WILL FEEDING THE WORLD
KILL THE PLANET?
Sustainably and equitably feeding
10 billion people in 2050 with
our current food system is simply
impossible. Some 50% of our
habitable land is used for agriculture
and over 75% of that is used for
Livestock. In fact, if the global
population today were to eat the
way we do in Australia, the US or
much of Europe there’s physically
not enough habitable land on the
planet. Water availability isn’t any
better with two thirds of the global
population projected to be living in
water-stressed conditions by 2025.
With finite planetary resources we
can’t keep eating the way we do
now in countries like New Zealand
or Australia unless we do things
differently. But linear change won’t
do it, we need exponential changes
in technology if food production is to
keep up with the global population
growth and the increasing food
needs. To achieve this there’s
three new technologies that can
change the future of our planet
and help feed the world. Some of
these technologies challenge our
fundamental assumptions on where
our food comes from and how it’s
made.
The first technology is cultivated
or cellbased meat. To make meat
this way we add animal cells to
a growth medium in a fermenter
and grow our meat as we would
brew beer. It’s predicted that global
demand for meat could double
by 2050 and this is currently not
achievable or sustainable. I believe
it’s indisputable that this technology
uses at least 90% less land and
some 50% less water and most likely
it’ll use significantly less energy and
produce less GHG emissions than
conventional animal agriculture.
There are still some challenges, but
we’ll see minced products on the
market in 2020 and steaks in 2022.
They’ll be expensive and in very
limited quantities, but by 2025 we’ll
be seeing commercial quantities.
The second technology is
synthetic biology, which has the
power to fundamentally alter food
manufacturing as we know it.
It’s an engineering approach to
biology using genetically modified
organisms.
Many highly resource intensive
animal-based products are in
high demand. An example is
whey protein, used in everything
from ice cream to sports drinks.
With usage set to double in the
next ten years the land and water
requirements for conventional
dairy production means that the
industry can’t meet this demand.
Using synthetic biology, a company
called Perfect Day is making whey
protein using genetically modified
yeast and they’ve recently teamed
up with ingredients giant ADM to
commercialise the product by 2021.
The third technology is producing
alternative proteins. We’re
accustomed to getting protein from
traditional plant and animal sources
but why restrict ourselves? There’s
nothing magical about these sources
of protein and there’s now many
alternatives. As an example, Solar
Foods from Finland uses electricity
from solar energy to split water into
hydrogen and oxygen. Water, carbon
dioxide and minerals are added as
well as microbes that can use the
hydrogen as a food source. The
microbes are grown and harvested
and the high protein end product can
be used as a food ingredient. It’ll be
Tony Hunter, global food
futurist speaker, consultant and
food scientist specialising in
AgriFood Tech.
in commercial production in 2021.
It’s 100 times more land and GHG
efficient and uses over 1,000 times
less water than conventional animal
products and arable land is not
required. You can make it anywhere,
even in a desert.
All three technologies do more with
less resources, reduce waste, or
both. Optimising our use of the
planet’s finite resources will be
essential to feeding a hungry planet
of 10 billion. It’s only a few years until
these products come to market and
go from science fiction to science
fact.
CREATE CLEAN
16 NOVEMBER 2019