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Meat grown in a laboratory could be considered halal, according to advice from Islamic scholars in Saudi Arabia to a US food start-up, as the industry begins exploring the certification of products that adhere to religious dietary rules.
San Francisco-based Eat Just asked three sharia scholars to investigate whether cultured meat can be halal. The scientists concluded that this was possible, provided that the stem cells used to make it were obtained from halal sources, among other things.
Although the industry is still a long way from reaching commercial scale, regulators in the US and Singapore have given the green light to a handful of lab-grown meat startups, and companies have been trying to test whether their products could be suitable for the billions of consumers who eat halal or kosher.
The process is far from simple as religious food certification varies from country to country and religious authorities in different jurisdictions may have different opinions.
Mirte Gosker, managing director of alternative protein advocacy group the Good Food Institute in Asia Pacific, said that while the Eat Just decision does not immediately change the halal status of cultured meat products in the market, it has the basis laid for commercialization.
“This week’s ruling provides much-needed insight into what an approval roadmap could look like, and we expect startups will immediately begin adapting their manufacturing processes to meet these new guidelines,” she said.
Lab-grown or “cultured” meat is made from animal cells and grown in bioreactors, unlike plant-based meat – produced by companies like Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods – which is made from ingredients such as pea and soy protein. Over the past year, investors have focused on cultured meat instead of the plant-based version.
The Islamic scholars advised that to be considered halal, the product’s cell line must come from an animal that Muslims are allowed to eat, that was slaughtered according to Islamic law, and that it was fed with permitted nutrients. They also stipulated that the final product must be edible, healthy and approved by the relevant regulatory body.
Eat Just CEO and co-founder Josh Tetrick said that while the company’s products were not currently halal, they would work to ensure this was the case. This would involve exchanging the current cell lines, which come from a chicken embryo, for cell lines from a fresh piece of halal meat.
Tetrick said there is a strong demand for lab-grown meat in Saudi Arabia and other parts of the Middle East and Southeast Asia, in part to improve food security.
“Our priorities are to scale up the technology, reduce costs and ensure it is accessible to everyone, including 2 billion people who simply don’t want to eat meat unless it is halal.”
Eat Just’s cultured meat division Good Meat, which sells its cultured chicken in one restaurant in Singapore and one in Washington DC, is now working with Saudi Arabia’s Halal Products Advisory – a subsidiary of the country’s Public Investment Fund – to get advice about the certification process.
In Singapore, the Majlis Ugama Islam Singapura, the only entity with the right to issue halal certification in the city-state, is working with Singaporean cultured meat producer Esco Aster to establish a regulatory framework.
The world’s largest kosher certification authority, Orthodox Union, last week certified the chicken cell line used by Israeli food startup SuperMeat.
There are already signs of discord. Indonesia’s leading Muslim organization Nahdlatul Ulama ruled in 2021 that cells taken from living animals and grown in a bioreactor were not halal.
In Israel, which has become a hub for cultured meat start-ups, Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi David Lau said in January that Aleph Farms’ lab-grown steak was kosher. However, Rabbi Menachem Genack, the director of the Orthodox Union, said this was not the case because the cell line came from a living animal.