After Eat Just gained regulatory approval in Singapore for its cultured meat last year, companies from countries all over the world are racing to bring their cultured meat products to market. We’ve heard news from Asia, the United States, Europe, and Australia regarding cultured meat, but one continent that seems to be left out of this space is Africa. Mzansi Meat Co., based in South Africa, is changing this as the first cultured meat company on the continent of Africa.
This week I spoke with Brett Thompson, a co-founder and the CEO of Mzansi Meat Co., who said he realized “There is no one doing cultivated meat or cellular agriculture in the entire African continent, which is insane to think about. The opportunity was there, and that is the beginning of our story.” The co-founders formed the company in 2020, and shortly after connected with scientist and CEO of Wild Earth, Ryan Bethencourt. Bethencourt invested in Mzansi Meat Co., which enabled the co-founders to start building out a team.
Mzansi Meat Co. is developing cell lines by extracting cells from animal donors, which are not harmed in the process. After the cells are extracted, they are grown in a bioreactor and then are differentiated into muscle and fat cells. Cultured meat companies have traditionally used FBS (fetal bovine serum) as a growth medium, but Mzansi is in discussion with companies that create growth factors from non-animal derived sources. The company will first focus on beef, using the biomass end product as an ingredient for ground meat. Eventually, the company will work on producing cultured whole cuts.
Representing the food and farming culture of Africa is important to Mzansi Meat Co., and the company will be extracting cells from indigenous cattle breeds. Recently, the start-up asked South Africa’s president Cyril Ramaphosa if they could extract cells from his prize-winning Ankole cattle herd to produce sought-after beef cuts without any slaughter.
“Braai” means to barbeque or grill food over an open fire, and this type of social gathering is a huge part of African culture. More urbanized countries and areas in Africa, like South Africa, tend to gravitate towards eating more Western styles of meat analogs for braais, like sausages and burgers patties. Mzansi Meat Co. will first start out with these analogs, and then begin producing more traditionally African cuts of meat.
As the first cultured meat company in Africa, Mzansi Meat Co. does not seem to face local competition in this space. However, Thompson said that there are possibly one or two other cultured meat start-ups in South Africa (this is currently all the information we have). With Mzansi, we are starting to see more activity with alternative proteins in Africa. VeggieVictory is the first plant-based meat company in Nigeria, and earlier this year it raised an undisclosed pre-seed round (Bethencourt also invested in this company).
Mzansi Meat Co. is currently in its pilot production phase, and hopes to have its first products available to sample by the end of this year. By the second half of next year, the company aims to have its products on retail shelves.
UPDATE: This article originally stated that Mzansi Meat does not face competition in South Africa; according to Thompson there are one or two other cultured meat start-ups in the country.
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