Animal board invited review: Animal agriculture and alternative meats – learning from past science communication failures

Meat Consumption, Sustainability and Alternatives: An Overview of Motives and Barriers

“…As explained above, an alternative to conventional meat consumption when there are concerns for sustainability and animal welfare is the consumption of meat produced more sustainably and/or following animal welfare standards. It is worth noting that the environmental impact of meat production is difficult to determine as it depends on a multitude of factors such as production systems, the competition for resources useful in other food or feed production or the metric used for its calculation [30,31].…”

“…For instance, depending on the process used to extract proteins from plants (e.g., wet or dry separation), the extraction could be more or less sustainable due to its requirements of energy, water and other compounds [81]. Moreover, depending on the metric used to calculate the environmental impact, and what is included in its calculation, cultured 'meat' could be more or less sustainable [31]. In any case, it is important to note that, even though reducing meat consumption and consuming meat alternatives could reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve the environment, other actions such as changing some aspects of the way we live can improve the environment much more [73].…”

What Is the Likely Impact of Alternative Proteins on Diet Quality, Health, and the Environment in Low- and Middle-Income Countries

“…The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) does not prescribe specific metrics but recommends using those that convert GHGEs into CO 2 equivalents [ 19 ]. Recognizing total GHGE is important for a comprehensive environmental assessment, given the distinct impacts of different GHGs, including short-lived climate pollutants and their potential for long-term climate effects [ 20 ]. Additionally, nitrogen and phosphorous flows are measurable, with atmospheric nitrogen being converted into reactive forms through fertilizer production and legume cultivation.…”

Prospective life cycle assessment of a bioprocess design for cultured meat production in hollow fiber bioreactors

“…The results of this paper are compared with examples of beef and poultry meat production systems to provide further illustration of the areas of development needs. As this paper is targeted at comparison with different bioprocess design scenarios, it does not provide a thorough comparison to the environmental impacts of conventionally produced livestock meat across wide range of different farming systems or a comparison of cultured meat with plant-based foods and other alternative protein sources; for this readers are directed to other papers comparing environmental impacts of different foods (Rubio et al, 2020;Van Eenennaam and Werth, 2021). The findings are intended as a framework to inform research and development towards areas for improving the environmental performance of cultured meat production systems.…”