Artificial meat to solve food shortage
If the doommongers are accurate – and it seems they might be – we are, in the not too distant future, going to run out of food. Creating ‘meat’ in a giant vat could be one solution, say scientists. Other options are genetically modifying animals and plants in order to increase their yield and ‘efficiency’. Neither option is particularly appealing, but at some point we’re going to have to put principles to one side and get on with it.
Cost of healthy living is rising
At a time of record food inflation and fake meat, it is healthy eating that is going to become particularly dear, says the BBC. While the price of sugar, chocolate and confectionery dropped, the cost of vegetables and mineral water climbed. Food accounts for around 12% of household spending.
Homemade is often anything but
The nefarious practices of certain restaurants were revealed this week by the Independent. A trading standards investigation found that many restaurants and pubs were claiming things were ‘fresh’, ‘hand-made’, and ‘local’ when they were not. This will probably not come as a great surprise to many. I prefer this kind of honesty.
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Other food news this week:
* Domino’s scraps plans for halal menu.
* Dark chocolate is good for the heart, according to a study.
* Green leafy veg could cut diabetes risk.
* Brussels gets its hands on the Cornish pasty.
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Blog of the week:
The heroic, if somewhat masochistic, Chris Pople goes to an Aberdeen Angus Steak House, ‘so you don’t have to’.
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Recipe of the week:
This recipe made me smile. That might be because it’s the morning and I’m hungry and hung over. Bacon and egg cups from How To Simplify.
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Cruel but funny of the week:
Sarah Jessica Parker looks like a horse.
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Video of the week:
A reminder of when Mitchell and Webb were actually quite funny.
Creating ‘fake meat’ in a giant VAT is exactly how Quorn is created now! Such mycoproteins have been grown in such a manner for years and people seem to eat them quite happily, don’t see why they should have qualms about meat!
Isn’t the problem with our future selves running out of food mostly down to the global population out stripping the global capacity to produce food?
And if so shouldn’t we be looking less at how we can synthetically create food to feed these burgeoning masses and perhaps more at the realities of exponential population growth on a planet with ultimately finite resources. Obviously this is a very difficult reality to face not one most would like to consider, and there are significant human rights issues to consider in attempting to control global population growth, but I think there are steps that can be taken and a campaign for greater awareness of the current and predicted future situations would be one of them.
We are essentially eating ourselves out of house and home at the moment and this isn’t remotely sustainable for the future.