Chinese company starts testing lab-grown meat production
CellX CEO says his company will file applications in Singapore and US this year
August 10, 2023
A meat company in China carried out a taste test of lab-grown meat developed from animal cells, Reuters reported.
The tasting event took place in an industrial park in Shanghai for the government, investors and media.
CellX, founded in 2020, served lab-grown meat kebabs and tofu with minced lab-grown meat with each dish costing less than 100 yuan for production.
The company is one of the front runners in growing meat in a laboratory in China. There are other companies with a focus on research and development.
These companies are producing meat in labs to appeal to consumers concerned about the impact of livestock farming on the environment.
"Our costs are at around $100 per pound, but by the time we commercially launch in two or three years, the price could go down 10 times," CellX CEO Ziliang Yang said.
Yang said that the pilot facility opened in Shanghai can produce "a couple of tonnes" yearly. There will be a commercial production company which will be able to produce hundreds of tonnes of meat a year.
Yang said his company will file applications in Singapore and the US — the two countries leading the world in terms of regulatory approvals for the retail sale of lab-grown meat products — this year.
He said that CellX aims to sell products in restaurants by 2025. However, it is unsure when lab-grown meat will be approved for human consumption.
"At the end of the day, producing in China means having that infrastructure at a relatively lower cost and this is a key advantage," Yang said. "It's really going to be about leveraging that supply chain and going overseas, that's the story as we see it."
