Why Biotech Meat Cannot Compete With Animal Meat At Retail
My latest Forbes article explains why even combining cell-cultured meat with plant-based ingredients will still prove impossible to compete with the real thing in the marketplace.
Recently, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration released its “no questions” letter in response to biotech meat company Upside Foods’ safety submission for cell-cultured chicken. Many media outlets falsely reported the news as “approval” or “clearance” despite the FDA saying, “the voluntary pre-market consultation is not an approval process”.
Upside Foods called the letter a “green light”, which many media outlets repeated, even though this also overstates the move as there is still a long way to go, for both FDA and U.S. Department of Agriculture approval and oversight. (The two agencies share jurisdiction and the FDA alone lists 8 steps, including the pre-market letter, while USDA lists 7 steps.)
But regardless of how close regulatory approval may be for cell-cultured meat, or for that matter, scientific viability, if and when any product is ready to be commercially sold, the nascent industry faces significant marketplace challenges that few seem to be talking about.
The various challenges that plant-based meat has experienced in the marketplace offers us some clues as to what’s coming for biotech meat companies.
Read the rest at Forbes.com…