Sustainable Consumption Institute

This project explores the dynamics of innovation emerging in response to the ‘meat problem’.

As meat rises up the environmental and public health agendas a range of ‘solutions’ are being promoted by different actors both within and outside the existing system of provision.

Some of these innovations aim to improve the existing system, such as new animal breeding technologies and rearing practices. Others, such as meat reduction initiatives, insect-based products, and lab-cultured meat, entail far greater disruption to the existing relationships, interests and cultural conventions which underpin current patterns in how meat is produced and consumed. 

This project investigates the interactions between existing patterns of meat production- consumption and the social, cultural, technological and political-economic aspects of sustainable meat innovations.

These dynamics will be explored through in-depth case studies of the emergence, diffusion and embedding of different sustainable meat solutions in the UK.