2024 was a big year for cultivated meat. We saw the first application for regulatory approval in Europe, an actual regulatory approval for cultivated beef in Israel, the announcement of a regulatory sandbox being set up to help start-ups gain approval in the UK, and most recently, cultivated quail entering the market in Hong Kong. We even saw the first approval in the continent of Europe with cultivated pet food in the UK.
Yet for a food with so much buzz, precious few consumers have actually been able to, well, consume it.
Cultivated meat still faces a range of challenges, from cost reductions to regulatory approval to consumer and farmer perceptions. But there’s all to play for in 2025.
How likely are we to see more regulatory approvals?
One of the key factors holding cultivated meat back is that it must achieve regulatory approval, as a novel food, before being sold on the market. And this is a complex and often time-consuming process.
In an interview earlier this year, Floor Buitelaar of Bright Green Partners suggested that long waits for regulatory approvals might make investors reluctant to put money into novel foods such as cultivated meat.
It is unlikely that we will see any regulatory approvals of new submissions in 2025 in the UK or EU, suggests Katia Merten-Lentz, partner at Food Law Science and Partners. However, it is possible that submissions that have been going on for a long time could come to fruition.
“Due to the technicity and therefore the complexity of the studies required to demonstrate the safety of cultivated meat, the preparation of the drafting is much longer than the one for more ‘conventional novel food.’”
Katia Merten-Lentz
“Due to the technicity and therefore the complexity of the studies required to demonstrate the safety of cultivated meat, the preparation of the drafting is much longer than the one for more ‘conventional novel food’,” she stresses.
As for whether we’ll see more applications, there is a growing interest among a range of start-ups. However, due to the complexity of the application process, the cases where this interest translates into novel food applications are rare. “In other words, I cannot imagine that dozens of submissions will emerge suddenly in 2025.”
However, all is not doom and gloom for the sector. If the UK remains open to innovation, Merten-Lentz suggests, its new regulatory sandbox could in the long run make approvals easier.
Most significant in this regard, she points out, is the toolbox that aims to guide the UK’s Food Standards Agency (FSA) on submissions.
The FSA also plans to change the law so that novel foods can be put on the market immediately following approval, rather than after a bill has been passed by government.
Will consumer attitudes to cultivated meat improve?
Cultivated meat is new to most consumers. Many see it as ‘Frankenstein food’, and bans in Italy and Florida, US have only added fuel to the fire of this rhetoric.
A recent survey by EIT Food suggested that while things aren’t quite as black and white as blanket distrust, people are still sceptical about cultivated meat.
In fact, more than half of all consumers, even vegetarians and vegans, said that they would not be willing to consume cultivated meat and precision fermentation-derived meat, and overall, only 26% of all of those surveyed were open to eating it.
It’s difficult to tell at this early stage when, or if, consumers will accept cultivated meat, suggests Seth Roberts, senior policy manager at think tank Good Food Institute (GFI) Europe.
“Whether consumer attitudes change will depend on several factors. Regulatory approval will be key to helping consumers have confidence in the safety and nutritional quality of this food, but ultimately cultivated meat companies need to demonstrate they can develop delicious products that fit into people’s food cultures.”
However, it has great potential, he suggests, citing a recent analysis by System IQ claiming that it could be worth €20-85bn per year to the EU, and create up to 90,000 jobs by 2050.
Alongside consumers, another key stakeholder group that needs to get on board with cultivated meat is farmers.
Will farmers embrace cultivated meat?
A recent study by the Royal Agricultural University (RAU) in the UK found that while some farmers are open to cultivated meat, significant distrust still exists for reasons such as fear of overwhelming corporate control of the food supply.
Furthermore, bans in places such as Italy are often framed in terms of a defence of the livelihoods of farmers.
While some companies have tried to address this problem - either by giving farmers more control of the cultivated meat production process, or by simply reframing cultivated meat as a compliment to, rather than replacement of, conventional meat - concern still remains among many in agriculture.
“At the moment, farmers see the issue as ‘slow-burn’. Compared to immediate challenges like shifting weather patterns and government support, the chance of cultured meat someday competing with their business feels a long way off. It’s not ‘front of mind’ for most farmers,” suggests Katherine Lewis, research engagement manager at the RAU.
Nevertheless, attention to the issue has grown on farming communities on social media, she explains, and most of it negative, sometimes referring to a fight against an ‘elite world order.’ It has the potential to come a culture war issue, she suggests, as it is in the US.
While farmers offline were more pragmatic, many took issue with cultivated meat being, according to them, overhyped and farming itself being misrepresented. “Changing the tone of industry comms to be more sensitive to how they land with farmers would certainly help,” she suggests.
This attitude must go beyond PR. “The industry should be listening, openly and substantively, to farmers and recognising how much they have to contribute to the discussion.
“The industry should be listening, openly and substantively, to farmers and recognising how much they have to contribute to the discussion.”
Katherine Lewis
“In the UK, nowhere else will this be more important next year than through the FSA sandbox. Including an open forum for farmers to have their say could help build a relationship between the two industries. Leaving them out could result in a backlash that benefits no one.”
How much investment will there be in cultivated meat in 2025?
Cultivated meat, with its long regulatory approval wait-times and uncertain views among consumers, is arguably risky business for investors. The future remains uncertain.
It is “difficult to say” how much investment there will be in 2025, suggests Kim Odhner, co-founder and managing partner of Unovis asset management, although he thinks “this space - along with the broader alt protein space - may face some significant headwinds in terms of fundraising.”
While regulatory approvals are a problem in the EU market, the overall factor that may dissuade investors, he suggests, is the difficulties of upscaling.
Upscaling cultivated meat remains, alongside consumer acceptance and regulatory approval, a significant bridge to cross.
On the positive side, suggests Odhner, recent regulatory approvals reflect the “inevitability” of such technology, and thus inspire some confidence in investors.
What will the market look like in 2025?
Cultivated meat is replicating many different types of meat, from simple chicken and beef to pet food to long-extinct animals such as the woolly mammoth. Even before being approved in most places, it has been seen in several iterations.
How will this versatile market grow and evolve in 2025? “Companies around the world are developing an exciting array of products far beyond the burgers and chicken nuggets that were the focus of early research,” GFI’s Roberts explains.
Developments that may come to fruition in the future include Gourmey’s cultivated foie gras, Ivy Farm’s cultivated wagyu beef, and the range of cultivated seafood dishes like tuna, octopus and sea bass being produced by start-ups in Europe.
