First Cultivated Meat Company gets FDA approval
17th November 2022
("Agronomics" or the "Company")
First Cultivated Meat Company Receives Greenlight from Regulator FDA in the US Ahead of Commercialisation
Agronomics (LON:ANIC), the leading listed company in cellular agriculture, is pleased to announce cultivated meat company UPSIDE Foods, Inc. ("UPSIDE Foods"), has received a 'No Questions' letter from the US regulatory body the US Food and Drug Administration ("FDA"), accepting their conclusion that their cultivated chicken is safe to eat. This is a momentous achievement for UPSIDE Foods, and a pivotal moment for the entire cultivated meat industry. This represents the first company to achieve a greenlight from the FDA in the US, and a validation of the sector shifting from research and development, towards commercialisation. We expect this to be the first of many FDA approvals for the sale of cultivated meat in the US.
The FDA's decision is a major milestone in the evolution of the global cultivated meat sector and another step towards the commercialisation of cellular agriculture. The news comes almost two years after the Singapore Food Agency (SFA) gave regulatory approval to Eat Just's cultivated chicken, which is now sold through its subsidiary GOOD Meat. At full-scale commercialisation, cellular agriculture has the capacity to make a meaningful contribution to the world's food production sustainably. It is projected that by 2040, cultivated meat could reach 35% of the global meat market.
This is a timely achievement for the sector given global concerns surrounding food security and climate change, which have come to the forefront in recent years. There is an urgent need to adopt new methods for food production to combat these challenges. The Company remains confident that cell culturing technologies, and cultivated meat produced from these processes, will play a vital role in the coming decades.
Jim Mellon, Co-Founder and Executive Director of Agronomics commented: -
"We are extremely pleased to see the first approval of a cultivated meat product in the US. Not only is this a massive market, but the FDA is considered one of the most stringent regulatory bodies globally for food safety.
This approval is a landmark event for the field of cellular agriculture and should give investors comfort that the path to commercialisation is now clear. We look forward to news of further approvals from within Agronomics' leading portfolio of companies."
The full announcement is set out below without any material changes.
FDA Completes First Pre-Market Consultation for Human Food Made Using
Animal Cell Culture Technology
Before Entering the U.S. Market, the Food Must Meet Other Federal Requirements
Constituent Update
November 16, 2022
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) completed its first pre-market consultation for a human food made from cultured animal cells. We evaluated the information UPSIDE Foods submitted to the agency and have no further questions at this time about the firm's safety conclusion. The firm will use animal cell culture technology to take living cells from chickens and grow the cells in a controlled environment to make the cultured animal cell food.
The FDA's pre-market consultation with the firm included an evaluation of the firm's production process and the cultured cell material made by the production process, including the establishment of cell lines and cell banks, manufacturing controls, and all components and inputs. The voluntary pre-market consultation is not an approval process. Instead, it means that after our careful evaluation of the data and information shared by the firm, we have no further questions at this time about the firm's safety conclusion.
The FDA is committed to sharing information about our oversight of human food made from cultured animal cells and today released:
● The FDA's response letter to the firm
● The FDA's scientific memo that describes our evaluation of the data and information provided by the firm
● The firm's own assessment that their food is safe
In addition to meeting the FDA's requirements, including facility registration for the cell culture portion of the process, the firm will need a grant of inspection from the United States Department of Agriculture Food Safety and Inspection Service (USDA-FSIS) for the manufacturing establishment. Additionally, the food itself requires a mark of inspection from USDA-FSIS before it can enter the U.S. market. As this product comes closer to entering the U.S. market, we are closely coordinating with USDA-FSIS to ensure it is properly regulated and labeled.
The FDA is ready to work with additional firms developing cultured animal cell food and production processes to ensure their food is safe and lawful under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. We encourage firms to have these conversations with us often and early in their product and process development phase, well ahead of making any submission to us. We are already engaged in discussions with multiple firms about various types of food made from cultured animal cells, including food made from seafood cells that will be overseen solely by the FDA. Our goal is to support innovation in food technologies while always maintaining as our priority the production of safe food. Human food made with cultured animal cells must meet the same stringent requirements, including safety requirements, as all other food.
For More Information:
● Human Food Made with Cultured Animal Cells
● Press Release: FDA Spurs Innovation for Human Food from Animal Cell Culture Technology
Agronomics is a leading listed alternative proteins company with a focus on cellular agriculture and cultivated meat. The Company has established a portfolio of 24 companies in this rapidly advancing sector. It seeks to secure minority stakes in companies owning technologies with defensible intellectual property that offer new ways of producing food and materials with a focus on products historically derived from animals. These technologies are driving a major disruption in agriculture, offering solutions to improve sustainability, as well as addressing human health, animal welfare and environmental damage. This disruption will decouple supply chains from the environment and animals, as well as being fundamental to feeding the world's expanding population. A full list of Agronomics' portfolio companies is available at https://agronomics.im/ .
About Cellular Agriculture
Cellular Agriculture is the production of agriculture products directly from cells, as opposed to raising an animal for slaughter, or growing crops. This encompasses cell culture to produce cultivated meat and materials, and fermentation processes that harness a combination of molecular biology, synthetic biology, tissue engineering and biotechnology to massively simplify production methods in a sustainable manner.
Over the coming decades, the source of the world's food supply traditionally derived from conventional agriculture is going to change dramatically. We have already witnessed the first wave of this shift with the consumer adoption of plant-based alternative proteins but today, we are on the cusp of an even bigger wave of change. This is being facilitated by advances in cellular agriculture. This change is necessary, given scientists claims that if we maintain existing animal protein consumption patterns, then we will not meet the Paris Agreement's goal of limiting warming to 1.5℃.
AT Kearney, a global consultancy firm, projects that cultivated meat's market share will reach 35% by 2040. This combined with the Good Food Institute's estimate that a US $1.8 trillion investment will be required in order to produce just 10% of the world's protein using this technology, means that we are on the cusp of a multi-decade flow of capital to build out manufacturing facilities. Funding in the field of cellular agriculture is accelerating, however still less than US$ 5 billion has been invested worldwide since the industry's inception in 2016.
For further information please contact:
|
Agronomics Limited |
Beaumont Cornish Limited |
Canaccord Genuity Limited |
Cenkos Securities Plc |
Peterhouse Capital Limited |
TB Cardew |
|
The Company |
Nomad |
Joint Broker |
Joint Broker |
Joint Broker |
Public Relations |
|
Richard Reed Denham Eke |
Roland Cornish James Biddle |
Andrew Potts Harry Rees Alex Aylen (Head of Equities) |
Giles Balleny Max Gould Michael Johnson |
Lucy Williams Charles Goodfellow |
Ed Orlebar Alistair Walker |
|
+44 (0) 1624 639396 |
+44 (0) 207 628 3396 |
+44 (0) 207 523 8000 |
+44 (0) 207 397 8900 |
+44 (0) 207 469 0936 |
+44 (0) 20 7930 0777 +44 (0) 7738 724 630 |
Reach is a non-regulatory news service. By using this service an issuer is confirming that the information contained within this announcement is of a non-regulatory nature. Reach announcements are identified with an orange label and the word “Reach” in the source column of the News Explorer pages of London Stock Exchange’s website so that they are distinguished from the RNS UK regulatory service. Other vendors subscribing for Reach press releases may use a different method to distinguish Reach announcements from UK regulatory news.
RNS may use your IP address to confirm compliance with the terms and conditions, to analyse how you engage with the information contained in this communication, and to share such analysis on an anonymised basis with others as part of our commercial services. For further information about how RNS and the London Stock Exchange use the personal data you provide us, please see our Privacy Policy.
Latest directors dealings
- 4 hours ago Johnson Matthey
- 5 hours ago Galliford Try
- 5 hours ago Galliford Try
- 5 hours ago Centrica
- 6 hours ago Smith & Nephew