mainly by not only producing muscle (like the burger in 2013) but also producing beef fat with the same technology. In terms of safety, there have been multiple food safety agencies globally that have evaluated cultivated products to be safe for consumption (Singapore, U.S., Australia, and Israel) and FAO / WHO have reported how food safety risks in cultivated meat are similar to those in conventional meat, and that they can be contained by proper handling and testing like in conventional meat. We have submitted Mosa Meat’s first product for market approval in Singapore and are eagerly awaiting the green light there.
Yet with all that progress, there are still scientific and engineering challenges to overcome before it can be produced at scale and cost levels that are commercially viable, to make it accessible to consumers globally. Together with peers in our field I have co-authored papers about challenges and served as an editor for publications about the advances of cultivated meat.
Food is strongly tied to culture and identity in many European countries and so there could be strong resistance to the acceptance of novel food like cultivated meat (for example, Italian MPs voted last year for a law banning cultivated meat) – how do you view this challenge and what could be done to overcome it?
Mark Post: Europe invented cultivated meat, some of the best companies in the world are here and the EU is well positioned to be a global leader in cultivated foods, which makes it disappointing that the discussion that has taken place in some countries has been quite misinformed and overlooks some of the opportunities ahead.
The FAO predicts meat consumption will increase by ~50% by 2050 and current production methods cannot meet that demand within planetary boundaries. Not only is cultivated meat not a threat to European farmers like it is portrayed in some discussions, it can complement our existing protein production and create new revenue opportunities for example for farmers to raise the crops needed to feed our cells. I believe we can both support and protect European food and its producers, while building a world class innovation ecosystem that creates new jobs and helps feed a growing planet without destroying it.
How do you view the regulatory landscape in Europe in regard to cultivated meat compared to other parts of the world?
Mark Post: We have the safest food in the world because the process managed by the European Food Safety Authority is so robust, well developed and scientifically independent. Europe was the first to set detailed guidelines for approval of cell cultured foods. The scientific part of the approval process takes the same time as elsewhere; the decision-making part takes longer given the complexity of the EU. Although the approval process for cultivated meat is faster in other regions, we welcome the thorough review because we want the gold standard in approvals and for consumers to have confidence in these new foods. Approvals and applications are accelerating around the world, and the first EU approval will likely be a positive tipping point for the industry.
Cultivated meat has been presented as an alternative protein with a lower environmental impact than conventionally produced meat – can it really be a more sustainable option?
Mark Post: Yes, we firmly believe that it can be a much more sustainable option. This was one of the main reasons for me to start working on cultivated meat and our internal projections show even more potential for a positive climate impact than some of the peer-reviewed LCAs that are publicly available, which show that cultivating meat from cells could cut the climate impact of meat production by up to 92%.
This is compared to an ambitious scenario for conventional animal agriculture in 2030 – where farmers manage to cut the carbon footprint of meat by 15% (beef), 26% (pork) and 53% (chicken). And if we use the freed-up land for regenerative agriculture and rewilding to sequester even more carbon, the positive climate impacts could be greater still.
Because the positive impact is indeed different per type of meat, at Mosa Meat we are focusing on producing beef first. Another big factor is the use of renewable energy in the production process, which is why we are using 100% renewable energy for our production process and have received certifications like ZNU and B Corp that demonstrate how these environmental and societal factors are embedded in our company decision making.
How do you see the future of cultivated meat?
Mark Post: The future of cultivated meat is promising and has the potential to transform the way we produce and consume meat, especially in countries with rapidly increasing meat consumption like China and India. We aim for it to complement and coexist with conventional meat sources, serving consumers that want to keep eating delicious and nutritious meat, while making a meaningful change to their climate footprint. We are encouraged to see many young companies starting to produce a wide variety of animal products, including for example foie gras, dairy, fish or leather. Consumer motivation studies have shown that the wish for variety (choices), is the most important reason to select meat alternatives. Within that breadth of assortment, cultivated meat will likely take a prominent place.
More and more governments around the world have started to ramp up their support for the development of cultivated meat (similar to how I got started in this field) and I am hopeful that we can make a positive impact in collaboration as soon as possible.