Singapore is the only country where cultivated meat can be purchased in a shop. Quick approvals and government support have lured several U.S., European cultivated meat firms. High cost of production, scaling up, and consumer skepticism remain challenges.   Huber’s Butchery, in Singapore’s upscale Dempsey Hill neighborhood, has long drawn shoppers looking for more than just cold cuts. Starting last month, the deli’s freezer section has stocked shredded chicken grown from cells in a lab, the first time anywhere in the world that cultivated meat can be bought in a store, its manufacturer said. Cultivated meat has been available at a handful of restaurants in Singapore and the U.S. for a couple of years. But the launch of Good Meat 3 — from California-based food technology firm Eat Just  — at Huber’s is a high point for the industry that has been in the doldrums lately. Investor interest is flagging, and cultivated meat has been banned in Italy, and in the U.S. states of Alabama and Florida. The retail launch “is more than a milestone for the company, it is also a milestone for the cultivated meat industry,” Josh Tetrick, Eat Just’s co-founder and chief executive, told Rest of World. The formulation of its new product uses just 3% cultivated chicken in order to sell at a lower price point so more people can try it, he said. “Singapore’s population has always demonstrated a remarkable openness to new technologies in food and elsewhere, making it the perfect marketplace for novel foods like cultivated meats.”   Unlike plant-based meats that have become commonplace with brands such as Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat, cultivated meat has struggled to get off the ground after an initial wave of enthusiasm. The tissue-engineering techniques behind cultivated meat have long been used in making vaccines and drugs: Animal fat and tissue are grown in a lab from cells, then processed into a variety of proteins. The obvious advantages are that it needs less land and water to produce, and can lower greenhouse gas emissions. But cultivated meat is expensive to produce and hard to scale, and has struggled to hold investor interest. The more than $3 billion put into cultivated meat worldwide over the last decade is a fraction of the investments in other technologies, such as renewable energy, which are also aimed at reducing emissions. “The biggest obstacle to cultivated meat reaching the masses … is the broad underinvestment in R&D and manufacturing infrastructure, especially from governments,” Mirte Gosker, managing director of the nonprofit Good Food Institute Asia Pacific, told Rest of World. Singapore’s foray into alternative proteins began in earnest in March 2019, with its “30 by 30” vision to sustainably produce 30% of its nutritional needs locally by 2030 — up from 10%. Alternative protein is a key part of this plan. But its strategy “goes beyond simply meeting its own domestic needs,” said Gosker.   “As a small country with limited natural resources, Singapore cannot single-handedly feed the world,” she said. “But it can serve as the place where companies from all around the world come to work with top-tier research agencies and food-tech partners to refine their formulations, eliminate inefficiencies in their manufacturing process, and explore new techniques and ingredients that could help them drive down costs.” Singapore was the first country to approve cultivated meat, with the nod for Eat Just’s chicken nuggets in December 2020. The Singapore Food Agency (SFA) recently greenlit Australia-based Vow’s cultivated quail for restaurants — the second company to receive a local license, and just the fourth globally. Later this year, SFA is expected to approve cultivated chicken and pork from French firm Vital Meat and Dutch company Meatable, respectively. There are about a dozen local alternative-protein startups in the country, and some 15 from Europe, the U.S., South Korea, Israel, and Hong Kong. While investments in other countries may be larger, “one of Singapore’s greatest strengths is the tight-knit innovation community which facilitates seamless collaboration between startups, researchers, and government agencies,” Gosker said.  The government has so far committed some $230 million towards alternative proteins — from grants to training researchers to building capabilities in bioprocessing and other complementary technologies. Singapore “invested very heavily in getting technological expertise into its government regulatory departments,” Simon Eassom, chief executive of Food Frontier, an Australia-based think tank, told Rest of World. “That means it’s able to fast-track a lot of these applications safely.” Applications only take half, or a third, of the time to process, compared to Australia or the U.S., he said. Singapore is the “perfect spot” for testing, George Peppou, co-founder and chief executive of Vow, told Rest of World. The speed of approvals is the “driving reason” why Vow launched its cultivated quail in Singapore, he said. “We have an application with the FDA, but we’re not intending to launch in the U.S. anytime soon … It’s a very expensive market to launch in, and now it’s so politically sensitive, it wouldn’t be worth the investment.” A selection of cultivated seafood products from Singapore’s Umami Bioworks, prepared for a tasting event in October 2022. Umami Bioworks The United States and Israel approved the sale of cultivated chicken and beef in June 2023 and January 2024, respectively. Australia and New Zealand are jointly assessing Vow’s cultivated quail for approval. China added cultivated meat to its five-year plan for food in 2022, while South Korea set up a regulatory framework for cultivated meat this year. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are also investing heavily. Meanwhile, Singapore’s Islamic Religious Council declared cultivated meat halal earlier this year, expanding the potential consumer base in the multiethnic country. In April, state-backed sustainable food firm Nurasa opened a food innovation center that offers food-tech startups facilities such as 100-liter bioreactors to help produce at scale. Some of Eat Just’s Good Meat 3 was produced there.     “Shared developmental resources like this can help solve specific problems in the value chain and bottlenecks that many companies share,” Mihir Pershad, who moved from the U.S. state of Maryland to Singapore, told Rest of World. Pershad’s Umami Bioworks, which makes cultivated seafood, has secured R&D grants and meetings with potential overseas customers through the Singapore government, he said.  Worldwide, there are nearly 200 cultivated meat companies. Although prices in the nascent industry have declined since the first lab-grown beef burger debuted in 2013 at a staggering $330,000, they still need to fall to under $10 per kilo — roughly a tenth of current costs — to be competitive in the mass market, estimates the Good Food Institute. Cultivated meat may reach cost parity with conventional meat by 2030, with the market worth about $25 billion by then, according to McKinsey & Company. But investor interest has flagged: The industry raised just $226 million last year, a steep fall from $922 million in 2022, according to the Good Food Institute. Several Silicon Valley startups have collapsed or shelved expansion plans. Eat Just is also under pressure in the U.S. Startups are also still finding investors: Cellivate Technologies, a Singapore company focused on cell-based solutions for the cultivated meat industry, recently beat out nearly two dozen startups in Southeast Asia to win a business reality TV show, with commitments of about $3 million from venture capital firms. “There is much more work to be done to prove that cultivated meat can be made at large scale,” said Eat Just’s Tetrick. “[But] this year, we will sell more servings of cultivated chicken than have been sold in any year prior.” As for its newest product, Huber’s Butchery is “pretty much selling most of what is supplied to us,” Andre Huber, the executive director, told Rest of World. “Response has been great.”

Kgk spirit spotted

SINGAPORE – National water agency PUB said the Newater Visitor Centre in Bedok will be closing its doors on July 31, after more than two decades of educating the public about water sustainability and welcoming more than 1.7 million local and international visitors. Officially opened in February 2003, following the completion of the first Newater plants in Bedok and Kranji, the centre offered the public a way to learn about the ultra-clean, high-grade recycled water through interactive displays, tours, exhibits and workshops. The adjacent Bedok Newater factory, the oldest Newater production plant launched in the same year, will also cease operations on July 31 upon reaching the end of its operational lifespan, said PUB on June 24.   As part of a guided tour at the Newater Visitor Centre, visitors could observe the process of Newater production at a viewing gallery in the adjoining factory. The Bedok factory will be replaced by a third Newater factory at the Changi Water Reclamation Plant, slated for completion in 2026. At its advent, Newater was hailed as a breakthrough that would help Singapore gain water self-sufficiency.     It is one of the four national taps – along with local catchments, imported water and desalinated water – that maintain a sustainable and diversified water supply.     PUB is in the midst of transitioning to a new used water management system, where used water will be transported to three water reclamation plants in the northern, western and eastern regions in Singapore via a 206km-long network of deep tunnels. PUB’s Newater factories will eventually be consolidated at the three water reclamation plants in Changi, the upcoming Tuas plant which is expected to be completed in 2026 and the redeveloped Kranji plant to be completed around 2035. Newater is primarily used for non-potable industrial and air-conditioning cooling purposes at wafer fabrication plants, industrial estates and commercial buildings.   During dry periods, Newater is added to Singapore’s reservoirs to supplement Singapore’s potable water supply. The water is then treated at waterworks here before it is supplied for domestic use. The idea of using reclaimed water to supplement the existing water supply was considered by PUB as early as the 1970s. The first Water Master Plan, drafted in 1972, outlined Singapore’s strategies for securing an adequate supply of water from local sources and exploring alternative options such as water reclamation and desalination. PUB and the then Ministry of the Environment (ENV), now the Ministry of Sustainability and the Environment, began the Singapore Water Reclamation Study – also known as the Newater Study – in 1998 to assess the viability of using Newater to supplement Singapore’s water supply. After PUB engineers found that the reliability of water treatment technologies had improved greatly and production costs had declined since the 1970s, a prototype Newater demonstration plant at the Bedok water reclamation plant was opened in May 2000. Between 2000 and 2002, Newater was put through rigorous testing to make sure it met the strictest international drinking water standards set by the World Health Organisation and the US Environmental Protection Agency. An independent panel of local and international experts reviewed the Newater study. While deeming it safe for drinking, they recommended incorporating Newater into the water supply, rather than using it directly as drinking water. Understanding that public trust was essential for Newater to be a viable source of water, PUB and the then-ENV launched a comprehensive public education exercise in 2002. The campaign included inviting grassroots leaders and MPs to the Newater demonstration plant in Bedok to better understand the Newater production process so that they could see how clean and odourless the water was and spread the message to the public. Tens of thousands drank Newater at the National Day Parade on Aug 9, 2002, after then Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong led the crowd in a toast to Singapore. ST PHOTO: JOYCE FANG Offering a strong show of support during the National Day Parade in 2002, then Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong led 60,000 people in a toast to Singapore with Newater. In 2021, then Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, in his speech at the official opening of the Keppel Marina East Desalination Plant, said that “PUB has ideas to repurpose the Bukit Timah Waterworks into a visitor centre”. When The Straits Times contacted PUB on June 24, the agency said that it is not yet ready to share any future plans for Bukit Timah Waterworks. PUB chief executive Ong Tze-Ch’in said: “Over two decades, Singaporeans young and old have made the journey to the Newater Visitor Centre to learn about how we recycle used water endlessly, allowing us to overcome our lack of natural water resources. With its closure, PUB will explore new platforms for education on our Newater story.” The centre is open for guided tours from 9am to 5pm on Tuesdays to Sundays, including public holidays, until its permanent closure on July 31. Visitors are encouraged to make bookings online at BookingSG. Editor’s note: In an earlier version of the story, we used the older name - Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources - instead of Ministry of Sustainability and the Environment. This has been corrected.

SINGAPORE – National water agency PUB said the Newater Visitor Centre in Bedok will be closing its doors on July 31, after more than two decades of educating the public about water sustainability and welcoming more than 1.7 million local and international visitors. Officially opened in February 2003, following the completion of the first Newater plants in Bedok and Kranji, the centre offered the public a way to learn about the ultra-clean, high-grade recycled water through interactive displays, tours, exhibits and workshops. The adjacent Bedok Newater factory, the oldest Newater production plant launched in the same year, will also cease operations on July 31 upon reaching the end of its operational lifespan, said PUB on June 24.   As part of a guided tour at the Newater Visitor Centre, visitors could observe the process of Newater production at a viewing gallery in the adjoining factory. The Bedok factory will be replaced by a third Newater factory at the Changi Water Reclamation Plant, slated for completion in 2026. At its advent, Newater was hailed as a breakthrough that would help Singapore gain water self-sufficiency.     It is one of the four national taps – along with local catchments, imported water and desalinated water – that maintain a sustainable and diversified water supply.     PUB is in the midst of transitioning to a new used water management system, where used water will be transported to three water reclamation plants in the northern, western and eastern regions in Singapore via a 206km-long network of deep tunnels. PUB’s Newater factories will eventually be consolidated at the three water reclamation plants in Changi, the upcoming Tuas plant which is expected to be completed in 2026 and the redeveloped Kranji plant to be completed around 2035. Newater is primarily used for non-potable industrial and air-conditioning cooling purposes at wafer fabrication plants, industrial estates and commercial buildings.   During dry periods, Newater is added to Singapore’s reservoirs to supplement Singapore’s potable water supply. The water is then treated at waterworks here before it is supplied for domestic use. The idea of using reclaimed water to supplement the existing water supply was considered by PUB as early as the 1970s. The first Water Master Plan, drafted in 1972, outlined Singapore’s strategies for securing an adequate supply of water from local sources and exploring alternative options such as water reclamation and desalination. PUB and the then Ministry of the Environment (ENV), now the Ministry of Sustainability and the Environment, began the Singapore Water Reclamation Study – also known as the Newater Study – in 1998 to assess the viability of using Newater to supplement Singapore’s water supply. After PUB engineers found that the reliability of water treatment technologies had improved greatly and production costs had declined since the 1970s, a prototype Newater demonstration plant at the Bedok water reclamation plant was opened in May 2000. Between 2000 and 2002, Newater was put through rigorous testing to make sure it met the strictest international drinking water standards set by the World Health Organisation and the US Environmental Protection Agency. An independent panel of local and international experts reviewed the Newater study. While deeming it safe for drinking, they recommended incorporating Newater into the water supply, rather than using it directly as drinking water. Understanding that public trust was essential for Newater to be a viable source of water, PUB and the then-ENV launched a comprehensive public education exercise in 2002. The campaign included inviting grassroots leaders and MPs to the Newater demonstration plant in Bedok to better understand the Newater production process so that they could see how clean and odourless the water was and spread the message to the public. Tens of thousands drank Newater at the National Day Parade on Aug 9, 2002, after then Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong led the crowd in a toast to Singapore. ST PHOTO: JOYCE FANG Offering a strong show of support during the National Day Parade in 2002, then Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong led 60,000 people in a toast to Singapore with Newater. In 2021, then Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, in his speech at the official opening of the Keppel Marina East Desalination Plant, said that “PUB has ideas to repurpose the Bukit Timah Waterworks into a visitor centre”. When The Straits Times contacted PUB on June 24, the agency said that it is not yet ready to share any future plans for Bukit Timah Waterworks. PUB chief executive Ong Tze-Ch’in said: “Over two decades, Singaporeans young and old have made the journey to the Newater Visitor Centre to learn about how we recycle used water endlessly, allowing us to overcome our lack of natural water resources. With its closure, PUB will explore new platforms for education on our Newater story.” The centre is open for guided tours from 9am to 5pm on Tuesdays to Sundays, including public holidays, until its permanent closure on July 31. Visitors are encouraged to make bookings online at BookingSG. Editor’s note: In an earlier version of the story, we used the older name - Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources - instead of Ministry of Sustainability and the Environment. This has been corrected.