Cultivated meat meets upcycling: Unlocking the potential of agricultural side-streams

Background

Scaling-up cultivated meat production could enable sustainable production of a nutritious protein source, much needed for a growing population. However, to progress cultivated meat, low-cost, high-volume resources must be used as production inputs. Agricultural side-streams present an underutilised resource, rich in favourable components for cultivated meat inputs.

Scope and approach

The term “agricultural side-stream” encompasses all plant-based by-products and waste-streams generated from the harvest stage through to food product processing. This review explores the potential to valorise these agricultural materials to support the production of cultivated meat as both cell media supplements and scaffolding materials.

Key findings and conclusions

Production of cultivated meat could become more economically feasible through repurposing agricultural side-streams as production inputs. Through assisting cultivated meat scale up, this could lead to the production of a quality protein source, which reduces the environmental impact and animal welfare concerns of conventional meat production while potentially contributing to lowering global antibiotic resistance and zoonotic disease spread. Furthermore, upcycling agricultural side-streams could provide an additional income stream for agricultural producers while contributing to lowering global food loss. These added benefits could increase consumer acceptance for this novel technology. The utilisation of agricultural side-streams in cell media and cell scaffolding is a relatively new area of investigation requiring thorough research into identifying optimal side-streams, optimised processing techniques and side-stream variability.