文章來源：《經(jīng)濟學人》Jul 22th 2023 期 Business 欄目 A new big cheese

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It looks like cheese. It smells like cheese. It tastes like cheese (specifically mature cheddar). And it is cheese—at least under the microscope.?“Synthetic dairy” is made with the same ingredients as the conventional sort.?But instead of getting the main ingredient from a live?ruminant, Better Dairy, a three-year-old British cheesemaker, derives some of it from?yeast.?These microbes are fed sugar, which they then convert into milk proteins in a process which is similar to brewing.

它看起來像奶酪。聞起來像奶酪。它的味道像奶酪（特別像陳年巧達干酪）。而且它就是奶酪——至少在顯微鏡下是奶酪?！昂铣扇橹破贰钡脑牧吓c傳統(tǒng)乳制品相同。但英國一家奶酪制造商 Better Dairy（3年前創(chuàng)立）并沒有從活體反芻動物身上獲取主要原料，而是從酵母中提取了部分原料。將微生物置于糖分中，然后它們將糖轉化為牛奶蛋白，這個過程類似于酒精釀造。

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Plenty of milk alternatives have hit café counters and supermarket shelves in recent years.?Plant-based?beverages?made from things like soyabeans, almonds and?oats?make up 15% of all milk sales by value in America and 11% in western Europe, reckons the Good Food Institute (GFI), a think-tank.?Yet lovers of real dairy, which plant-derived products cannot quite mimic, still need cows, goats and?ewes.?“Precision fermentation” companies like Better Dairy hope to change that—and take a fat slice of the $900bn global dairy market.

近年來，大量牛奶替代品出現(xiàn)在咖啡館柜臺和超市貨架上。智庫“優(yōu)質食品研究所” (GFI) 估計，以大豆、杏仁和燕麥等原料制成的植物奶占美國牛奶總銷量的15%，占西歐牛奶總銷量的 11%。然而，植物奶無法完全模仿真正的乳制品，牛奶愛好者們仍然需要奶牛、山羊和母羊等動物產(chǎn)的奶。Better Dairy 等“精準發(fā)酵”公司希望改變這一現(xiàn)狀，且希望在全球9000億美元的乳制品市場中分一杯羹。

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Remilk, an Israeli startup, has recently received approval to sell its?fare?in America, Israel and Singapore.?Perfect Day, a Californian one, already sells synthetic milk, ice cream and cream cheese.?It recently signed contracts to sell its proteins to Nestlé, a food giant, and to Starbucks.?In its latest funding round two years ago it raised $350m, valuing it at $1.6bn.?All told, precision fermenters have raised nearly $3bn from investors since the start of 2021.

Remilk是一家以色列初創(chuàng)公司，最近它獲得了在美國、以色列和新加坡銷售其產(chǎn)品的批準。加州一家名為Perfect Day的公司已經(jīng)開始銷售合成奶、冰淇淋和奶油奶酪。最近，該公司與食品巨頭雀巢公司和星巴克簽訂了蛋白質銷售合同。在兩年前的最新一輪融資中，它籌集了 3.5 億美元，估值達 16 億美元?？傊?021年初以來，精準發(fā)酵企業(yè)已從投資者那里籌集了近30億美元。

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Synthetic dairy?dispenses with?certain undesirable aspects of milk and milk-making.?Lactose, to which some people are allergic, and hormones, which have been linked to some adult diseases, can be stripped out.?Fermentation tanks do not need to be pumped full of antibiotics and can be set up anywhere—handy at a time of rising worries about food security and climate change.?The process uses less water and, because it requires less energy and less land, emits fewer greenhouse gases than conventional dairy production, which is responsible for more than 3% of annual planet-warming emissions, almost twice as much as aviation (and a lot of it from?belchy?cows).

合成乳制品摒棄了牛奶和牛奶制造過程中某些不可取之處。例如，可以去除乳糖和激素，因為有些人對乳糖過敏，而激素則與一些成人疾病有關。發(fā)酵罐不需要灌滿抗生素，且可以安裝在任何地方——在人們對糧食安全和氣候變化的擔憂日益加劇的今天，發(fā)酵產(chǎn)奶很方便。與傳統(tǒng)乳制品生產(chǎn)相比，精準發(fā)酵用水更少，而且由于所需的能源和土地更少，排放的溫室氣體也更少。而傳統(tǒng)乳制品所產(chǎn)生的溫室氣體排放量（其中很大一部分來自打嗝的牛）占每年全球溫室氣體排放量的 3% 以上，幾乎是航空業(yè)排放量的2倍。

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One challenge for the innovators is winning consumers’ trust. Steel tanks lack the familiarity of cows.?A quarter of respondents to a survey in America aren’t keen to try “precision-fermented” fare (which may explain why producers prefer to call it “animal-free”).?Regulators create hurdles, too. Although the startups are confident they will get the green light—the technique is already used for flavourings and insulin—they worry about the time this will take and about labelling disputes.?According to GFI, even in America, the land of free enterprise, it takes about nine months. It Europe it takes twice as long; the first products will not reach European supermarkets until 2024.

創(chuàng)新者們面臨的一個挑戰(zhàn)是如何贏得消費者的信任。相比于奶牛，消費者對發(fā)酵鋼罐更陌生。美國一項調查顯示，1/4的受訪者不太愿意嘗試“精確發(fā)酵”食品（這或許可以解釋為什么生產(chǎn)商更愿意稱其為“不含動物成分”）。監(jiān)管機構也設置了障礙。盡管初創(chuàng)公司相信他們會獲得批準——精準發(fā)酵技術已經(jīng)用于生產(chǎn)調味品和胰島素——但他們擔心獲批需要很長時間，也擔心標簽爭議。根據(jù)GFI的數(shù)據(jù)，即使在美國這片自由企業(yè)的國度，也需要9個月左右的時間才能獲批。在歐洲，則需要2倍的時間才能獲批；第一批產(chǎn)品要到 2024 年才會進入歐洲超市。

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The technology is also a work in progress.?For now Better Dairy’s cheddar still uses?bovine casein, one of the proteins in milk; the firm is working on a synthetic version that would make its cheese properly vegan.?And the process remains costly. A fermenter that can hold about 30 litres of milk can cost ￡150,000 ($190,000).?Buying a cow, which can produce about as much in a day, will set you back ￡1,600.

精準發(fā)酵技術也還在不斷發(fā)展中。目前，Better Dairy公司的巧達干酪仍然使用牛酪蛋白，這是牛奶中的蛋白質之一。該公司正在開發(fā)一種合成奶酪，以制造真正的純素奶酪。而這一工藝的成本仍然很高。一個能裝 30 升牛奶的發(fā)酵罐需要 15 萬英鎊（19 萬美元）。而購買一頭牛只需要1600英鎊，且一天可以產(chǎn)出相同數(shù)量的牛奶。