Lab-grown food set to hit British shelves in two years
10th March 2025
Lab-grown meat, dairy and sugar products can be available for British consumers within two years, the Food Standards Agency has confirmed.
The lab-grown food may appear on store shelves sooner than expected, following the news that FSA is looking at how it can speed up the approval process for lab-grown foods.
Its spokesperson said that the sandbox programme, funded by the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology’s Engineering Biology Sandbox Fund, will make sure that cell-cultivated products (CCPs) are safe for consumers before they’re sold, while supporting innovation in the sector.
Dog food made from meat that was grown in factory vats went on sale in the UK for the first time last month, BBC News reported.
Supplier Meatly told the media the “chick bites” were the first pet food products made from cultivated meat to be sold commercially anywhere in the world.
Singapore became the first country to authorise the sale of cell-cultivated meat for human consumption in 2020. It was followed by the United States in 2023 and Israel last year.
‘Providing consumers with a wider choice of new food’
Professor Robin May, chief scientific advisor at the FSA, said that safe innovation is “at the heart” of this programme.
“By prioritising consumer safety and making sure new foods, like CCPs, are safe, we can support growth in innovative sectors. Our aim is to ultimately provide consumers with a wider choice of new food, while maintaining the highest safety standards.”
Science minister, Lord Vallance, added: “By supporting the safe development of cell-cultivated products, we’re giving businesses the confidence to innovate and accelerating the UK’s position as a global leader in sustainable food production.
This work will not only help bring new products to market faster, but strengthen consumer trust, supporting our Plan for Change and creating new economic opportunities across the country.”
Eight companies to take part in programme
Today, 10th March, the FSA announced the eight CCP companies that have been selected to participate in the programme. The participants were chosen through a rigorous selection process to represent the diverse, international range of technologies, processes, and ingredients used in CCP production.
CCP businesses participating in the programme are Hoxton Farms (UK), BlueNalu (USA), Mosa Meat (The Netherlands), Gourmey (France), Roslin Technologies (UK), Uncommon Bio (UK), Vital Meat (France) and Vow (Australia).
FSA added: “As well as also working with the wider international CCP industry, we will be working closely with academic partners including the Cellular Agriculture Manufacturing Hub (CARMA) led by the University of Bath, National Alternative Protein Innovation Centre (NAPIC), and the Bezos Centre for Sustainable Protein.
“The trade body who will represent the broader industry is the Alternative Proteins Association (APA), alongside non-governmental organisation (NGO) The Good Food Institute Europe (GFI).”
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