Farmers have produced our food for over 10,000 years. We believe they should continue to do so.
Previous technological revolutions have often had socially damaging implications. The containerization of shipping, industrialisation of fishing or closure of coal mines has hollowed out the core of areas that were almost entirely dependent on these industries. In a less hyper-localized example, the mass adoption of the motor car decimated the industries that had developed to support the horse as a mode of transport, such as blacksmiths, saddle-makers and carriage making. When not managed correctly, this can cause economic hardship for people and communities in these sectors.
The protein transition has the potential to do the exact same thing to areas that currently depend heavily on animal agriculture. Whilst the government is talking about the importance of a just transition for areas in Scotland and the North East dependent on oil and gas (making these areas the focal point of renewable energy infrastructure and carbon capture and storage), a just transition for rural economies does not appear to be high up the policy agenda.
We are not Luddites, small-mindedly resisting change. We are merely imagining how we would like the food system to look in 2050. With or without the involvement of British farmers, the protein transition is coming. If smart choices are not made today, a large portion of the global meat supply will come from a handful of billionaire-owned multi-national companies. We do not believe this would be a desirable, healthy or resilient food system. Nor would it be fair to farming communities. If Britain does not get ahead in this sector, the economic benefits will not be realised. Whilst food undoubtedly has to become more sustainable, we should not forget its importance in connecting people to land and community, and continuing the traditions of ancestors who went before us.
Our approach allows farmers to benefit from the protein transition by producing cultivated meat on farms, utilising existing assets. Low-grade agricultural land that was previously used to graze livestock would then be rewilded to generate natural capital credits. By selling both cultivated meat and natural capital credits, our dual-revenue model would help farmers increase their financial resilience, maintain their crucial role as food producers and generate ecological and environmental benefit from their land. By adopting this model, additional diversification possibilities become available for farmers, such as ecotourism or wild meat production.
Given the high up-front costs and technological complexity of producing cultivated meat, this market is likely to be too risky or challenging for farmers to enter into alone. Red Tail will thus provide upfront investment for the hardware required to produce cultivated meat and will employ a biotechnician to oversee its production. Working with the landowner to leverage their knowledge of the land, we will help develop a natural capital strategy to restore ecosystems on agriculturally unproductive land, generating carbon credits and biodiversity net gain credits.
Decentralised cultivated meat production that involves rural communities will empower farmers, revitalise the rural economy, provide more value to the consumer and facilitate substantial nature restoration. A centralised model does not guarantee that the land-savings from replacing conventional meat with cultivated meat will yield tangible ecological and environmental benefits.
By aggregating a network of smaller farms, we create a viable alternative to centralised cultivated meat production, ensuring that the benefits of this transition remain in the hands of farmers rather than large corporations. Unlike many cultivated meat companies, Red Tail is focused on democratising access to this technology and restoring nature. By selling all of the meat under the Red Tail brand, we minimise marketing and distribution costs while giving farmers a direct and fair route to market. Under our model, farmers will receive a higher price per kg of meat produced on their farm than they do via conventional animal agriculture. This scalable model ensures that farmers are the key beneficiaries of the protein transition, consumers have access to affordable, sustainable meat and rural communities are revitalised through nature-positive, carbon-positive farming.
Continue Reading - Introduction to Red Tail Part 4: Visions of a Future
