Photo by Kyle Mackie

With Republicans in control of all three branches of the federal government, liberal states should increasingly fund cultivated-meat research. For those who don’t know, cultivated meat is grown from animal cells, without slaughter. The new protein offers a number of environmental, public health and animal welfare benefits.

While there are individual Republican leaders who support cultivated-meat development, by and large the party is hostile to the emerging technology. For the foreseeable future, it strikes me as unlikely the federal government will provide money for the effort. Thankfully, at least two Democratic-controlled states have contributed to such funding.

Back in 2022, California directed $5 million toward alternative-protein research across three schools in its land-grant university system. The investment was championed by Assemblymember Ash Kalra, who cited the technology’s potential to mitigate global warming and secure additional economic opportunities as motivating factors.

“By providing California universities resources to advance public knowledge of alternative proteins, we........

© CounterPunch