For cultured meat to change the world, it needs to reach commercial markets worldwide.
That means we have to collaborate globally on critical issues such as safety.
This is why I am thrilled to share our latest collective action for cultured meat: Phase II of the Cultured Meat Safety Initiative.
First, some background:
The Cultured Meat Safety Initiative (CMSI) is a joint initiative between New Harvest and Vireo Advisors aiming to address critical challenges related to evaluating the safety of cultured meat products.
In CMSI Phase I, we worked with 87 individuals from 50 different cultured meat companies from around the world to spell out how cultured meat was made and what the safety issues may be in the most inclusive and open way possible.
CMSI I continues to be highly impactful, serving as a key resource in the FAO’s process to inform its 195 members (194 countries and the European Union) about how to consider the safety of cultured meat.
Singapore Food Agency co-hosted one of the CMSI Phase II workshops
Now, we have just completed CMSI Phase II, which began over a year ago, in March 2022. During this phase, we worked with 48 governmental scientists and regulators from 15 jurisdictions around the world to identify what was needed to support the safety evaluation of cultured meat products to reach commercial markets worldwide.
The outcomes of Phase II resulted in a publication that has just been submitted for peer-review. Once peer-review is complete, we’ll give you an overview of the publication and what we learned. But in the spirit of open, we have made the pre-print available in the meanwhile for you to get an early look at what we found.
Once again, we harnessed our role as an independent nonprofit and Vireo Advisor’s leadership as food safety experts to develop credible data and advance public knowledge.
Major thanks to Soroush Pour, Lejjy Gafour, Andras Forgacs, Gabor Forgacs, and Kristin Ellis for donating to this initiative as individuals and to the 22 companies and investors who gave as corporate donors. Check out the website to see everyone who was involved.
Phase II brought us one step closer towards broadening engagement across diverse stakeholder groups. Multi-stakeholder collaboration is necessary to address the research priorities identified during Phase I and II, and ensure cultured meat is brought to market safely and accepted by consumers.
Thanks to all who helped make this happen!
