Realistic Meat Substitutes: A Path Towards Sustainable Food by 2100
Global food production must increase by approximately 50% by 2100 to feed the planet’s growing population. However, today’s food production is already unsustainable, surpassing planetary boundaries. Can new technologies save us? In a new report, Karim Jebari and Emma Engström identify three disruptive agricultural technologies and analyze how far they can take us towards sustainability. Technologies for creating realistic meat substitutes appear particularly promising.
This is a translation of an interview originally published in Swedish on iffs.se
Out of the world’s 8+ billion people, around 2.3 billion face some level of food insecurity, and about 700 million suffer from hunger or starvation—figures that have risen since 2019.
By 2100, the global population is expected to reach approximately 10 billion. To reduce food insecurity and hunger, food production must increase by roughly 50 percent.
"Increasing the food supply through, for example, new technology and thus lowering prices is probably the simplest way to ensure that those who need more food get it," says Karim Jebari, philosopher and researcher at IFFS.
The more technology can increase food production while reducing the burden on planetary boundaries, the less strain will need to be placed on other approaches, such as behavioral changes – for instance, reducing meat consumption – or politically challenging measures like increasing global equality. Karim Jebari compares this to the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccines.
"Through vaccines – a technology – we were able to reduce the reliance on lockdowns and other behavioral changes," says Karim Jebari.
BACKCASTING
In their report (Backcasting the Future of Food: A Technology-Oriented Path to Sustainable Production in 2100), Emma Engström, PhD in engineering and researcher at IFFS, and Karim Jebari start from a desirable scenario for 2100: that food production has increased by 50 percent and that the burden on the planetary boundaries most associated with agriculture – land use, freshwater consumption, biodiversity, and eutrophication – has decreased. Current food production exceeds all these boundaries.
Starting from a desirable scenario and examining what needs to happen to reach it is called backcasting. Unlike the more common forecasting method, where current trends are extended into the future, starting from the other end has several advantages.
"Forecasting struggles to incorporate radical changes because it is based on existing trends. If the starting point is instead a goal and how to achieve it, we can identify what in the present can fulfill the goal. Or show that we need to go back to the drawing board because there is no path to achieving the goal. Both results are valuable," says Karim Jebari.
NEW TECHNOLOGIES IN FOOD PRODUCTION
The focus of this study has been to see how far the technological route alone can take us. By reviewing the research literature, they identified three technologies with particularly high potential to increase food production while reducing environmental impact:
Vertical farming, where crops are grown vertically, saving significant amounts of land and water.
C4 photosynthesis, a genetic modification of certain crops that makes photosynthesis more efficient.
Technology to create realistic meat substitutes that taste and look like meat from animals.
In terms of efficiency and reduced environmental impact, the latter stood out.
"Animal farming has an enormous impact on planetary boundaries. Forests are cleared for grazing land, and much of the land used for crops goes to meat production because livestock in many countries are fed with maize, oats, and soybeans – food that could otherwise be used for humans," says Karim Jebari.
Meat production is also the main contributor to eutrophication, threatening several ecosystems. Cattle consume enormous amounts of water and are a major source of methane emissions, a greenhouse gas. Replacing animal farming would significantly reduce the strain on planetary boundaries.
According to the researchers’ calculations, if the three technologies were implemented on a large scale, they could collectively reduce land use by 54 percent, eutrophication by 46 percent, and water use by 32 percent – even if food production increases by 50 percent from today’s levels. Food production would then remain within the limits Earth can handle, according to the planetary boundaries framework developed by the Stockholm Resilience Centre.
In all three areas, substitutes for animal products had by far the greatest effect.
PROTEIN FROM BACTERIA
One specific technology highlighted by the researchers comes from the Finnish company Solar Foods, which uses the bacterium Xanthobacter to produce a protein sold under the name Solein.
"The bacteria live in places like the oceans where heat rises from underwater volcanoes, splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen. The bacteria have adapted to consume hydrogen, which they can convert into energy," says Karim Jebari.
The protein is already included in products sold in places like Singapore.
POLITICAL AND CULTURAL BARRIERS
The hope is that, with the help of this and other technologies, products sufficiently similar to today’s meat and dairy products can be produced to minimize the societal demand for behavioral change. When it comes to food, this seems particularly difficult.
"The elephant in the room is the cow. Eating meat, especially beef, is deeply culturally associated with wealth and prosperity. Some may argue that certain behavioral changes have been easy, such as the introduction of smoking bans in outdoor restaurants. But there, we were dealing with a low-status symbol – smoking was primarily associated with low social status and the working class. Meat has long been associated with luxury," says Karim Jebari.
Meat substitutes that achieve a high degree of similarity to meat minimize the need for cultural and social adaptation. But even if this is achieved, several political and economic obstacles remain.
"About a third of the EU’s budget goes to subsidies and support for agriculture. For example, it’s striking that oat milk is still more expensive than regular milk, even though milk from animals is much less energy-efficient since you have to feed an animal with crops and grass, care for it, milk it, and then process the milk. Instead, you could make milk directly from crops. When agricultural products are so heavily subsidized, it’s hard for alternatives to compete," says Karim Jebari.
Additionally, many costs from agriculture – such as eutrophication and greenhouse gas emissions – are not borne by agriculture itself.
"Various forms of environmental taxes could be introduced so that agriculture bears more of its own costs. But it’s politically very difficult. Making food more expensive is not exactly popular," says Karim Jebari.
BASIC ASSUMPTION: FOSSIL-FREE ELECTRICITY
The three technologies together thus have the potential to make our food production sustainable and sufficient for everyone by 2100. But this requires one important thing: that there will be access to a large amount of cheap, fossil-free electricity in the future through wind, solar, hydro, nuclear power, or some other technology that does not yet exist. Two of the technologies in the report – vertical farming and Solein production – require large amounts of electricity.
How realistic is it to assume that cheap, fossil-free electricity will be available in the future?
– "It’s not an assumption but a prerequisite for this to work. And we don’t know how it will turn out, but we argue that, unlike the amount of arable land, energy production does not have the same fixed limits. For example, there’s nothing to prevent us from tenfolding the number of nuclear power plants in the world by 2100. But we can’t tenfold the amount of arable land. The limit on how much energy production can grow is much more permissive than the limit on arable land. We can produce significantly more energy than we can conjure up arable land to farm on."