So-called “clean meat and clean milk” has taken over the food and agricultural news. Every time you go through the milk section at the supermarket there it is almond “milk”, the non-dairy way to drink something that is like milk. Over at the meat counter, beef and other products are now under attack by companies who plan to make a product that tastes and looks the same with similar benefits in consumption. These products have even made it to the mainstream like the veggie burger or the “Impossible burger” that is growing in popularity. With an increasing number of people looking into meat alternatives, it is highly important that we as agriculturists know facts that can help us combat the altering opinions about our products.
The biggest thing that anyone in the beef business or other meat industries can do is know the facts of your products. Take beef for example - it provides the Big 10 Nutrients - zinc, iron, protein, riboflavin, niacin, phosphorus, selenium, choline, and two B vitamins - nutrients that are critical to a nutritious diet. Other meats provide important ingredients to muscle growth and development, metabolism, healthy blood circulation.
Although many claims are out that beef production is bad for the environment, protein food sources have a unique advantage to using land that is rocky, steep, and land that is not favorable for producing row crops or vegetables. Using cattle or other livestock on land that is highly erodible helps protect the soil, keep the overgrowth of vegetation under control and naturally fertilize the land, much like bison when they roamed the land. It’s not only natural but also safe.
With high criticism of GMOs from activist groups, it’s hard to understand how they can see this cultured fake meat as anything better. In REAL meat the only time for contamination to happen is when the meat is exposed to air, the so-called “clean” meat is always exposed to air and contamination at all times makes it a high-risk product that could lead to easily making consumers sick.
Secondly, fake meat is not a practical product. Products that are made in a petri dish take 3 months to grow. The demand from extremest humane groups claiming that their products don’t hurt animals is also a false claim. In order to get the cells to produce the lab-grown meat scientists must first collect fetal calf serum, this is the fluid around the calf in the womb. In order to collect these cells, they must first abort the calf. That seems like a lot of waste for a few cheeseburgers. Add in the equipment and energy required to grow it - lights and incubators - all using carbon that is put right back into our environment. The expense of these products hurts the average consumer. Almond “milk” costs more than traditional dairy products and a petri dish hamburger costing up to $280,000 to produce, it is entirely too much to push on to the American consumer.
Lastly, we need to end misleading advertising. We, as farmers and ranchers, are always led to doing as the consumer wants. However, when groups lead the consumers in a way that, in the long run, will hurt our markets, we have to change the tides. We need to educate consumers on the misconceptions that these groups have led them to believe. Legislation needs to be made to regulate against names of meat that are misleading through cattlemen’s organization. Almond “milk” should be called juice, veggie “burgers” should be called veggies you can grill, and so-called “clean meat” should be called what it is, lab-grown cells. These names will not turn off the die-hard veggie people who will eat these products - no matter what, but they will help shed light on the unequal labeling that has happened in recent years. We must show our disgust with meatpackers like Tyson and Cargill, who have helped fund and invested in these movements. They should be removed from agriculture organizational boards and do our best, as commodity groups, to reprimand those companies who are driving down the cost of our products for their own business dealings.
At the end of the day, we as producers can't stand outside of labs and grocery stores and hope that things will improve. We have a job to do: raise a healthy, safe, and nutritious product for consumers, while maintaining the health of our livestock and natural resources. As President John F. Kennedy once said, “The farmer is the only man in our economy who buys everything at retail, sells everything at wholesale, and pays the freight both ways.” It’s time to change our food and labeling system to bring fairness to American agriculture and win the battle with fake meat.
Long Live Cowboys,
Chase "CD" Brinegar
Iowa FFA Association
2018-2019 State President
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