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Innovations in Alternative Food Production and Implications for Food Systems

The next session, moderated by Naomi Fukagawa, U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), explored innovations in alternative meat production and their implications for food systems.

HOW GAME CHANGING IS ALTERNATIVE FOOD PRODUCTION FOR THE ENTIRE FOOD SYSTEM?

Jan Dutkiewicz, Johns Hopkins University, focused on how production of meat alternatives may impact the food system. He began by highlighting interest in meat alternatives. For example, Burger King is rolling out the Impossible™ Burger nationwide, while Beyond Meat®, another company producing meat alternatives, had the single most successful initial public offering in 2019. At the same time, Dutkiewicz observed, organizations such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the EAT-Lancet Commission, the World Wildlife Fund, and Greenpeace are increasingly recommending a more plant-based diet.

Conventional Meat Production in America

Dutkiewicz explained that the United States is generally a meat-eating nation in part because of the historical success of the American meat industry in providing cheap protein and embracing such technologies as refrigeration and long-range transport that allow centralized production to reach distant consumer markets. For example, he noted, the first industrial-scale slaughterhouses in Cincinnati and Chicago pioneered the disassembly

line model of animal production, which enabled low-skilled workers to efficiently convert animal bodies into salable cuts of meat. Overall, he said, the meat industry is like many other large industries in that it uses an economies-of-scale model aimed at selling cheap, standardized products to consumers.

Dutkiewicz told the audience that the U.S. meat industry processes nearly 10 billion animals per year, about 9 billion of which are chickens (NAMI, 2017). Chicken represents the largest share of total meat processed by weight, he elaborated, but beef and pork also make up a significant portion of the total (NAMI, 2017). He added that the average American consumer eats about 200–220 pounds of meat per year while paying less for that meat than is paid in any other country as a percentage of income. Overall, he reported, Americans spend just 6.4 percent of their income on food as the result of a system of “cheap food” production (Patel and Moore, 2017) with respect to both the end result and the inputs, such as labor.

Dutkiewicz explained that cheap food production creates a number of externalities, including those related to the environment, labor, and animal rights. Environmental concerns relate to land use, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with food animal production, and water use and contamination. With respect to labor, Dutkiewicz cited concerns regarding the conditions at poultry plants and the business practices of major meat processors that give them a monopsonic relationship with suppliers, meaning they can unduly influence prices for animals and disadvantage contracted farmers. In addition, he noted concerns regarding animal welfare, which have increasingly entered mainstream discussion.

The Emergence of Meat Alternatives

Dutkiewicz pointed out that historically, attempts to address the negative externalities of conventional meat production have targeted the values of individual consumers, including by calling on individual consumers to buy local or become vegetarian or vegan. However, he observed, the impact of such efforts has been limited, as 97–99 percent of American meat continues to come from conventional agriculture, and the percentage of the population that is vegetarian or vegan has remained at about 2–5 percent for the past decade or two.

In contrast with that approach, Dutkiewicz continued, a new wave of food entrepreneurs, innovators, and disrupters are working to address the externalities of conventional meat production by creating a product as analogous to meat as possible. The aim, he said, is to change the methods of production of what consumers are eating while changing the actual product (“meat”) as little as possible. This approach, he explained, is based on the

theory that consumers make decisions based primarily on price, taste, and habit, with ethics serving as a less important factor.

Plant-Based Meat Alternatives

Dutkiewicz distinguished the new generation of plant-based (cellular) alternatives, such as the Impossible Burger and the Beyond Burger®, from traditional plant-based products by pointing out that producers of the latter products did not aim for taste parity with meat by targeting an audience that was already vegetarian or vegan or concerned about health. In contrast, the new products target consumers who like meat and are intended to compete with conventional meat on price, taste, and habit but with less of an ecological impact. According to Dutkiewicz, “Compared to a conventional beef burger, a [plant-based] Beyond Burger uses 99 percent less water, 93 percent less land, emits 90 percent fewer GHG emissions, and uses 46 percent less energy,” statistics based on a University of Michigan life-cycle assessment (Heller and Keoleian, 2018). He characterized the alternative meat market as the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. food sector and noted that 70 percent of purchasers are not vegetarian or vegan.

Dutkiewicz pointed out that the products are mass-produced and narrowly target concerns regarding animal welfare and the ecological footprint of conventional meat production. The success of these highly processed products means that they do not need to also benefit food justice or public health for consumers to purchase them.

Dutkiewicz posited that the technology used in producing these meat alternatives could offer broader opportunities to shift away from monocrop agriculture if the nutritional and protein profiles of plants could be incorporated into alternatives. He sees opportunities for collaboration among small farmers that grow nonmonocrop products, food science, and public health in developing a broader range of nonmonocrop products that would move the United States away from a corporate food regime to a “food tech justice regime.” He suggested this would involve, for example, cutting animal farms, slaughterhouses, large-scale processors, and fast food chains out of the food supply chain.

Cellular Agriculture

Dutkiewicz next provided a brief history and description of cellular agriculture. As he explained, the first hamburger grown from cow stem cells in a lab was created in 2013 at a cost of $332,000. Production costs have declined significantly to about $50 today, he reported, and products such as meatballs and chicken nuggets have been created that are indistinguishable in taste and even at the cellular level from the traditional products.

Dutkiewicz explained that the cellular agriculture process begins with a biopsy from an animal or animal model in a lab that is placed in a bioreactor and fed a growth medium. Inside the bioreactor, muscle or fat tissue grows, just as it would inside the body of an animal, and becomes edible.

Dutkiewicz characterized such lab-grown meat products as “disruptive,” with taste and DNA indistinguishable from those of conventional meat products and a dramatically reduced ecological impact, including reduced energy use, GHG emissions, land use, water use, and a more efficient and shorter value chain. He noted that many of the major meat and pharmaceutical companies are already investing in the technology and that it offers the potential for increased jobs in the biotech field. He acknowledged, however, that issues related to production at scale; technology, including the cost and use of growth mediums; and the timeline for mass-market release and return on investment still need to be addressed. He added that most funding for cellular agriculture research has come from venture capital, meaning the intellectual property is being developed within private companies, and little information is available publicly.

Dutkiewicz concluded by pointing out that cellular agriculture technology is disruptive because it has the potential to create meat as a food product that is distinct from agriculture and offers major ecological benefits, but he noted that the impacts on labor and land use are unknown.

ALTERNATIVE FOOD PRODUCTION SYSTEMS: THE SCIENCE AND IMPLICATIONS

James Reecy, Iowa State University, spoke about the science and implications of in vitro meat, comparing and contrasting it with the conventional meat industry and the incremental innovation that has occurred within the meat industry. He also described the implications for climate, natural resources, cultural considerations, and nutrition and health.

In Vitro Cell Culture

As Reecy explained, animals comprise many single nucleated cells with the ability to replicate. The muscle that provides the taste and mouthfeel of meat is formed when the myoblasts fuse together. Reecy reiterated Dutkiewicz’s explanation that lab-grown meat is created when muscle fiber cells are placed in a bioreactor external to the animal and used to produce meat; animals still have to be used as the source of these cells, but many fewer animals are harmed than with conventional animal agriculture. Based on several assumptions, he estimated that as few as 14 head of cattle per year could produce the same amount of meat as 39 million head through conventional agriculture.

He added that one cell can replicate only a finite number of times before it is necessary to start again with new cells, and that while the cells could be genetically modified to be capable of replicating an infinite number of times, this may not be socially acceptable.

While lab-grown meat currently costs about $50 per serving, Reecy believes it will eventually become cost-competitive with other protein sources. He suggested that finding the solution is a matter of simple engineering, although this engineering will need to involve a great deal of innovation. However, he acknowledged that challenges come with mass-producing lab-grown meat, including how to keep the meat sterile as it grows and ensure that bacteria do not grow along with it without using large amounts of antibiotics. He also echoed Dutkiewicz’s concern that because most of the technology that has been developed in this area is proprietary, limited information about it is publicly available.

Comparison with the Meat Industry

Comparing lab-grown meat with traditional meat, Reecy observed that both industries have inputs and outputs. In the case of lab-grown meat, the bioreactor takes the place of the animal itself in growing the muscle cells. With traditional animal agriculture, inputs include grass, roughages or concentrates, minerals, and vitamins, and outputs include meat, manure, and numerous other products. Reecy noted that manure provides value as organic matter that can go back into the soil. With lab-grown meat, inputs include purified amino acids and glucose, and outputs include a waste product in liquid form, that is, spent cell culture media, in addition to the meat. Reecy added that livestock production is a trillion-dollar industry in the United States, accounting for 5.6 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product.

Improvements in Protein Production Over Time

According to Reecy, U.S. milk production has steadily increased since the 1950s, with the amount of milk produced nearly doubling and fewer than half as many cows being used (Capper et al., 2009). This is possible, he observed, because milk production per cow is nearly four times greater than was previously possible. The situation is similar for beef and poultry, he added. The amount of time needed to raise a poultry bird to be ready for sale is now less than one-third of the time required in the 1960s, and the animal is now twice as large.

With these increased efficiencies in production, Reecy acknowledged that carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions per animal have increased as well; however, emissions per unit are only about one-third of what they were in

the 1960s (Capper et al., 2009). He explained that most of the increased efficiency can be attributed to changes in the genetics of the animals. In 2005, he elaborated, a process called “genomic selection” was initiated to leverage the genetic potential of the animal based on its genotype, resulting in more than a doubling of production efficiency over the prior process. In 2010, after the process had been revised again, production efficiency again doubled, and it continues to increase. Reecy suggested that to be competitive, the in vitro meat industry will have to increase its production efficiency on an ongoing basis.

Environmental, Cultural, and Nutritional Concerns

While in vitro meat would have less of an environmental impact than that of traditional agriculture, Reecy pointed out that the growth hormones used to get the cells to grow may raise concerns. He noted similar concerns arise with the growth hormones used to stimulate milk production in cows.

Reecy also explained that the nutritional profile of in vitro meat could be superior or inferior to traditional meat based on multiple factors, such as whether or not heme iron is present and the fat content of the meat.

In closing, Reecy highlighted that the livestock industry provides much more than meat, including leather and wool, and that moving to lab-grown meat would have implications for these other commercial products. He pointed out that these other industries would also have to undergo innovations if the animals were removed from production.

ALTERNATIVE FOOD PRODUCTION: CONSUMER CONCERNS

The final speaker of the session, Michael Hansen, Consumer Reports, addressed consumer concerns regarding alternative meat products. He defined several basic categories of such products: (1) traditional plant-based products; (2) “high-tech” versions of traditional plant-based products, such as the Beyond Burger; (3) plant-based products with genetically engineered inputs, such as the Impossible Burger, which is made with genetically engineered soy leghemoglobin containing heme iron; and (4) animal cell–cultured products. Hansen compared the ingredients, nutritional qualities, and climate impact of the Beyond Burger, the Impossible Burger, the Amy’s Organic California Burger, and a ground beef burger. He also identified safety concerns with the Impossible Burger and provided information about cell-cultured meat, including the findings of a consumer study.

Comparison of Ingredients, Nutritional Characteristics, and Climate Impacts

Comparing the ingredients of the various burgers, Hansen noted that the Beyond Burger and the Impossible Burger have many highly processed ingredients, including protein isolates, and are not organic. He pointed out that research has linked consumption of highly processed foods to overeating and weight gain (Hall et al., 2019). He added that the ground beef burger has a small number of ingredients (primarily beef) and can be non–genetically modified or organic, while the Amy’s Organic burger contains primarily organic vegetables and is less processed than the other plant-based burgers. More detail on the ingredients in each of the burgers is presented in Table 4-1.

With respect to nutritional quality, Hansen reported that the plant-based burgers have more sodium than the beef burger, and the Beyond Burger and Impossible Burger have similar levels of calories, fat, and saturated fat. The Amy’s Organic burger is slightly healthier, he observed. A comparison of the nutritional characteristics of these burgers is presented in Table 4-2.

With respect to climate impacts, Hansen observed that the Beyond Burger and Impossible Burger are associated with about 90 percent fewer GHG emissions relative to conventional industrially produced meat. However, he pointed out that grass-fed, ecologically sustainable meat produced through regenerative agriculture can produce net negative GHG emissions, as shown by the case of ground beef produced by White Oak Pastures. With regenerative agriculture, he elaborated, soil is built up instead of being degraded, and carbon is deposited back into the system instead of being removed.

Potential Concerns with Impossible Burger Components

Hansen stated that the Impossible Burger contains genetically engineered soy leghemoglobin and 46 proteins from Pichia pastoris yeast, a combination termed “soy LegH Prep.” He explained that, following several years of back and forth between Impossible Foods and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Impossible Foods received a “No Questions” letter from FDA in 2018 regarding the company’s Generally Recognized As Safe (GRAS) Notice on soy LegH Prep for use as a flavoring and iron source in meat. In 2019, FDA approved soy LegH Prep as a color additive. However, Hansen questioned the safety of soy leghemoglobin and the yeast proteins, as they are new to the food supply. He pointed out that for the GRAS Notice, Impossible Foods conducted short-term 14- and 28-day feeding studies in rats to assess the systematic toxicology of soy leghemoglobin, and used the same data for its proposal to use soy leghemoglobin as a color additive.

TABLE 4-1 Comparison of the Ingredients in Various Plant-Based Burgers and a Beef Burger

NOTE: GMO = genetically modified organism; USDA = U.S. Department of Agriculture.

*Potentially genetically engineered.

SOURCES: Presented by Michael Hansen on August 7, 2019, modified from Peachman, 2019.

Hansen explained that the 28-day feeding study, which was based on a small sample size of 10, found several statistically significant adverse effects. These effects included a decrease in body weight gain; changes in blood chemistry, such as a decreased reticulocyte count, which can be a sign of anemia or damage to bone marrow; decreased clotting ability; decreased

blood levels of alkaline phosphatase, which has been linked to malnutrition and celiac disease; increased blood albumin, which can result from acute infection or damage to tissues; an increase in potassium values and decreased blood glucose and chloride, which could indicate kidney problems; and increased globulin values (Fraser et al., 2018). These findings were explained as “minimal” change, “non-dose-dependent,” “non-adverse,” of “no toxicological relevance,” and “within expected biological variation,” findings with which Hansen disagrees. Given that there were statistically significant findings for a short-term study with a small sample size, he suggested that more longer-term studies are warranted.

Hansen also expressed concern that the heme B iron in the Impossible Burger could increase the risk of colorectal and other cancers linked to red meat consumption and heme B (Bastide et al., 2011; Ward et al., 2012). While heme B iron is found primarily in meat products, he added, it has not previously been extracted from its natural source, and the effects could be different. He suggested that safety standards should be higher when a substance is added to a food product instead of being naturally occurring in that product, as is the case with caffeine in coffee beans, for example.

Hansen also pointed out that 33 percent of the ingredients in the soy leghemoglobin product are the Pichia pastoris yeast proteins, which have been used to make food additives and drugs but have not previously been used in the human food supply. He also expressed concern about the dismissal of the feeding study results related to the yeast proteins.

In addition to further studies to explore changes in blood chemistry, gene expression (transcriptomics), and metabolic changes (metabolomics) associated with these products, Hansen suggested that research is needed to identify any long-term effects of their consumption, such as increased cancer risk and reproductive or developmental effects.

Animal Cell–Cultured Foods

Hansen also commented on animal cell–cultured foods, agreeing with Dutkiewicz and Reecy regarding potential concerns about safety, such as contamination, appropriate growth media, use of hormones, engineering, and the lack of transparency because much of the research to date has been proprietary. He provided an overview of the regulatory framework for cell-cultured foods, which was announced in 2018 in a joint statement from USDA and FDA. As he explained, FDA will oversee the cell collection, cell banks, cell growth, and differentiation; USDA and FDA will jointly oversee cell harvest; and USDA will have authority over the production and labeling of food products derived from cells of livestock and poultry. Hansen noted that regulations have not yet been issued, and unanswered questions remain, such as whether chemical inputs will be considered GRAS or will need to undergo the additive approval process.

Hansen concluded by sharing the results of a June 2018 survey of more than 1,000 consumers conducted by Consumer Reports on the best terminology to use for lab-grown meat. The top consumer choices were “lab-grown meat” and “artificial/synthetic meat.” “Clean meat,” “in vitro meat,” and “cultured meat” were all less popular (Consumer Reports, 2018). According to Hansen, “clean meat” and “cell-cultured meat” were the industry’s preferred terms.

AUDIENCE DISCUSSION

An audience member from USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service commented that USDA and FDA held a series of public meetings in 2018 on meat alternatives. One key takeaway from these meetings was that stakeholders disagree regarding what cell-cultured meat products should be called, with traditional meat producers being opposed to use of the term “meat.” This audience member also said that development of a regulatory scheme has been suspended until scientific and technological issues

associated with the production of these products have been resolved. She stated that she sees the alternative meat products as complements to rather than replacements for traditional meat, and suggested that with the world’s population growing, innovation is welcome.

Another audience member expressed surprise that all of the presentations during a session on the topic of alternative food production were focused on meat alternatives, noting that there are also other types of alternative food production. She commented that she thinks the primary motive of meat innovators is profit rather than solving a health, social, or environmental problem. She also highlighted the need for social innovations in the food system. She cited a recent report on agroecology¹ and food system innovations from a panel of experts of the Committee on World Food Security, which found agroecology, which includes the regenerative agriculture Hansen had addressed, to be the most significant alternative to the U.S. industrial food system. She argued that regenerative agriculture has benefits for the economy, health, the environment, and culture, and that this type of innovation in the food system should be a higher priority.

Dutkiewicz responded, noting that producers of alternative meat products are not attempting to mitigate the animal welfare, environmental, and labor impacts of traditional meat production. He asserted that the production of meat alternatives has the potential to make obsolete aspects of the food system that are particularly exploitative of the environment, animals, and labor. In the U.S. free market system, he added, one of the best ways to effect systemic change is through the private sector.

A third audience member asked about the extent to which there should be increased emphasis on improving global livestock practices compared with the emphasis on innovative alternatives to meat or behavioral change. Reecy responded that improvements in livestock production have great future potential, but that cultural changes are needed to implement them globally. As an example, he observed that, in some developing countries, livestock is seen as a ready source of income that could be used to improve one’s standard of living.

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¹ Agroecology is defined by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) as follows: “Loosely defined, agroecology often incorporates ideas about a more environmentally and socially sensitive approach to agriculture, one that focuses not only on production, but also on the ecological sustainability of the productive system” (USDA/NAL, 2007).

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