Ethics Newsline®

U.S. News & World Reports notes that despite ethical baggage, laboratory-produced food may be timely development

LOS ANGELES
The animal-rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) is offering a million-dollar prize for the first scientist who develops commercially viable “test-tube meat.”

National Public Radio reports that PETA says its prize money will go to the contest participant who can make the first in-vitro chicken meat and sell it to the public by June 30, 2012.

PETA president Ingrid Newkirk acknowledged that “many people are stunned” to hear that PETA is interested in lab-grown meat, but she says it is clear that members must overcome their “revulsion at flesh-eating” to achieve “a kinder world,” according to a report from the Scotsman.

The Toronto Star reports that while Newkirk insists “humans don’t need to eat meat at all,” she says that because many people “refuse to kick their meat addictions, PETA is willing to help them gain access to flesh that doesn’t cause suffering and death.”

The move enters an interesting ethics intersection because genetically engineered food products have themselves been at the center of controversy, notes an analysis from U.S. News & World Report. Science editor Ben Harder observes that with a global food shortage looming, the topic of lab-produced food probably has never been more timely.

In addition to preventing the killing of animals for food, Harder notes, lab-raised meat could stave off the ongoing destruction of the Amazon because soybeans, the current leading meat substitute, is cultivated in part by soybean farmers burning vast tracts of rainforest to plant their cash crop.

Sources: NPR, Apr. 25 — Toronto Star, Apr. 24 — U.S. News and World Report, Apr. 24 — Scotsman, Apr. 24.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Mar. 17 — Related Newsline story, Mar. 3 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 18 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 11 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 4.