Here is my reaction. According to Andras Forgacs, bio-fabrication is a key to solve the food problem. It is said that the world’s population will reach 10 billion in the near future, and we will need 120 billion animals to maintain our population. Maintaining so many livestock has given a burden on our planet. Bio-fabrication techniques have already been used in medical field. He said that we will get meat, leather, or other animal products by bio-fabrication instead of killing animals.
Before listening to the presentation, I thought it is natural for us to kill animals to the degree of necessity of our lives. We always consume many animal products in our daily lives. So, I think bio-fabrication is a creative idea, and partly agree with him. First, bio-fabrication is a humane way. In modern society, we kill more animals than we need, and waste a lot of animal products. In addition, we sometimes breed animals in poor surroundings, and slaughter livestock in a cruel way. If bio-fabrication is introduced in our society, we don’t need to kill animals, and inflict excessive pains on animals. Second, bio-fabrication leads to environmental protection. Breeding animals needs a mass of water, grain, and land. We must cut down many forests to run a farm. Moreover, it is said that to produce one kilogram of beef needs about ten times of grains and two thousand liter of water. These things have caused damage to our environment. Therefore, bio-fabrication helps us to protect our environment.
There is, however, a cost problem. I think to introduce bio-fabrication we need high techniques and a lot of money. In developed countries, if they succeed in introducing bio-fabrication in the near future, they will solve the food problem. However, in developing countries, they don’t have a lot of money. They cannot help depending on breeding real animals. Hence, first of all, we should narrow the gap between rich and poor countries. For these reasons, I partly agree to his idea.