If we can identify which crops, and which varieties of a crop, are best to use for specific plant-based meats, we can make a better product. Analytical tools like trait mapping and digital phenotyping can help us better understand not only wheat and soy but the countless other crops that are available to us. They are not necessarily the optimal crops for plant-based food production. They are the byproducts of existing industries such as the livestock and biofuel industries. Today most plant-based meats on the market are made with soy and wheat because these ingredients are abundantly available. (Key point: crops are also where livestock animals get all of their raw materials for creating muscle-plant-based meat just cuts the animal out of the process.)
The process of creating plant-based meat breaks down into four basic technology areas:Ĭrops are where we get the raw materials for creating plant-based meats. We’re so glad you asked! We define plant-based meat as a food derived from a plant or fungus-sorry to all the die-hard botanists out there-designed to replace animal-based meat either as a stand-alone or in a recipe. We’re already seeing this shift with plant-based meats. As these products become increasingly accessible, cost-competitive, and delicious, the market will shift. Plant-based and clean meat both offer ways to satisfy the growing demand for meat in a much more sustainable way. Global Demand for Meat 2005 vs 2050 (in tonnes)ĭata source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, ESA Working Paper No. From a land-use standpoint alone, by the year 2050, the demand for meat will have skyrocketed beyond what our planet is capable of producing. Compounded with our growing global population, this adds extraordinary pressure to our already straining environment. Meat consumption is on the rise.ĭespite the rising awareness of these inefficiencies and the other deleterious effects of industrial-scale animal agriculture, the world will eat more meat per capita this year than ever before.Īs standards of living rise around the world, humans are eating more meat. Even setting aside issues around animal welfare, antibiotic use, and food safety, the inherent limitations of feed conversion in this biological system make conventional animal agriculture unsustainable. Nevertheless, it still requires 9 calories of chicken feed to create 1 calorie of chicken meat. Chickens have been relentlessly bred to reach slaughter weight as fast as possible with the biggest chicken breast possible. Why is there such a discrepancy between the huge amount of land we allocate to livestock production and the relatively meager amount of protein calories we glean? Using animals as units of meat production is an inherently inefficient process. American national competitiveness & the future of meatĪdapted from and based on UN FAO statistics.Marketing & promoting plant-based dishes.Cultivated meat research tools database.University chapters: The Alt Protein Project.