Cultivated meat now has a naming problem

EU cultivated meat labelling: summary

• EU bans meaty terms for plant-based and cultivated meat across member states
• Burger sausage and nuggets remain permitted after three-year transition
• Industry faces added marketing hurdles as consumer acceptance already lags
• Aleph Farms argues ban confuses substance terms with format descriptors
• Company signals possible noncompliance citing scientific and logical concerns

In a major development for Europe’s meat and alternative meat sectors, new rules will restrict how plant-based and cultivated meat products can be marketed and sold across all EU member states.

Under the changes, cultivated meat – also known as cell-based, cultured or lab-grown meat – will no longer be permitted to use traditional ‘meaty’ terms such as chicken, beef, pork or steak. More generic product names like burger, sausage and nuggets will remain allowed, even after the three-year transition period.

For a young industry already struggling to win over consumers, the news is unwelcome. Any limitation on marketing and sales strategies represents yet another hurdle on the path to scale.

Yet not all cultivated meat companies appear willing to comply. Notably, one of the sector’s biggest players has said outright that it won’t.

Should ‘meaty’ terms be banned in cell-based? It depends...

The list of soon-to-be banned terms is lengthy. It includes beef, veal, pork, poultry, chicken, duck, tenderloin, ribs, wing, breast, ribeye, T-bone and bacon, among others.

But Aleph Farms, one of the largest names in cultivated meat, argues the list is inconsistent. It contends that it mixes substance-based terms with format-based ones, blurring the distinction between what a product is and how it is consumed.

Terms like chicken and cheese, as well as descriptors like sirloin, ribeye or brisket, relate to the nature or substance of the product itself. While format terms like steak, burger or nugget, are different, argues the Israel-headquartered company.

“You can have a tuna steak, a cauliflower steak. Steak is the format, not the substance of any product.

“Europe already recognised this logic when it allowed ‘burger’ and ‘sausage’ to survive the restriction. The same logic should apply to steak.”

What about the science? Conventional vs cultivated meat

The reason ‘steak’ terminology is of particular concern is that Aleph Farms has succeeded in developing its first whole-cut product, coined the Petit Steak.

Made from blending cultivated meat with plant-based ingredients, the Petit Steak has received regulatory approval in Israel. Aleph Farms has also submitted applications in Singapore, Thailand, and the UK. And although a novel foods dossier isn’t officially in the hands of EU regulators, the start-up is investing on the continent via a manufacturing hub in Switzerland.

That cultivated meat products should be considered novel is largely uncontested from a process perspective. Unlike conventional meat, cultivated meat is made by taking stem cells from a living animal, feeding them with a growth medium, and allowing the cells to multiply in a bioreactor. The ultimate idea is that meat can be produced slaughter-free.

Where there’s less consensus is whether cultivated meat should be subjected to the same ban as plant-based meat.

Cultivated meat belongs to the animal protein category, explains the Aleph Farms spokesperson. “Bundling it into a plant-based labelling dispute and applying the same rules is a shortcut that doesn’t serve clarity for consumers nor the science.”

But the big question remains compliance

The biggest question for a company like Aleph Farms, or any cultivated meat player potentially implicated by the ban – for example US producers Mission Barns (cultivated pork) or Good Meat (cultivated chicken) if they ever launch in the EU – is how they’d market and sell their goods.

“Petit Steak is a steak. It’s a format descriptor we believe is perfectly fine,” says the Aleph Farms spokesperson. “We’re not going to pre-emptively rename a product to comply with a rule we believe is scientifically and logically flawed.”

The start-up would be prepared to make that case to regulators directly. What it’s less likely to do is start getting creative with other descriptors for its product, like ‘prime cut’ or ‘filet’.

That’s not to say Aleph Farms wants confusing messaging. In fact, it’s advocating for the opposite: “We all want a clear and transparent label.”

But the company’s concerned there’s tension in the EU’s decision-making process.

“Cultivated meat doesn’t yet commercially exist in Europe and regulating its language before its framework is fully developed suggests the industry was caught in the crossfire of a different debate rather than considered on its own merits.”