New Zealand farmers may need to adapt to new technologies that are enabling the creation of viable alternatives to meat.
The meat-free Impossible Burger Photo: Supplied / Impossible Foods
Beef + Lamb New Zealand marketing innovation manager Lee-Ann Marsh said in as little as three years we may start seeing entirely lab-grown products on supermarket shelves.
Companies were investing large amounts of money in products like lab-grown milk, grape-free wine, and realistic substitutes to meat and fish.
These could potentially prove a real disruption to our farmers.
"I think these new technologies that can actually replicate animal proteins without the animal will be quite disruptive," Ms Marsh said.
However, farmers did not need to be too apprehensive so long as they were adaptable.
Although synthetic meat was usually mentioned in the same breath as science fiction, speakers at yesterday's conference on alternative proteins said such products were going to become common items on shopping lists soon.
Food futurist Melissa Clark Reynolds said the price of making meat alternatives was plummeting and, therefore, becoming more viable.
Ms Reynolds said New Zealand had a unique opportunity to carve out a niche market.
"I'd like New Zealand to be able to combine very high quality meat production and at the same time I'd like us to really think carefully about how we produce high quality crops that can be inputs into the alternate protein business."
Plant-derived meat alternatives are becoming more available.
The government's farming enterprise, Landcorp, which uses the brand name Pamu, is also looking at meat possibilities.
Its farming innovations manager Paul McGill said they were looking at the possibilities around mixed farm systems containing both livestock and plants.
"It's a new space but there's a lot of investment around the world going into this area and a lot of different technologies...there's definitely potential for New Zealand to diversify."