No kill meat receives approval for sale in US
Image: Good Meat
Good Meat, the cultivated meat division of food technology company Eat Just, and Upside Foods have announced that they have received approval from the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) for cultivated chicken to be sold to American consumers.
The development comes shortly after USDA’s approval of Good Meat’s label – and four months after the company received its “no questions” letter from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The March milestone indicated the FDA accepted the company’s conclusion that its cultivated chicken is safe to eat and allowed the USDA to begin its part of the regulatory process outlined in a 2019 agreement between the agencies.
“This announcement that we’re now able to produce and sell cultivated meat in the United States is a major moment for our company, the industry and the food system. We have been the only company selling cultivated meat anywhere in the world since we launched in Singapore in 2020, and now it’s approved to sell to consumers in the world’s largest economy. We appreciate the rigour and thoughtfulness that both the FDA and USDA have applied during this historic two-agency regulatory process,” said Josh Tetrick, co-founder and CEO of Good Meat and Eat Just.
Good Meat won multiple regulatory approvals for its chicken in Singapore in 2020 and 2021, and in January 2023 received a key clearance that paves the way for greater scalability, lower manufacturing costs and a more sustainable product. Since its Singapore launch, the company’s chicken has been featured on menus at fine dining establishments, popular hawker stalls, via the foodpanda delivery platform and most recently by reservation at Huber’s Butchery, one of Singapore’s premier producers and suppliers of high-quality meats.
Upside Foods wrote: “This historic milestone is the culmination of years of dedication, ingenuity, and resilience from our team and supporters and marks the beginning of a whole new era in meat production. Most of all, it means that soon, Americans will be able to enjoy delicious meat that doesn’t involve the slaughter of billions of animals every year.”
UpsideFoods will now continue the process of scaling, including sourcing many of the nutrients our cells need to grow, which have never been required at large, food-scale quantities and costs before.
Upside Foods said it will launch with its smaller-scale processes as its large-scale cultivators can produce up to 50,000 pounds of cultivated meat across its portfolio of products every year, with a projected expansion capacity of up to 400,000 pounds. The company plans to at work on a larger space with an annual capacity of millions of pounds of cultivated meat products.
In the United States, under the Federal Meat Inspection Act (FMIA) and Poultry Products Inspection Act (PPIA), all meat and poultry sold commercially must pass inspection to ensure that it is safe, wholesome and properly labelled. To accomplish this, USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) places inspectors in slaughterhouses and processing plants – and for the first time in history, will assign inspectors to Good Meat and other cultivated meat and poultry facilities that follow.
As part of the USDA’s approval, Good Meat received a grant of inspection for its demonstration plant in Alameda, California, as has its contract manufacturing partner, JOINN Biologics. The comprehensive vetting includes facilities and equipment; standard operating procedure for sanitation; and the systematic approach to identification, evaluation and control of food safety hazards known as HACCP.
Immediately after receiving the grant of inspection, production started for the first batch of cultivated chicken that will be sold to restaurateur and humanitarian chef José Andrés. Andrés, who is owner of José Andrés Group, which operates more than 30 restaurants across the country.
“Good Meat’s grant of inspection is a historic moment for the global food industry as we prepare for the first cell-cultured/cultivated chicken products to be sold in the United States, following rigorous and science-based evaluations by the FDA and USDA. AMPS Innovation members continue to make ground-breaking advancements that will, in partnership with the entire food and agriculture sector, help meet increased demand for protein as the world’s population continues to grow.” – Robert Rankin, executive director, Association of Meat, Poultry, and Seafood Innovation.
