of beef-more than what Mexico consumes in a year. Melke and her fellow scientists at Mosa say they are getting very close.Īccording to Mark Post, the Dutch scientist who midwifed the first lab-grown hamburger into existence, and who co-founded Mosa Meat in 2015, one half-gram biopsy of cow muscle could in theory create up to 4.4 billion lb. Unfortunately, current production methods are devastating for our climate and biodiversity, so it’s a steep price we’re paying for these cravings.” The best solution, says Friedrich, is meat alternatives that cost the same or less, and taste the same or better. “Our bodies are programmed to crave the dense calories. “For 50 years, climate activists, global health experts and animal-welfare groups have been begging people to eat less meat, but per capita consumption is higher than ever,” says Bruce Friedrich, head of the Good Food Institute, a nonprofit organization promoting meat alternatives. Nearly two-thirds of the respondents view the issue as a “global emergency.” Nonetheless, few favored plant-based diets as a solution. published the largest ever opinion poll on climate change, canvassing 1.2 million residents of 50 countries. But denying pleasure, even in the pursuit of a global good, is rarely an effective way to drive change. Growing meat in a bioreactor may seem like an expensive overcorrection when just reducing beef intake in high-consuming nations by 1.5 hamburgers per week, per person, could achieve significant climate gains, according to the WRI. But What If We Radically Rethink How We Make Food? Read More: Dinner As We Know it Is Hurting the Planet. Industrial animal agriculture, particularly for beef, drives deforestation, and cows emit methane during digestion and nitrous oxide with their manure, greenhouse gases 25 and 298 times more potent than carbon dioxide, respectively, over a 100-year period. Livestock raised for food directly contributes 5.8% of the world’s annual greenhouse-gas emissions, and up to 14.5% if feed production, processing and transportation are included, according to the U.N. Mosa Meat granted TIME exclusive access to its labs and scientists so the process can be better understood by the general public. Competition is fierce, and few companies have allowed journalists in for fear of risks to intellectual property. More than 70 other startups around the world are courting investors in a race to deliver lab-grown versions of beef, chicken, pork, duck, tuna, foie gras, shrimp, kangaroo and even mouse (for cat treats) to market.