Lab-made hamburgers. That's what cultured meat actually is. This real meat is made without an animal having to die. Doesn't that sound great? Well... Cultured meat is a complicated subject. Opinions on it are divided. Some people are enthusiastic, but others think it's a strange idea. Unfortunately, there is a lot of ignorance about cultured meat. That's why we interviewed Peter Verstrate, co-founder of Mosa Meat, who, together with his colleagues, presented the first cultured meat burger in 2013.

How did you end up in food science?

"My older brother studied food technology at college. I had completed pre-university education so I could go to university in Wageningen. I studied food technology there. After that, I started working at a company that processed meat products. I fell into it. It wasn't that I had a passion for doing something with meat. This was the production company of a well-known supermarket. Then I moved to Zwolle and started working in Wijhe."

Mosa Meat's innovations and efforts are driven by the idea that we no longer need to slaughter animals for meat. This shift could bring about significant positive changes to the world, offering a hopeful and optimistic future.

How did the transition from the meat industry to the cultured meat industry go?

It went very smoothly. In 2002, I still worked in the meat processing industry for an American company with European branches. The office manager came to my desk and told me that an old man in the hall wanted to talk to me. It was a coincidence that I was there. Otherwise, I wouldn't be working at Mosa Meat now. The old man was Willem van Eelen. He wasn't the one who invented cultured meat but was the first to do something with it. The idea of ​​cultured meat is much older. Van Eelen told me that he had a patent on cultured meat and explained what that was. I was fascinated. After being skeptical, I realized that this could ensure that all the disadvantages of the meat industry would disappear or be reduced to almost zero. This was nearly too good to be true, but it was certainly not something to let go of now.

One of the reasons I saw possibilities for growing meat was that my wife worked in a laboratory where they grew heart cells for medical research. If that was possible, why wouldn't you be able to make meat?

Van Eelen had come to me because I worked for a well-known meat producer. I worked in the Research & Development department for research and quality. That was the closest I could get to someone who understood what this was about. Van Eelen was looking for a Dutch party to join a team of three Dutch universities. He had received a government subsidy of 2 million euros for the initial research into this new technology. The condition was that the project had to be Dutch. In addition to Dutch universities, there also had to be a Dutch company to market the products. At that time, there was still the naive idea that we would figure it out after a few years and the product would be ready for the market."

How did that story continue?

"I was very fascinated. It was a ticket for a train that you don't know where it's going yet, but you get on and see where you end up. However, I had to get permission from the company's management. The fact that it was about stem cells was a bit scary, and the meat industry is already quite conservative. Some interests become complicated when you try to devise an alternative for part of the meat production chain. There was some doubt about whether or not we should do this. I then wrote an extensive memo about why we should do this. Eventually, I was told I could participate in the project, but only as anonymously as possible. Join in, but make sure that our company doesn't come to the fore too much. That's what I did. I became the project leader. It took several years. Several universities were involved. Amsterdam, Eindhoven, and Utrecht each had their own task. That did lead to some things."

How did Mark Post get involved in the project?

"Halfway through the process (in 2006) someone got sick. She had to leave the project. Then, Mark Post joined the project. He was a professor at Maastricht. He shared my level of fascination. He saw the potential impact of our research. After the project, a report was made. Mark went back to Maastricht and decided to continue working there on developing large-scale animal cell cultures. In the meantime, there was also increasing interest from the media. It is fascinating to see what the world would look like if we no longer had to kill animals to make meat. It would be fantastic if that ever happens."

How did you come to present the first cultured meat burger?

"One of the media interviews that Mark Post did was picked up by Sergey Brin, the co-founder of Google. He has a foundation to donate money to things that he thinks are worthwhile. Someone came to us on behalf of his foundation and wanted to help us. This was in 2010 or 2011. They tried to put the subject on the map. The idea was to make and eat a product while it was being filmed. We had already found a way to make tiny fibers, and we could make a hamburger with many tiny fibers, which would cost about 20,000. However, this had to be done by hand, under conditions far from optimal. Because of my background in Research & Development, I knew how to make a product from individual fibers. It would be costly, but that was no problem. They financed the production of many fibers and organized the event in London. In 2013, one of our hamburgers was cooked and eaten there. This was at a press conference, with much media attention to create as much awareness as possible for the subject. This was a turning point that inspired a great many people. Since then, more than 100 companies have emerged that produce cultured meat. From companies that make the necessary equipment to produce cultured meat.

At that time, this was still an academic activity of the University of Maastricht. Mark and I preferred to continue with government support. We also tried to do that, but that did not work. It had become a controversial subject then, especially in a country like the Netherlands. Change is, of course, scary. The government stopped supporting us. We had to look for private investors. The first hamburger was incredibly expensive and made under conditions that were not sustainable. The step from there to large-scale production, which met all the requirements, was enormous. We knew we couldn't do this with 5 or 10 people, so we needed serious money. That's when we founded Mosa Meat in 2016, and we've been a startup ever since."

Verstrate emphasizes that its approach to meat production doesn't cause animal suffering, emphasizes the animal-friendliness of its processes, and refutes claims that suggest the opposite.

Where do you find people to strengthen your team?

"We find them everywhere. We now have about 120 people from more than 30 different nationalities. We are a very diverse team. We mainly employ scientists. We have hardly worked with recruiters because people have been unable to find us until now. People do this to experience change and make it possible. The drive and focus on the end goal is enormous."

What is your end goal?

"That's going to happen in steps. Ultimately, we want to replace the cow. We want to develop technology for this. We realize that that won't work with meat alone. It is good to see companies working on growing skin to make leather. From another angle, fermentation is being used to try to make milk. There are all kinds of initiatives to replace less efficient animal products with more efficient variants. We are not doing process development because the process is already running in the pasture. We must understand it and transfer it to a bioreactor or other system. In this way, we must ensure that the process is much more efficient than in the animal. There is an addiction to meat. It is seen as a luxury product. Cultured meat meets a need without harming the animal or the environment."

What problems have you encountered in the process?

"There are three essential points that must ensure that cultured meat becomes affordable and can be produced on a large scale. First of all, the food for the cells must be cheap. The lower the cost of the food, the lower the end product's price. In the supermarket, arguments about sustainability yield less than if you ask people about their sustainability behavior. The products must, therefore, be affordable. To produce the food, you must know exactly what the cells need. The vast majority of the cells receive a liquid containing amino acids, vitamins, and minerals. The cheaper, larger scale, and more innovative you make that mixture, the better. We are working with Nutreco ourselves. That company produces animal feed. They realized that in addition to the traditional animal feed chain, in which animal feed is converted into animal feed, a second chain could emerge in which feed is converted into tissues and cells. They have entered into a process with us to prepare for them to be able to produce food for cells on a large scale. This has to meet criteria different from that of food for an animal. They have now built a pilot plant for this already in use, so it is starting to take shape in earnest. Secondly, food is converted into cells. This has to be as effective as possible, and in a cow, this is not effective at all. If you have the food, you still have to figure out when to give which part of the food. After all, you want to throw away as little as possible. Therefore, the food must be converted into biomass as efficiently as possible: the animal cells and tissues. That is a lot of work. You have to know how the metabolism of the cells works, how substances are used, and which substances are stimulating or limiting. This is not very difficult, but it is a lot of work. You must collect a lot of data to optimize the feeding strategy. We have a lot of work to do on that now. It will also take some time before this is really optimal. Finally, the machines and supplies have to be affordable. The investments in the machines have to be kept within limits. That means it depends on how cheap and scale that conversion process can be. You need a lot of equipment to produce cultured meat, but after a few years, this equipment must also be replaced. Part of the price of a product is determined by the depreciation of the machines. These will, therefore, have to become much cheaper. A bioreactor the size of a washing machine now costs around 100,000 to 200,000 euros. We will have to work with the industry that produces such machines on cheaper bioreactors. There is increasing interest in becoming part of that process. The bioreactor is quite advanced, but it has to become more affordable than it is now to get the price of cultured meat down."

Besides amino acids, vitamins, and minerals, does the food for the cells contain anything else?

"Yes. A small part of the food consists of molecules needed as signal transmitters. The cells must be in an environment they think is an animal. Otherwise, they won't do it. Cells are very picky. These substances are traditionally found in serum. The best is fetal calf serum, a terrible substance extracted in a very animal-unfriendly way. One of our first tasks was to stop working with this. We have not done this since 2019. So we had to develop a replacement. Certain proteins also occur in that serum, which also occurs in animals. For example, tiny amounts are needed to trigger cells to divide or form tissues. These serums contain thousands of small substances, of which you only need a few. So you have to know which molecules you need, and then you have to produce those molecules as cheaply as possible. Some companies are busy producing proteins that will replace serum on an increasingly large scale. The price of this is also starting to drop seriously. Not so long ago, there was one specific substance for which we did not yet have a solution, but we have now found that too."

Can you estimate what a cultured meat burger would cost if it were on supermarket shelves today?

"That is really an estimate. The first burger cost 250,000 euros. Now, that amount would be hundreds of euros. It is more important to know how to get the price down. We have already made enormous progress in that and see the price dropping significantly in the coming years. Within ten years, I think we will be at the cost of traditional meat."

What is your view on meat substitutes as an alternative to real meat?

"I am very interested in that. I have worked on it myself. Most meat companies also make meat substitutes themselves or via third parties. I know how difficult creating the meat experience in a meat substitute is. I advise people who are vegetarian and eat meat substitutes without any problems to remain vegetarian when the meat comes onto the market. Ultimately, the plant substances in a meat substitute are the same as the nutrients in our cells. From an environmental perspective, eating from the source is always more convenient than unleashing all kinds of processes on it. Some vegetarians have given up eating meat with great difficulty and cannot wait for our product to come onto the market. Then we will have a solution for that soon. Our market is not vegetarians but hardcore meat eaters. We have to convince them that they can eat cultured meat just as well as regular meat."

How do people view cultured meat? How does society react?

"That varies greatly. It depends on culture, region, and age. It is a very varied picture. If you look at Europe, the percentage of people who will definitely eat it or want to try it varies from 20 to 30 percent in the south of Europe to 40 to 60 percent in the northern and western countries. This is probably due to a different food culture.

If you look at the number of factories you would have to build to provide 5% of the world's population with cultured meat, that percentage is irrelevant. The meat market is enormous. 350 million tons of meat are eaten per year. If you calculate what could come from an average cultured meat factory, you would need thousands of factories to meet the demand. For now, there is a sufficient sales market for the first initiatives. If that has an adequate effect, it will cause a catalytic effect. Then we have to do our very best to meet the demand.

Opponents are becoming increasingly active. In Europe, there is more resistance to cultured meat in countries that are politically correct on the spectrum. In some countries, people are actively working on legislation against cultured meat. Italy actually has legislation in this area. The question is whether that is legal because it is illegal in the EU. There are (which is not so pronounced) economic and cultural reasons behind it. In itself, I understand that you have difficulty with the fact that your piece of meat suddenly comes from a factory. I can imagine that people find that difficult."

Cultured meat is still prohibited in the EU. Have you submitted an application for approval there?

"That is correct. It is still prohibited in the EU. It is a novel food. It must first go through a whole procedure before it can be marketed. We have already submitted an application to the EU. A company (Gourmet) has already submitted an application to produce foie gras (liver pate). This is made by force-feeding geese so their livers become more extensive and they can make pate from it. I can't bring myself to eat that anymore. Gourmet is growing cells from which to produce foie gras. We have gone to great lengths to determine what our European application should look like. The EFSA (European Food Safety Authority) only wants minimal dialogue with people who submit a dossier. This is to prevent all kinds of conflicts of interest from arising. I understand that, but this also makes it difficult.

We have also submitted an application in Singapore. It is permitted there; another company has the green light. Two companies have permission in America to market a certain variant (chicken) of cultured meat. In a country like Singapore, you can talk much more informally with the legislators about how they view things, making the application more effective.

The EU application is a lengthy process. I would sign for 18 months. The net time is 18 months, but it can take much longer. That depends on the number of questions they ask and, therefore, also on the clarity and completeness of the submitted file. Every time they have a question, the clock stops, and you are busy for months before you can continue.

That safety check is about the first half of the process. The other half consists of an administrative but political process in which that advice is converted into legislation. This is ultimately voted on. In the EU, you have to have 27 countries behind you to allow the products. Apart from the scientific advice, there is a vote on whether people want it. That is when countries that find this annoying or threatening can vote against it."

France, Italy, and Austria sent a letter to the EU stating that animals were still dying to produce cultured meat.

The letter stated: "Moreover, lab-grown meat does neither pose a more environmentally friendly alternative to meat produced from farm animals, nor does it provide for higher animal welfare standards.", a quote from a letter to the EU on the subject: The CAP's role on safeguarding high-quality and primary farm-based food production, 22 January 2024) This letter also stated that cultured meat would be unsafe. However, Peter Verstrate does not know why this would be the case.

"The part about animal welfare is probably about FBS (fetal calf serum). Not all companies have found a solution for this yet. Animal welfare is nonsense because you don't have to kill animals anymore. They could be referring to the fact that you take an animal's cells out and grow them. If you kill the animal for 0.5 grams of cells, then they are right. However, this can be taken from the buttocks of a cow with a biopsy and under anesthesia. Perhaps other companies are not that far along on which they base these assumptions. For example, those that still use serum.

Companies are in different phases. We really don't need to kill animals anymore. In the Netherlands, performing a biopsy is considered an animal experiment. You have to submit a pile of papers to ask for permission. Around the corner, animals are systematically slaughtered, and we can extract all the cells we want from them. It is not as easy to do this as you think it should be, but animal-friendly is our middle name.

As for the second side, the sustainability side (no more environmentally friendly alternative). Several life cycle assessments have shown that this is the case. They are all based on assumptions because you do not have data from the large-scale production of cultured meat. However, research has been done by independent parties, who used different models to simulate the future situation as closely as possible.

The only difference is the energy content of the process itself. How much energy you have to put into it to make cultured meat depends on how you calculate it. Several reports make it clear that this is expected to have huge benefits on land and water use, pollution, and antibiotic use.

Mosa Meat's ultimate goal is to replace traditional beef production with technology, thereby fundamentally changing how meat is produced and consumed.

What do you think of the fact that it is said that more transparency is needed? To what extent are you transparent about what exactly goes into it? Can you look that up somewhere?

"No. We have made publications. Our serum-free medium has been published. We found this to contribute so fundamentally to the mission that we published it. EFSA determines whether it is safe based on a dossier describing what is in it in detail. Every action, every substance, and every analysis must be accounted for. We do not make everything public, but a large part of it. I would not want to see it as less transparent than the traditional meat industry."

You do not work with genetic manipulation?

"No. Other companies do. They use genetically modified cells. It is tempting to do so. I am not against it. Genetic modification can now be done very precisely with technologies such as CRISPR-Cas. Europe's policy in this area is conservative, but I expect that in the long term, these types of technologies will be more accepted. Currently, you have no chance in Europe to do it that way, so we do without it. The EU has become less strict regarding ​​plants but still strict with animals."

Does that also have to do with the agricultural lobby in Europe?

"I don't expect so. It has more to do with extreme caution. Which in itself is logical."

Are you working on other products besides hamburgers?

"We focus on cows. On hamburgers and minced meat, small pieces of meat. If you want to make a large piece of meat, you need the same technology we are developing and some extras. We see that as a next step. That is why we are now working on minced meat. That is easier to round off, and half of the cow is processed into minced meat. The hamburger is the signature product of a cow. The reason we chose beef ourselves is the fact that the production of beef is the least efficient. Calculating the economic model for cultured meat from a chicken is much more difficult. If you want to be animal-friendly, you have to start making chicken. About 60-70 cows and about 80,000 chickens per minute are killed per minute worldwide. Fish is much more. It depends on what drives you. For cows, that is the environment."

How is the reaction of livestock farmers?

"Varying, ranging from neutral to curious. They wonder what that means for them. As far as we have asked and experienced that. We are a member of the Dutch Association of Meat Manufacturers. We work with farmers and are part of a project that looks at what role farmers can play in the future in producing cultured meat. This ranges from producing crops, from which food is made, to being a company where animals walk around and where the punctures are taken. As a producing company, you buy your tube with cells that you can use in growing meat. Local production of cultured meat by a farmer could also be an option. Respect Farms is working on what it would mean for a farmer to produce locally cultured meat on a small scale.

One of the difficult aspects of meat is its logistics. There is a lot of dragging back and forth with meat. It is bred, fattened, and slaughtered with an incredible amount of transport. The rise of cultured meat is an opportunity to reconsider this. If you do this more locally, for example, in the province, then locally produced food is sold locally instead of the entire global logistics chain that meat currently has.

What about competition from other companies?

"There are several associations of companies. One of them is Cellular Agriculture Europe (CAE), which we co-founded, and companies come together there to discuss what helps us together. We do not discuss all the details, but we do talk about naming, legal aspects, publicity, and responding to issues. We do not do that as a company but as CAE. There are also such associations in America and Asia. There is also consultation there. The companies know each other, and if necessary, we can find each other. If we were the only ones doing this, investors would not quickly join. So it is not just competition. The fact that there are many companies in this sector shows that a lot of thought has been given to it and that it could be a good idea. That helps to broaden the field. We are not open source, but we are the most transparent. In every emerging market, you always have cowboys. We are one of the more realistic parties."