CRAFT builds the world’s first cultivated meat farm

The CRAFT Consortium, consisting of RespectFarms, Wageningen University & Research, Mosa Meat, Aleph Farms, Multus, Kipster, and Royal Kuijpers, has started designing and building the world’s first cultivated meat farm, paving the way for commercialization.

The project, co-funded by EIT Food, has received the first €2 million from a €4 million grant application. This pioneering initiative enables farmers to diversify their activities with cultivated meat — reducing water use by 78%, land use by 95%, and social costs by 56%. “It is important that food innovations stay as close as possible to primary food production and make use of local resources and waste streams,” says René Wijffels, Professor of Bioprocess Engineering at Wageningen University.

Mosa Meat

“This is the world’s first attempt to combine cellular and traditional agriculture, promising consumers the best of both worlds: the unmatched experience of real meat, through locally produced and sold products. The project will yield a business model that is both fundamentally new and centuries old — adding a fresh perspective to agriculture as we know it, also for farmers. Mosa Meat has been involved from the very beginning, and we are delighted to support the project with our expertise and experience in the various stages of this revolutionary technology,” says Peter Verstrate, co-founder and COO of Mosa Meat BV.

Mission

The mission of CRAFT is to integrate cultivated meat into real farms, with production led by farmers and rooted in local communities. The project will demonstrate how cultivated meat can coexist with traditional livestock farming, creating resilient and sustainable food systems. “CRAFT involves farmers in creating new ways to produce food. We use what already works in agriculture and combine it with new technology. This will accelerate the path to market and impact. CRAFT brings a global problem down to farm scale. That’s how we can solve it. And once it works, we’ll scale it up to the rest of the world to maximize impact. Let’s export technology instead of meat and animals,” says Ralf Becks, co-founder of RespectFarms.

RespectFarms Founders Ruud Zanders, Ralf Becks, Ira van Eelen and Florentine Zieglowski

Pioneering work

“This grant allows us, together with RespectFarms and our partners, to pioneer the production of cultivated meat on a farm scale. We are providing farmers with viable, resilient, and sustainable models that align with the European mission for healthier lives and fairer food systems,” says Neta Lavon, co-founder and CTO of Aleph Farms.

Ruud Zanders, co-founder of Kipster and RespectFarms and Consortium Expertise, adds: “Current consumption of animal products is not sustainable within our planet’s capacity. We therefore need to find other ways to provide our food — within the limits of the Earth, with as little impact as possible on animals, people, and the climate, and with a future for the farmer. Et voilà: the cultivated meat farm.”

Partners

Each partner contributes essential expertise to the project’s success. RespectFarms acts as system integrator and leads the on-farm implementation. Wageningen University & Research (WUR) provides scientific leadership and R&D. Mosa Meat and Aleph Farms — companies with years of experience in cultivated beef and hybrid meat innovation — contribute expertise in product development and regulatory strategy to ensure compliance and market readiness. Multus develops scalable, resource-efficient cell culture media. Kipster, a pioneer in sustainable, animal-friendly farming concepts, offers expertise in agriculture and economics.

Royal Kuijpers, a specialist in designing facilities for efficient, safe, and sustainable operations, says about the collaboration: “Together with RespectFarms, we are building a future in which food production is smarter, more sustainable, and fairer. This collaboration within CRAFT enables us to truly make a difference for generations to come.”

Finally, Cai Linton, co-founder and CEO (MEng Molecular Bioengineering), expresses pride in the key role Multus plays in CRAFT as the main partner for the development of cell culture media within a highly collaborative consortium. “CRAFT is a groundbreaking initiative that brings together leaders in agriculture and biomanufacturing to demonstrate the path toward a safe and resilient food system. Using our high-throughput robotics and AI platform, the Multus team will develop a range of novel, high-quality, and resource-efficient cell culture media to accelerate the transition from scientific breakthroughs to commercial production and real-world impact.”

www.respectfarms.com