Sour meat and flan mark the culinary tradition during King’s Day. But Willem-Alexander and Maxima themselves insisted on a new Maastricht innovation: the hamburger made from cultured meat.
At the royal request, Mosa Meat from Maastricht will be on Onze Lieve Vrouweplein on Wednesday 27 April. The Maastricht company Mosa Meat wants to produce meat without having to slaughter animals. The meat is made by growing cells from a cow in a laboratory. As the cells multiply and form muscle fibers in a special liquid, meat is produced.
Mission
The company was founded by Mark Post from Berg en Terblijt and is located on the Brightlands Health Campus in Randwyck, Maastricht. “Apparently the royal couple also believe in our mission. That’s great. We think our cultured meat is really necessary. There are more and more meat eaters all over the world. That’s because in China and India people are getting richer, they are going to eat more meat “In the next 20 years, meat consumption is going to increase by 70 percent. With today’s raw materials, we just can’t produce enough meat to meet that demand. So we have no choice but to start producing meat in a different way.”
Farm
Mosa Meat has stabled cows on a farm in Maastricht that act as the supplier of the cells. “We get that from the buttocks of these cows here,” says Post. Scientists are investigating which type of cell works best for the culture process. For example, cells from calves and from adult cows and from bulls and cattle are compared.
climate
“The environment and climate are of course important, but there is also a moral aspect to our project. We don’t have to kill animals,” says Lea Melzener, junior scientist at Mosa Meat. “I was a student in Bonn myself and after a masters project in Maastricht, this initiative really appealed to me. We produce meat in a way that is much better, not only for the animals but also for the climate.”