Defending tradition – Italian government bans lab-grown meat

In a sign of respect for farmers, Italian lawmakers have voted for a law banning the production, sale or import of cultured meat and animal feed.

Farmers lobbied hard for legislation to ban cultured meat. Francesco Lollobrigida, Minister of Agriculture, proudly stated, quotes Air Force:

“Italy is the first country in the world to be safe from the social and economic risks associated with synthetic food.”

Nevertheless, the vote in parliament was accompanied by rallies for and against the ban. A fight even broke out between farmers and some deputies. The head of large farmers’ organization Coldiretti, Ettore Prandini, clashed with two lawmakers from the opposition More Europe party, calling them “criminals” for opposing a ban on lab-grown meat with signs denouncing it as “anti-science and anti-Italian.”

Deputy Benedetto Della Vedova accused him of hooliganism. Fellow centrists called on the farmers’ lobby to apologize, with the president of the lower house of parliament, Lorenzo Fontana, saying that “disagreements should never escalate into forms of violence.”

Despite everything, parliament supported the bill with 159 votes to 53. Now those who violate this law face a fine of up to 60,000 euros. For now, the law won’t have much effect since cultured meat is still only legal for human consumption in Singapore and the US.

The European Union has not yet given the green light to lab-grown meat, called “new foods.” But if this happens, Italy’s new law could be challenged by the European Commission.

In September, Wolfgang Gelbmann, of the European Food Safety Authority, said that no proposal had yet been submitted to the body for approval:

“In Europe, we don’t have these products on the market yet… because they are considered novel foods by regulators, the European Commission and member states, and that requires an Efsa safety assessment, authorization from member states and the European Commission.”

The adopted law is a victory for Italy’s agriculture minister, who a year ago promised to keep “synthetic foods” out of Italian dinner tables. He praised MPs for supporting the new law, which was passed in response to a petition from lobby group Coldiretti, and said:

“We protect our food, our food system, by maintaining the connection between food, land and human labor that we have enjoyed for millennia. We must protect our workers, our agricultural businesses and the citizens who have the right to good food.”

Mr Lollobrigida is a member of the prime minister’s far-right Brothers of Italy party and has previously extolled Italy’s proud traditions of food and wine culture.

The petition was previously condemned by Elena Cattaneo, a professor, senator for life and a leading expert in the field of biological sciences. She said it was an emotional, cartoon-style brochure that classified natural food as good and grown food as bad, produced from “crazy cells in bioreactors.”

The law bans synthetic products made from animal cells without killing the animals and prohibits manufacturers from using meat-related words to describe plant protein on labels. Critics point out that there is nothing synthetic about lab-grown meat, as it is created by growing natural cells without genetic modification.

The law comes as a blow to animal welfare groups, who emphasize lab-produced meat as an environmental solution to carbon emissions.

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