Mosa Meat opens largest cultivated meat plant in the world
Image credit: Mosa Meat
Dutch cultured meat company Mosa Meat has opened what it says is the world’s largest cultivated meat plant to date, in Maastricht.
The new 29,708 square feet space is the company’s fourth scale-up facility, and marks the completion of its Center for Advanced Meat Production, Upscaling, and Sustainability (C.A.M.P.U.S.).
According to Mosa Meat, the first production runs at the new space are expected to begin in the coming days.
The opening of the cultivated meat plant was attended by the Mayor of Maastricht Annemarie Penn-te Strake, the Governor of Limburg Emile Roemer, and the Mosa Meat team.
Two Michelin-starred Chef Hans van Wolde also ran a cooking demonstration at the event using some of the company’s cultivated meat burgers. The chef has joined Mosa Meat’s product development, sensory evaluation and recipe formulation team, working alongside the internal group of food scientists.
Van Wolde said in a statement: “When I first tried a Mosa Burger as part of the internal
development team, I was blown away by the beefy taste and the amazing mouthfeel of the
beef fat. It gave me goosebumps. I genuinely believe this new way of making beef can
delight connoisseurs and casual beef lovers alike, while enjoying the positive benefits of
cultivated beef from a sustainability perspective. I am excited to work with the Mosa Meat
team to make future versions even better.”
Founded in 2016, the company has been working for years to scale up its cultivated beef production and show it has the capacity to produce large amounts of cultured meat. Last year, Mosa Meat partnered with Singapore-based contract development and manufacturing company Esco Aster to help bring its products to market, but it is still awaiting regulatory approval to sell its cultivated beef in the country.
Maarten Bosch, Mosa Meat‘s CEO is confident the launch of the new facility will help them move closer to approval and commercialisation. “As this scale-up facility comes online next month, we will have the capacity to make tens of thousands of cultivated hamburgers”, he said in a statement. “The facility is designed to grow as demand increases with regulatory approvals and regional market entries, up to hundreds of thousands of cultivated hamburgers per year. And in combination with our contract manufacturer in Singapore, even a lot more. We are excited to debut this great tasting hamburger today that even hardcore carnivores will love.”
Mosa Meat Co-founder and CSO Dr. Mark Post added: “When we introduced cultivated meat
to the world, we predicted it would take 10 years to create a consumer product. Now, almost
exactly 10 years later, we have a consumer product that we can start making in larger
quantities and that we can start serving to consumers in Singapore, pending regulatory
approval”.
Interest in and support for cultivated meat has been growing for some time in the Netherlands. Last March, the Dutch House of Representatives passed a motion to make the sampling of cell-based meat legal, while in April 2022, the government set aside €60 million to put towards the development of cell-based agriculture in the country.
