The new generation of veggie burgers do taste more like meat than their sawdust-leaning predecessors. And most agree that plant-based meat alternatives are a step in the right direction, considering the hefty impact that cattle have on the environment. But the Impossible Burgers and Beyond Meats of the world come with their own not-so-insignificant carbon challenges. This week on Sea Change Radio, we speak with environmental reporter Nithin Coca about his research for Vox.com on the impact of these popular plant-based meats on agricultural supply chains around the globe. We talk about the rapid growth of the market sector, take a look at how it affects the coconut oil and cacao butter industries, and, while we are at it, get a snapshot of lab grown meats, as well.

00:02 Narrator - This is Sea Change Radio, covering the shift to sustainability. I'm Alex Wise.

00:18 Nithin Coca (NC) - There's a reason it was included in the European Union's recent deforestation regulations. One of the six commodities included in that is cacao, because of the deforestation risk presented.

00:30 Narrator - The new generation of veggie burgers do taste more like meat than their sawdust-leaning predecessors. And most agree that plant-based meat alternatives are a step in the right direction, considering the hefty impact that cattle have on the environment. But the Impossible Burgers and Beyond Meats of the world come with their own not-so-insignificant carbon challenges. This week on Sea Change Radio, we speak with environmental reporter Nithin Coca about his research for Vox.com on the impact of these popular plant-based meats on agricultural supply chains around the globe. We talk about the rapid growth of the market sector, take a look at how it affects the coconut oil and cacao butter industries, and, while we are at it, get a snapshot of lab grown meats, as well.

01:49 Alex Wise (AW) - I'm joined now on Sea Change Radio by Nithin Coca. He's a freelance environmental journalist based in Japan. Nithin, welcome back to Sea Change Radio.

01:58 Nithin Coca (NC)  - It's great to be here again.

01:59 Alex Wise (AW)  - So you just submitted a piece for vox.com entitled plant burgers are way better for the planet than beef. But these two ingredients threaten tropical ecosystems, so I wanted to dive into these two ingredients in a deeper way. You really uncover the problems that go into coconut and cacao. Why don't you start at the beginning in terms of these veggie burgers, these plant-based meats and how the industry has evolved over the last few years?

02:32 NC - Happy to. So I remember when I first heard about plant based meat, I think it was at an event like five or six years ago and there was like a big marketing push by these companies, Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat, to come to these environmental and journalism conferences and kind of push this as a more sustainable alternative to normal agriculture. And it was, I think, when I was in in 2019, I was doing several reporting on coconut in Southeast Asia, looking at kind of issues that farmers are facing. And my editor at the publication at the time asked me to, like, look into what are the key companies that are using coconut oil? And I came across the fact that there are key ingredient in both beyond and Impossible Burgers and I thought that was super interesting because they're basically shifting to sourcing an ingredient that only grows in the tropics and only grows in regions where there's high levels of biodiversity and forests and I was concerned, like if plant based meat grows to the scale they want to because, you know, look at the projections, they want to expand by 10 to 20 times in just five or ten years. To rapidly displaced animal meat and hopefully and transform our food system to one that they argue is more sustainable. If that's the case, there's going to be a lot more coconut oil. And, as is covered later cacao butter is an ingredient in Beyond products.