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Sparkle (3)
At first sniff, in vitro meat (IVM) might inspire the skeevies, but IVM may provide multiple solutions to a human population increasingly outgrowing (and soiling) its own planetary pants. (We need an elastic waistband version of Earth, it seems.) As Winston Churchill surmised in 1931: "Fifty years hence we shall escape the absurdity of growing a whole chicken in order to eat the breast or wing by growing these parts separately under a suitable medium." According to Churchill, we're quite tardy.
"Livestock's Long Shadow, an influential 2006 report by the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization, calculated that the global livestock industry is responsible for about 18 per cent of mankind's greenhouse-gas emissions - more than all of our cars, trains, shipping and planes combined. The FAO said it also accounts for more than eight percent of our freshwater use, largely to grow crops fed to animals. Meat production now uses up 70 per cent of the world's agricultural land. And then, of course, there is the animal suffering attributed to the industry and intensive animal-farming."
--"Fake Meat: Burger Grown In Beakers", WIRED, 7/31/09, by Leo Hickman
Though the concept is hardly new, my first impression of IVM appeared in the second episode of the superb but short-lived show, Better Off Ted -- "Heroes," in the form of "meat blobby" where I assumed it to be pure hilarious fiction. I then came across IVM in an unlikely spot, on the Farm Sanctuary site. (As covered previously in this space, Farm Sanctuary is a haven for abused and neglected farm animals.) While IVM is by no means their central cause, they do state a clear position. An excerpt:
"As we advocate for an end to factory farming and institutionalized cruelty to farm animals, the developing research into the mass production of in vitro meat presents an opportunity to seriously impact the number of animals slaughtered for food in years to come."
So, I gave Dr. Allan E. Kornberg, Executive Director of the Farm Sanctuary, a call to discuss. Now, this is a vegan who literally comes to work every day asking himself, "How can I make the lives of farm animals better?" From his perspective, the advantages of IVM are crystal clear -- nobody would suffer or die for your burger or McNugget. Said Dr. Kornberg:
"There are nearly 10 billion land animals slaughtered for food every year in the US. It’s hard to get your mind around it. If there’s a way to stop it, I'm all for it.….Everybody on senior staff agreed because what we advocate for is the best interest of the animals. We decided to make a statement to support this technology but we are not necessarily the first animal rights group to support IVM."
Indeed, in 2008 (the US red meat market generated $61 billion that year) PETA famously announced a $1 million dollar prize to the “first person to come up with a method to produce commercially viable quantities of in vitro meat at competitive prices by June 30, 2012.” Of course, the technology is so far from market-ready that the comparatively paltry dollar amount is a symbolic gesture. Still, it's a clear message of support: IVM will not get ugly flack from the notoriously combative organization if/when IVM commercially debuts.
CB: What do you say to those who call IVM "unnatural" or "disconnected from nature?"
AK: "Much of what we do in an advanced society is unnatural -- a building is heated and air conditioned, going 60 mph, hundreds of chickens in a space -- is that natural?
"We’re so disconnected from nature now. Not many people in North America are hunters/gatherers anymore. In a vacuum, IVM seems disconnected, but I’m not really sure how eating a pig that was raised in a stall, locked in with bars, how is that very connected to nature either. And that is connected to cruelty, so that’s the difference.
"When I think about the public health problem of eating animal products, the actual impact of what animals nutrients do to our bodies -- health disease, cholesterol -- not to mention the unintended risks of infectious disease -- swine flu, mad cow -- (with IVM) all of those diseases would go away. The reason why mad cow happened is because humans -- aside from the other tortures -- would take from slaughtered cow, brain and spinal cord, grind
