SYNTHETIC FOODS

Synthetic, or genetically modified, fake meats and the like attempt to mimic real meat in both looks, taste and texture. But how much do we really know about the production process and how do they affect the environment and our bodies?

- Martin Oliver

arming, especially in its industrial, broadacre form, is considered by some to be the world's most environmentally damaging activity, based on the totality of its impacts. Food production represents about a quarter of the world's greenhouse emissions, and somewhere between 11-20 per cent of global emissions are from animal agriculture alone.

Today, synthetic food technologies are enabling the industrial production of foods that closely resemble proteins such as meat, milk and eggs in terms of their appearance, taste and texture. Other work involves the synthesising of fats and other ingredients. Some products are already on the market in a limited number of countries.

This field of synthetic biology is similar to genetic modification (GM), and many of these "fake" food products use GM technology in their production processes, via "precision fermentation", with GM microbes or by cell-culturing with animal cells.

Production occurs in industrial vats known as "bioreactors" to yield the desired food.

Some large players

The industry is characterised by a mixture of a few larger companies and dozens of hopeful start-ups Perhaps most well-known is Impossible Foods, a Silicon Valley manufacturer that launched in 2011.

Its products, including the famous burger, are sold in nine countries. These products are more expensive than regular meat, but the price difference has been narrowing. The key aim was to create a product that looks, cooks and tastes like real meat, with the resemblance extending to it even bleeding. Meat-like characteristics are achieved through the addition of soy leghemoglobin (heme), precision-fermented from genetically modified yeast.