Cutting out the middleman: the problem with meat

Eating plants instead

When Jane Land and her partner Matthew Glover launched the Veganuary campaign from their kitchen in the UK in January 2014, they had little idea of the phenomenon they were about to unleash. Their campaign – which asks people to “go vegan” for the month of January – has grown from around 10,000 initial sign-ups to more than 600,000 each year (with possibly many more joining unofficially), and seen participation across the globe.

Veganuary is tapping into a wider trend, with surveys showing increasing interest in reduced meat diets, for their positive impact on both planetary and human health. Research from the University of Oxford has shown that these benefits do, indeed, correlate – the healthiest foods also have the lowest environmental impact⁶, with plant-based foods scoring better on both measures than meat and dairy products in general, and processed meats in particular.

If we are to hit the 2015 Paris Agreement climate target, it’s essential that this move to reduce meat intake is not just a passing trend. In 2018, the EAT-Lancet Commission brought together human health and environmental sustainability experts to develop science-based targets for healthy diets⁷. In the West, they found that consumption of red meat needs to fall by around 75%, to be replaced by a near 100% rise in the consumption of lentils, beans, legumes or nuts.

A series of international pledges have promised to return 1 billion hectares of agricultural land to nature by 2030 – eating crops directly, rather than cycling them through livestock first, will be an important step towards making this possible.

Read also: Five reasons why you should consider going plant-based

Lab meat, fish meat, and I can’t believe it’s not meat

In a global population projected to both grow, and grow more wealthy, demand for meat is expected to rise. Meat consumption is typically correlated with income – in Uganda, for instance, where GDP per capita has stayed flat since 1990, so has meat consumption, with the average Ugandan eating just 10kg of meat per year; while in China, where GDP per capita has grown 10-fold over the same period, meat consumption has tripled to more than 60kg per person per year. (This compares with the more than 120kg of meat the average American consumes each year.) Encouraging a switch to nuts and pulses is, on its own, unlikely to gain sufficient uptake to achieve the cuts in land-use and emissions we need; shifting demand to “alternative” meat and dairy products will be key.

In 2016, Danone, under then CEO Emmanuel Faber, purchased WhiteWave, a developer of plant-based dairy alternatives which included the Silk and Alpro brands. The move represented an important entry point into the growing dairy alternatives market, and was part of Faber’s drive to position Danone at the forefront of sustainability in the food sector. It proved to be a far-sighted decision. In 2020 Danone announced that it had achieved 15% annual sales growth in its plant-based products division – alternative dairy products now comprise 20% of sales in its dairy division. Last year the company acquired Earth Brands, the maker of vegan yoghurts and condiments, in a further sign of confidence in the sector.

Read also: The CLIC® Chronicles: Meet Ÿnsect, the French start-up raising beetles to tackle growing food demand

Imitation meats, too, are making inroads into supermarket aisles and attracting major industry names. Rivalling headline-grabbing start-ups Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods, Kellogg’s-owned MorningStar Farms, which has been creating vegetarian products for nearly 50 years, recently launched a new range of meat imitation products called Incogmeato^TM, which includes plant-based burgers, sausages and chicken designed to be indistinguishable from animal meat. In 2021 Kellogg’s invested USD 43 million in MorningStar Farms, to expand their reach into a market projected to be worth at least USD 290 billion by 2035⁸.

Cultured meat – real meat grown in lab conditions rather than via traditional farming methods – is another threat to the established meat market. In the UK, start-up Ivy Farms grows pork or beef in just three weeks, cutting the environmental impact of traditional meat production, while avoiding the risks of antibacterial resistance and animal-to-human disease transmission that accompany factory farming. US start-up WildType is using similar technology to grow seafood – their first product is “sushi-grade” salmon grown at a micro-brewery style pilot plant in San Francisco. Food equipment manufacturer GEA Group is anticipating strong growth in this sub-sector, and is aiming to triple sales of both cell-based and plant-based manufacturing equipment in the next four years. By 2035 it is estimated that 10% of meat, eggs and dairy produce will come from non-traditional sources⁹.

Farmed fish could also play an important role in replacing meat. Since 1990, aquaculture, which promises greater sustainability than traditional fishing, has seen industry growth of 500%. Most aquaculture takes place out of doors, in lakes or near-shore enclosures. In Norway, Frederikstad Seafoods is pioneering indoor aquaculture, cultivating salmon from infancy to harvest in enormous tanks in warehouses near Oslo¹⁰. By locating production facilities near to markets, indoor aquaculture can achieve a lower net CO₂ footprint than outdoor aquaculture, with both forms of production markedly better for the environment than rearing cattle or sheep¹¹.

Smaller, leaner, cleaner: reducing emissions by reducing “emissions”

The agricultural sector is responsible for 45% of all anthropogenic methane emissions, a potent greenhouse gas, and it is widely recognised that livestock, and ruminants such as cattle in particular, bear much of the blame. (Where it was previously thought that cows were prodigiously flatulent, it is now understood that they are, in fact, champion burpers – if cows could blush, our keen interest in their digestive habits would surely give them cause.)

Around 20% of methane emissions from ruminants are thought to be dictated by genetics¹², thus, selective breeding could create a new generation of low-emissions livestock. Feed additives also have promise – increasing unsaturated fat content has been shown to inhibit methane-producing bacteria in the digestive system¹³, while one study found that adding seaweed to cattle feed led to an 82% drop in methane emissions¹⁴.

Read also: Satellite imagery – how the eye in the sky can track methane leaks

Amsterdam-based start-up Connecterra is turning to artificial intelligence to improve efficiency and productivity. By attaching connected devices to individual animals – Connecterra CEO Yasir Khokar describes their device as “a fitbit for cows” – farmers can keep track of fertility, calving, injury and other indicators of threats to health, allowing early intervention. Improved animal health increases productivity, allowing herd numbers to be kept to a minimum. Connecterra also help farmers cut emissions by preventing unnecessary inputs – a recent test of their AI-based Farm Emission Optimisation Model helped a Dutch dairy farm reduce its annual CO₂e output by 42 tonnes, the equivalent of burning 81 barrels of oil. 

The adoption of innovation in farming can be a gradual process, and governments and industry have been slow to introduce policy incentives – but this could now be changing. In New Zealand, for instance, a country where agriculture is responsible for almost half the country’s total GHG emissions, a new law proposed for 2025 will tax emissions from farm-reared animals. While some demand for traditionally-raised meat is likely to remain, over the next several decades, policy and innovations in animal husbandry should combine to create a leaner meat and dairy industry, with improved animal welfare and a smaller environmental footprint.

A new nutrition reality

Today’s food systems are a threat not only to the planet, but to people as well. In 2020, according to the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, around 800 million people were affected by hunger. Perversely, at the same time, obesity affected 650 million people. More of the global population now lives in countries where people die from obesity-related illnesses, such as diabetes and heart disease, than from under-nutrition.

In the West, obesity is strongly linked to poverty – in the UK, for instance, a 2013 report found that children from deprived areas were almost twice as likely to be obese compared to those from more affluent areas. Obesity is no longer just a Western problem, however. A 2019 study from University College London found that low and middle-income nations are now facing the double-burden of malnutrition and obesity¹⁵, as cheap, high-calorie, low-nutrition processed foods become more widely available.

Dr Francesco Branca, lead author of the report, said, “We are facing a new nutrition reality. We can no longer characterise countries as low-income and undernourished, or high-income and only concerned with obesity. All forms of malnutrition have a common denominator – food systems that fail to provide all people with healthy, safe, affordable and sustainable diets.”