Cultivated meat and precision fermentation – will consumers eat it?
In the world of proteins, things are changing. While plant-based meat is prominent in many European markets, novel foods like cultivated meat and precision fermentation-derived meat are on the horizon.
Even before these foods can actually be consumed, knowledge of them is widespread. At EIT Food’s recent Next Bite event in Rome, insights into how consumers view these crucial markets were revealed.
Consumer acceptance is not a given, suggested Durk Bosma, head of insights at the EIT Consumer Observatory. It needs to be earned.
Which consumers are willing to try precision fermentation-derived and cultivated meat?
Certain demographics are far more open to these kinds of food than others, according to Tom Rees, industry manager at Euromonitor International.
For example, men are more likely to be open to consuming them, as are younger adults. Those who earn more, and are higher educated, are also more likely to try these foods than those who are not.
In terms of region, consumers in Asia-Pacific are significantly more open to these foods than Europeans are.
However, consumers who are open to adoption of these foods are still in the minority. While vegetarians and vegans are more open to cultivated meat and precision fermentation-derived meat than other consumers, even among this cohort less than 50% said they would consume them.
Overall, around 26% of those surveyed said they were open to eating meat produced in this way, compared with 30% who would not eat anything produced in this way.
What are consumers motivated by when it comes to food choices?
When consumers are deciding whether to adopt a meat alternative, it often comes down to four factors: health, sustainability, animal welfare, and taste.
According to EIT’s Bosma, animal welfare is the most pertinent of these. Consumers overall see biotechnology-produced meat as better for animal welfare than animal products. Consumers care more about animal suffering than they do animal death, he suggested, and will change their habits to reduce this suffering.
Plant-based sales in Europe show some signs of growth
According to the organisation The Good Food Institute, sales of plant-based products in Europe have grown significantly in some areas of Europe. Between 2022 and 2023, they increased by 5.5% in data taken from six European countries – Germany, Italy, France, Spain, the UK and the Netherlands - despite reports of a decline in the fortunes of the industry.
In Spain, France and Germany, sales grew, while they remained stable in Italy. However, sales declined in the UK and the Netherlands. The overall value of plant-based meat sales grew by 3.9% to €2 billion, although the volume of sales measured by weight decreased by 3.2%.
However, when it comes to sustainability, many consumers do not have an issue with animal products. Because food has always been made this way, Bosma suggested, some consumers do not believe that it is unsustainable.
When it comes to health, while some consumers consider red meat as unhealthy, and some are worried about antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in animals, overall consumers do not consider animal products to be particularly unhealthy. Conversely, they are sceptical about the health potential of biotechnology-produced meat, potentially because of a suspicion of ultra-processed foods.
Lastly, consumers are also sceptical about the potential for biotechnology-produced foods to taste good. The overriding perception of such technology is that it is currently a better fit for low quality meats, like chicken nuggets, than high quality meats, like steak. Animal-sourced meat, in short, has the upper hand over biotech when it comes to taste.
“[Biotech-produced meat] has been presented as a high-tech solution – which it is,” Bosma told FoodNavigator after the panel. “But that alienates it from the common consumer. They can’t really imagine that something that lives in a petri dish could become similar to a steak.”
"Consumers can’t really imagine that something that lives in a petri dish could become similar to a steak.”
Plant-based meat - which is already widely available across the market – is already viewed negatively by some consumers. This may also have influenced the way consumers view new forms of meat alternatives.
“This is a completely different technology, it’s a completely different product, but consumers do see this in the same area – trying to create something that looks like meat. They don’t have high hopes.”
What should the industry do to appeal to consumers?
The problems that the alternative protein industry faces are not just technical, Bosma suggested, but communication based as well. It must connect with consumers.
In order to do this, he suggested, the alternative protein industry should lean hard into animal welfare. Showing consumers happy animals will present a clear link between the reduction of animal suffering, which consumers care about, and biotech-produced meat. To further bring this message home, he suggested calling biotech-produced meat ‘new meat,’ and conventional meat ‘slaughter meat.’
Biotech-produced meat should also avoid going premium until it can be proven to be tasty, as consumers are currently sceptical about its taste potential.
In order to connect to consumers, Bosma told us, the technology must also be presented as familiar. For example, precision fermentation is simply a new version of a process – fermentation – that has been part of food preparation for thousands of years.
“It’s important to find narratives that consumers understand, and find appealing instead of scary,” he told us.
