Image: Aleph Farms.
Israel has become the first country in the world to approve cultivated beef, after its Ministry of Health cleared Aleph Farms to sell steak grown from cow cells, with no slaughter involved. The company says it is the first anywhere to receive this kind of approval for beef.
The approval came in the form of a "No Questions" letter for the company's Aleph Cuts brand, TechCrunch reported on Wednesday. The first product is a thin-cut Petit Steak, which Green Queen reports is grown from non-modified, non-immortalized cells of a premium Black Angus cow named Lucy.
That makes Israel only the third country to green-light cultivated meat of any kind, after Singapore in 2020 and the United States in 2023. Every approval before this one was for chicken.
Aleph Farms co-founder and CEO Didier Toubia told Food Safety News:
We believe that addressing joint challenges like food security is the best way to ensure the prosperity of the Middle East and other parts of the world that rely heavily on massive food imports, especially in Asia.
Dr. Ziva Hamama, food risk management department director at Israel's Ministry of Health, said the decision was not taken lightly:
This regulatory milestone... reflects a comprehensive assessment of crucial factors, from toxicology and allergens to nutritional composition, microbiological safety, and chemical safety.
There are a couple of steps left. The company still needs to follow the ministry's labeling and marketing directions and pass a Good Manufacturing Practices inspection of its pilot facility, and Globes reports it expects the steak to be on sale by mid-2024. It will start in a few select restaurants, priced similarly to premium conventional beef. The steak itself is a hybrid: cultivated beef cells make up about 20% of the product, with soy and wheat proteins giving it texture.
It isn't vegan, of course, and for most of our readers a bean burger will always be the easier option. But every steak grown from a few cells is one that didn't need a whole animal, and beef is the worst offender on the planet's plate. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization estimates livestock produce around 14.5% of all human-made greenhouse gas emissions, with cattle responsible for the lion's share.
This is the next step after Singapore became the first country to approve lab-grown chicken, the FDA gave its first safety clearance to lab-grown meat and the US approved lab-grown chicken for sale. Governments are putting money behind it too, with the Dutch government investing 60 million euros in cultivated meat. It's all part of the food revolution Google predicted back in 2016.
Steak without the slaughterhouse. The future is looking brighter.