A webinar organized by the American Chemical Society on March 11th was disappointing in both content and perspective. Compared by Chris Gregson of Greenstalk Foods, none of the participants was actively involved in production or marketing of either a vegetable-based meat substitute or a cell-cultured product. Many of the comments by the participants were basically a restatment of the obvious. We are all aware that motivation by consumers to purchase alternatives to real meat include misperceptions over health, environmental considerations, welfare concerns, and a new angle, freedom from antibiotic resistant pathogens.
Julie Mann of Puris Holdings, herself a vegan, considers that ultimately alt-meat will eliminate the need for livestock, a claim made 15 years ago by Josh Tetrick when he launched the first of his alt-egg ventures with HSUS support. Andrew Ive of Big Idea Ventures claims to have funded 43 companies and his focus concerns the economics of alt-meat. The issue that he studiously avoided is that publicly quoted companies involved in vegetable-based meat substitutes are reporting losses. Beyond Meat and the Vegetable Protein segment of Maple Leaf Foods have yet to come close to breaking even despite immense investment and increasing production levels. 
Andrew Ive did however note that vegetable based products gained consumer acceptance when moved from vegan sections in supermarkets to meat coolers. Ive notes that producers of vegetable-based products are improving product presentation and innovation is apparent as major processing companies use equipment and additives respectively devised by Buhler of Switzerland and Givaudan of France. Ive believes that progress will be made by combining the aspirations of entrepreneurs with technology.
Joshua March of Artmys Foods stressed quality issues in relation to vegetable-based alternatives. To date alt-meat products do not reproduce the organoleptic qualities of real meat with respect to taste, texture and appearance, both raw and cooked. March also questions the nutritional content of vegetable-based meats. While conceding the absence of cholesterol and possibly contaminants, alt-meat is more “processed” than conventional meat.
The status of cell cultured meat was glossed over although there has been considerable progress by companies in Israel including Aleph Farms, Future Meat Technologies, Biofood Systems, and Super Meat. Again, the ACS panel while acknowledging technical progress failed to address the large differential in cost of production between cell cultured and conventional meat.
Recently, Singapore has emerged as a champion of alternatives to meat. This is partly due to the fact that the Government of the city-nation recognized that 90 percent of their food is imported and they recognize their vulnerability especially with regard to protein. Accordingly, regulations to allow the manufacture and sale of cell-cultured meat were hastily enacted. Josh Tetrick appears to have taken advantage of a favorable regulatory climate and claims to be serving a cell- derived chicken substitute in a restaurant in Singapore. From comments by Andrew Ive, it is apparent that the product is in fact a vegetable-based meat alternative with inclusion of some cell-cultured material without specifying the relative volumes of vegetable and cell-derived components. Contrary to the transparency demonstrated by Memphis Meats in the U.S. and developers in both Israel and the E.U., Tetrick has never revealed details of his production process nor has he identified or provided images of his production facilities.
The ACS Webinar was less than informative, possibly due to the selection of participants who appear to have either aspirational or investment approaches to alt-meat. Presenters with actual real-world experience in production and marketing would have contributed to a more enlightening program.