What’s your Beef with Beef?

What is Lab-Cultured Meat?

Lab-cultured meat is an up-and-coming alternative to traditional meat sources and plant-based ‘meat’ products. Cultured meat is grown in vitro from animal stem cells. Stem cells are taken from the animal’s muscle tissues, placed in a nutrient-rich broth and grown in a large-scale bioreactor until muscle fibres are formed. Scientists are able to modify the meat into specific cuts while it is being grown and can also modify its nutritional value. This up-and-coming meat alternative has the potential to disrupt how animal protein is produced and sold. So, should livestock farmers be concerned about lab-cultured meat bankrupting them? Should Canadian consumers worry about the future of the Canadian beef and poultry industries? Should the Canadian government regulate this before it gets out of hand? These are the questions that concern a lot of people on the topic of cultured meat.

Current Production and Pricing

Currently, minimal lab-cultured meats are available on the market due to high production costs and technological challenges. There have been samples of the product served, like the first lab-grown burger that was sold in the Netherlands in 2013 for ~$425000 CAD. Over the past decade, technological advancements have reduced the production costs of cultured meats drastically. However, culturing cells is still an expensive and complicated process, with high barriers to entry and a small consumer market. Production costs are still high and large-scale production remains a difficult feat, but as more research is done and production methods improve, the potential for commercial availability of cultured meat is becoming more realistic.

In 2022, Singapore had lab-cultured chicken hit shelves across the country. The cuts were priced at $7.50 CAD for a 120g portion of chicken. In Canadian grocery stores, skinless boneless chicken is priced between $1.44/100g and $3.44/100g as of December 2024. So, a 120g portion of traditionally raised chicken costs at most $4.13. The portion of Singapore’s cultured chicken is nearly double the price of the traditionally produced chicken in Canada. Looking into past years of chicken pricing in Singapore, the highest retail price was 8.56 SGD/kg, which is equal to $0.88/100g in Canada.

While lab-cultured meat is still far from affordable, continued technological advancements, scaling up production and streamlining the in vitro growth process, suggest that lab-cultured meat could eventually become incredibly cost-effective. Some experts, like Amy Rowat, have predicted that cultured meat will eventually be a cost-competitor with organic meat varieties. Still a premium price, but more palatable for the average Canadian’s budget.

Consumer Acceptance

As production costs and cell culturing technology evolve, so do consumers’ perspectives. Cultured meat still has a long way to go in garnering acceptance from the public. If you saw a lab-cultured burger on the shelves tomorrow, would you go out of your way to try it? Although some would try a lab-cultured burger when it first hits shelves, others raise concerns about possible detrimental health effects that come with rapidly growing cells in a lab dish. Lab-cultured meat is promoted as being an eco-friendly and cruelty-free alternative to regular meat, but there’s a certain “ick” factor when people are eating something produced entirely in a lab.

Many people have also mentioned the ethical implications of growing meat in vitro. The media presents lab-cultured meats as being an ‘cruelty-free alternative’ to traditional forms of livestock production. While lab-cultured meats do not require an animal to be sent to slaughter, they do require routine cell biopsies of the animals. People have posited that animals subjected to stem cell extraction would have a worse quality of life than those that are free to graze until they are sent to slaughter. A study by Michael Siegrist demonstrated that when consumers knew more about the process of developing lab-cultured meats, they were less likely to try them. It’s a similar principle to the public’s distaste for genetically modified (GM) foods, the more you know, the more questions you’ll have about what you’re eating and the less you’ll want to eat it.

What does this mean for Canadian livestock and meat?

As there is no widely available lab-cultured meat in Canada, there hasn’t been any push for the Canadian government to place restrictions on development or begin heavily regulating it. The Canadian government already has policies implemented surrounding novel and GM foods. If lab-cultured meat were to enter Canadian markets, it would be subject to the regulations put in place by the novel food guidelines. However, the Canadian government should be aware of the advancements of this technology and ensure that any products being sold in Canada are safe and up to national food standards. If strict regulations are placed on the development and sale of cultured meat out of public fear and uncertainty, the technology will not have the potential to improve.

Globally, only four countries have approved the sale of cultivated meats. However, only Singapore has products available on shelves in the grocery store for human consumption. The other three countries are the US, Israel and Britain, whose sales have only been approved for restaurant tastings or for use in pet food. As Canada usually follows the regulatory pattern of the US, we might see the approval of lab-cultivated meat soon, but probably won’t see it beat out traditionally grown meat. Canadian consumers shouldn’t be concerned about cultured meat taking over the beef and poultry industries, there is currently no consumer demand and the technology is still in it’s early stages, so prices are not competitive with traditionally raised meat. If lab grown meats make it to Canadian markets, it will consumers that determine the overall success of the product.