These Food Tech Trends are Disrupting the Food System

EAT

Jul 12

As industrial agriculture continues to grow, animals, the environment, and people are paying the cost. These innovative food production methods could be the answer to creating a more ethical food system.

More than 200 million land animals and three billion aquatic animals are killed for food around the world every single day. Their suffering is undeniable: cramped, dark intensive farming conditions, emotional and physical trauma, and a painful death years at just a fraction of their natural lifespan. But the world’s demand for meat, dairy, and eggs is only increasing, and so innovative companies and scientists are racing to find future-proof solutions that can upend the food system and save the trillions of animals from being treated and used as commodities.

Cellular agriculture

Considered one of the leading solutions to traditional animal agriculture’s devastating impact on animals and the planet, cellular agriculture produces animal products, such as meat, eggs, and dairy, from cell culture rather than whole animals. This cuts out the need to farm, raise, and slaughter animals, and bypasses much of the climate degradation. And because it’s crafted in a lab rather than via animals on a farm, it contains none of the antibiotics of conventional meat.

Simply put, cells are painlessly taken from a living animal and then scientists feed and nurture the cells so that they multiply. Production of cultivated meat involves approximately 7 - 45 percent less energy use than conventionally produced European meat, according to a study on its environmental impacts. Greenhouse gas emissions were also found to be 78 - 96 percent lower, while land use was cut by 99 percent and water use by 82 - 96 percent.

Across the world, companies are striving to produce cell-cultured meat, dairy, eggs, and seafood, with the goal of producing cultured products at the same cost as their animal-based counterparts. The industry has since grown to more than 60 companies on 6 continents, backed by $450M+ in investments, according to Good Food Institute (GFI). Major players in the cultivated market include Upside Foods, SuperMeat, Mosa Meat, Future Meat Technologies and the seafood producers Wildtype and Shiok Meats.

Singapore became the first country to grant approval for the commercial sale of cultivated meat, with Qatar expected to follow. Meanwhile, in Europe and America, companies continue to work through regulatory processes.

Plant-based alternatives

Over the past few years there’s been an explosion of plant-based meat options arriving on the market, from Beyond Meat burgers to the world's second-largest meat company Tyson Foods' own nationwide brand of vegan offerings. 100 percent plant-powered restaurants have popped up everywhere and major chains, including KFC, Burger King, and McDonald’s, have worked to keep up with consumer demand by adding everything from the Impossible Whopper to the McPlant.

Plant-based seafood alternative solutions also continue to hit the market, with 2022 set to be the year of alt-seafood. U.S. sales of fish-free seafood grew by 23 percent in 2020 and the industry is expected to reach $1.3 billion in the next decade. Brands such as Good Catch and Gardein already have alternatives readily available in stores, from Good Catch’s varieties of fish-free tuna to Gardein’s fishless fillets and even crabless cakes.

Plant-based milks are also gaining popularity, with oat, soy, and coconut becoming firm fridge staples across households and major retailers. As part of Starbucks’ goal to reduce carbon by 50 percent by 2030, the coffee giant is committed to expanding its plant-based menu choices. With dairy products accounting for the biggest source of carbon dioxide emissions throughout Starbucks' operations and supply chain, Chief Executive Officer Kevin Johnson stated that "alternative milks will be a large part of the answer,” with “the demand-supply curve for consumer goods already altering."

3D-Printed food

3D printing is the process of making three-dimensional objects from digital files. The desired food object is created by building it one layer at a time, also known as additive manufacturing. The most popular method is to use food-grade syringes to hold the printing material, which is then deposited layer by layer through a food-grade nozzle. The key advantage of 3D food printing is that it can be done in a much more controlled way, resulting in items that could not otherwise be produced.

The cutting-edge technology is being harnessed by the plant-based meat industry, the cultivated meat industry, as well as a hybrid of the two. When it comes to printing alt-meat, 3D food printing can help achieve the same all-important taste and texture as animal-based meat.

The alternative protein space in 3D printing is rapidly expanding. Revo Foods has created 3D-printed plant-based salmon slices and is set to launch whole-cut vegan salmon fillets in U.S. supermarkets next year. Meanwhile, Redefine Meat, currently offers 3D-printed plant-based meat whole cuts including burgers, ‘kababs’, and sausages at restaurants in Europe. Recently, Selfridges became the world’s first department store to feature Redefine’s plant-based 3D-printed meat.

Other players include Aleph Farms who developed the ‘world’s first’ cell-based ribeye steak using a combination of 3D bioprinting technology and real cow cells. Novameat has created both vegan steak and cell-based meat, as well as a hybrid meat analogue, using animal cells with a biocompatible plant-based scaffold in an effort to overcome pricing limitations (such as affordable scaffolding) of cell-based meat. To clarify, in cell cultivated meat production, scaffolding helps create structure and texture by facilitating muscle, fat, and connective tissue development.

Microbial fermentation

Microbial fermentation is also an emerging player in the alternation-protein world. Based on the centuries-old method of fermentation, microbial protein is produced in steel tanks by feeding sugars and other nutrients to microbes in a process similar to how beer and bread are developed. The end result is a nutritionally-rich food that can taste and feel like red meat, all while requiring far less land and water, and emitting fewer greenhouse gases. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a microbial protein meat alternative (mycoprotein) as safe in 2002.

Examples include Nature’s Fynd, which is using its innovative fermentation technology to produce sustainable and ‘meaty’ fungi protein developed from microbes found in Yellowstone, and Quorn, which uses mycoprotein derived from an abundant natural organism called Fusarium Venenatum.

Precision fermentation

Precision fermentation can produce real cultured meat proteins without hurting or slaughtering animals. During the process, scientists encode genetic material for the desired animal protein into host organisms such as yeasts or fungi. The code is mixed with vitamins, minerals, and sugars before being placed into fermentation tanks (also similar to those used to brew beer), where the animal proteins grow. As well as cell-based meat, this method can also produce animal-free whey and caesin proteins, egg whites, and collagen.

Protein companies are also using this technique to produce components founds in plants. For example, Impossible Foods uses precision fermentation to create “heme,” a flavoring ingredient in their burger that gives the product its red, meaty look and flavor.

Want to hear from the innovators, scientists, and chefs disrupting the food industry? Check out our podcast focus The Future of Food - where we talk with the game-changers who are leading the way toward a world without factory farms and slaughterhouses.

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