Lab-grown meat was supposed to upend Big Ag. Instead, it's stuck in what one researcher calls the "Trough of Disillusionment," writes Erin Somers at Harper's Magazine. Her piece tracks the arc from a 2013 burger that cost $330,000 to produce—hyped as a climate savior that could eventually replace cattle—to a 140-company gold rush that attracted $3 billion, spawned mammoth meatballs and sky-high projections, and then … largely stalled. Costs remain high, scaling is brutal, regulators are cautious, political opposition has grown (particularly among conservatives), and investors have pulled back hard. US bans are spreading even though cultivated meat is currently sold in only one store in the world, which happens to be in Singapore.
"The days of cultivated meat as a possible panacea for climate change are long gone," writes Somers. "Many of the industry's biggest players—the ones still in business, anyway—are now embracing a more modest role in our food system." Some hope remains: Jeff Bezos' Earth Fund, for example, gave $30 million to establish the Bezos Center for Sustainable Protein at North Carolina State University. For the story, Somers pays a visit and also tastes faux meatballs incorporating cultivated fat via Mission Barns, a partner of the center. ("Not terrible," but it "felt like mushy cardboard in my mouth.") At this point, it seems that lab-grown meat is destined for "a niche shelf in the refrigerated aisle, the Impossible Burger's quirkier cousin," she writes. Read the full story.
,
uBlock 
,
and
Ghostery 
)
