CORPORATIONS

NAOMI XU ELEGANT: 'China consumes more meat than any other single country. It accounts for a quarter of global meat consumption and half of all global pork consumption, an ominous stat as African swine fever ravages the country’s pork production capabilities. Now, as the environmental costs of meat-eating have revealed themselves and plant-based alternatives like Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat are gaining mainstream popularity, some entrepreneurs are looking to convince China’s consumers to make the switch from animal to plant. “China already has a long history of plant-based food,” says…

NICK SIBILLA: 'In a win for the First Amendment, Mississippi will no longer ban plant-based food companies from labeling their products with terms like “veggie burgers” and “vegan bacon.” On Thursday, the state dropped rules that would have enforced the labeling ban, and instead replaced them with common sense. Under the new regulations now in effect, a plant-based meat alternative won’t be considered “mislabeled” if it uses an adjective like “meatless,” “plant-based,” or “vegan,” on its labeling. Previously, meatless marketers could risk fines of up to $1,000 “per offense,” even jail time.…

GEORGE REYNOLDS: 'Once a niche interest group parodied in TV shows such as The Simpsons (in which a character describes himself as a “level five vegan” who refuses to eat anything that casts a shadow), in the past two years, vegans have been thrust into the limelight. A philosophy rooted in non-aggression has found itself at the heart of some of the most virulent arguments on social media. In November 2018, Good Morning Britain hosted a debate titled “Do people hate vegans?”; the political website Vox tackled the question in even more direct fashion a week later, asking: “Why do people hate…

CHASE PURDY: 'In the edible space race to bring cell-cultured meat to market, Israel just stepped up its game. Israeli startup Future Meat Technologies this month announced its plan to build the world’s first pilot production facility for growing cultured meat, a signal of just how close scientists and entrepreneurs are to getting a product into consumers’ hands. Yaakov Nahmias, founder of the company, says it plans to break ground on the facility in coming months, making history just south of Tel Aviv, in a relatively small Israeli city called Rehovot. In 2014, Nahmias won the Rappaport…

BETH GREENFIELD: 'Anyone who food shops or eats out, even occasionally, has likely noticed the influx of plant-based meat alternatives on the market... Now comes the backlash — led by both an aggressive ad campaign and a series of legislative efforts. “What’s hiding in your plant-based meat?” asked a full-page ad in the New York Times about the “ultra-processed imitations” filled with mysterious ingredients — to which Impossible Foods shot back “the Impossible Burger has none of the noxious slaughterhouse contaminants that can be found in almost all ground beef from cows.” Call it the…

LAUREN FERRI: 'A revolutionary vegan meat company has launched its products in Australia, including a plant-based hot dog and a burger than bleeds. Moving Mountains will now be sold exclusively though Woolworths stores around Australia and will also be a feature at Henry's Burgers in Melbourne. Competition in the plant-based meat sector is expected to increase, with Australia's east coast rivaling top markets for vegetarian products in London and California... The UK-based company was founded in 2016 by Simeon Van der Molen... In just two years the business has quickly grown into a $180…

ELAINE WATSON: 'A series of ads attacking the next generation of plant-based burgers as ‘ultra- processed’ products ‘hiding’ scary unpronounceable ingredients is a crude attempt by a “dark-money front group funded by Big Beef to mislead consumers and push propaganda,” claims Impossible Foods, which says its products are “better for people and the planet than the products they replace.” Its comments came as The Center for Consumer Freedom (CFF) – a nonprofit founded by former tobacco lobbyist Richard Berman, who critics say has perfected the art of setting up nonprofits to advance corporate…

OWEN ROGERS: 'Leather is often framed as a byproduct of meat and dairy, but considering the scale of the industry and ubiquity of leather in clothing worldwide, it’s easy to see why it should be considered as an industry in and of itself. We know that raising cows for food can be incredibly damaging to the environment, and when we look more closely at leather production, we can see that those environmental impacts don’t end with cows’ deaths. This study was primarily focused on the impact of three post-tanning processes: retanning, fatliquoring, and dyeing... To examine the environmental…

DAVID YAFFE-BELLANY: 'With plant-based burgers, sausages and chicken increasingly popular and available in fast-food restaurants and grocery stores across the United States, a new group of companies has started making meatless meat: the food conglomerates and meat producers that Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods originally set out to disrupt. In recent months, major food companies like Tyson, Smithfield, Perdue, Hormel and Nestlé have rolled out their own meat alternatives, filling supermarket shelves with plant-based burgers, meatballs and chicken nuggets. Once largely the domain of vegans…

PM NEWSWIRE: 'It started with plant-based milk, then plant-based yogurt and now it's plant-based meat that's taking the spotlight... Plant-based foods are here to stay and the market is expected to continue on its upward trajectory for the foreseeable future. In the past year, plant-based food sales in the US increased by 11% to an impressive $4.5 billion USD , while the global vegan foods market is estimated to hit $24.3 billion USD by 2026 . The leading drivers behind this growth are plant-based dairy and plant-based meats, with sales increasing by 39% and 37% respectively in the last…