Chinese Consumers’ Attitudes and Potential Acceptance toward Artificial Meat

Abstract

The interest for artificial meat has recently expanded. However, from the literature, perception of artificial meat in China is not well known. A survey was thus carried out to investigate Chinese attitudes toward artificial meat. The answers of 4666 respondents concluded that 19.9% and 9.6% of them were definitely willing and unwilling to try artificial meat respectively, whereas 47.2% were not willing to eat it regularly, and 87.2% were willing to pay less for it compared to conventional meat. Finally, 52.9% of them will accept artificial meat as an alternative to conventional meat. Emotional resistance such as the perception of “absurdity or disgusting” would lead to no willingness to eat artificial meat regularly. The main concerns were related to safety and unnaturalness, but less to ethical and environmental issues as in Western countries. Nearly half of the respondents would like artificial meat to be safe, tasty, and nutritional. Whereas these expectations have low effects on willingness to try, they may induce consumers’ rejection to eat artificial meat regularly, underlying the weak relationship between wishes to try and to eat regularly. Thus, potential acceptance of artificial meat in China depends on Chinese catering culture, perception of food and traditional philosophy.

Brazilian Consumers’ Attitudes towards So-Called “Cell-Based Meat”

“…It is likely that respondents with low income hope to have access to a cheapest protein food in the future, whereas richer respondents are not willing to pay for this novel food product, despite earning more money per month. In contrast, in the study of Liu et al [35], Chinese young people, who are beginners in being economically independent, being still students, may tend to be more conservative (i.e., with lowest WTT, WTE, and WTP) towards new products, especially if the price of the new product is too high.…”

“…Moreover, younger respondents are more concerned about the ethical and environmental issues related to animal husbandry, and tend to think of "cell-based meat" in terms of their own consumption, whereas older people tend to think of it in terms of an implicit societal transition (for review: [47]). This is not the case for older Chinese respondents (>51 years of age) who are more willing to engage with "cell-based meat", unlike younger people [35].…”

“…A first approach to tackle this problem is to conduct online surveys to examine how consumers will react to "cell-based meat". Based on the consumers' perceptions and attitudes towards "cell-based meat", and their willingness to try, regularly eat, or buy it, these surveys have been conducted in different countries among various consumer groups, mainly focused on Europe [25][26][27][28] and the United States [29], but not exclusively [30][31][32][33][34][35], emphasizing that there were multiple factors influencing acceptance as well as rejection of "cell-based meat".…”

Immortalizing Cells for Human Consumption

“…The sensory experience of cultured meat may additionally be affected by certain attributes to be selected for in cell lines. Consumer surveys have found that many consumers expect cultured meat to be less tasty than conventional meat, and this perception contributes to their unwillingness to consume cultured meat [ 11 , 12 ]. The sensory experience of meat generally involves taste and aroma from the Maillard reaction and lipid oxidation reactions, color from heme proteins, and a tender, juicy texture [ 85 ].…”

“…Past research has found that consumers expect cultured meat to taste worse than conventional meat, and that taste is essential for the long-term acceptance of cultured meat [ 11 ]. Taste, nutrition, and safety have been shown in consumer studies to be important concerns for the willingness to consume cultured meat [ 11 , 12 ]. Immortal cell lines used in cultured meat should therefore be developed from cell types and species familiar to consumers and that are tasty, nutritious, and food-safe.…”