We are used to the fact that our food and that of our pets are manufactured in large industries. Now everything can take a 180º turn and in a short time the food for our dogs and cats will have been manufactured in a laboratory using cell culture. A procedure that is already being used for human food where there is vegan and non-vegan options, and even to create mushrooms with a perfect cell structure and then turn them into synthetic leather. This is how Adidas did it with its latest ecological Stan Smith.
Until now it seems that no one had thought to extrapolate the cell culture process to cat and dog food. The biotech company Because Animals has already finished its round of financing and has reached 6,7 million dollars. Now we just need to see how he uses that money in the creation of cell culture meat to make pet food.
This is the objective of Because Animals, that is, to be able to create pet food without animal meat. The company was founded in Philadelphia in 2016 and it was not until 2018 that it launched its first product. At that time, it was a probiotic supplement to help our dogs and cats have better digestion and a better immune system. thus avoiding certain diseases.
After another phase of fundraising, in 2019, the company launched organic biscuits with nutritional yeast for dogs. Little by little they have been getting closer to their goal and at this moment they have broken the mold, obtaining enough financing to get down to work and start creating food for dogs and cats, but without animals.
Food for dogs and cats without animals
In this recent round of financing, Because Animals managed to attract the attention of a European multinational, specifically Orkla ASA, as well as other important companies in the sector that wanted to support the idea of food based on health and sustainability.
Orkla ASA is a group that works within Europe in consumer packaged goods and has a division called Orkla Alternative Proteins that is the one that led the financing.
This was achieved thanks to the fact that both companies, Because Animals and Orkla Alternative Proteins, are on the same page and are committed to health and sustainability when it comes to pet food.
We don't know yet if that food could be considered vegan or not, as Because Animal presented a prototype without fetal bovine cat serum, but with mouse tissue. This was before this latest round of funding. Meanwhile, the most direct competition continues to use blood samples from pregnant cows.
In the case of food for humans created in laboratories, it does differentiate between vegan and non-vegan food. And just like with humans, the vegan diet has certain drawbacks also for dogs and many studies relate it to health problems in dogs.
Initially, the idea is to increase the production of that lab-grown meat cat food. Then focus on the development of cell culture and plant based dog foods.
So, in a few years we will see on supermarket shelves the first dog and cat food containers that have been created in laboratories in a sustainable, healthy and animal-free way.