Reshaping Australian Food

CSIRO’s 2023 report entitled, “Reshaping Australian Food Systems”, paves the way for a ‘reset’ of food production in Australia.

According to the green zealots at CSIRO, traditional wholefoods diets are now deemed ‘unsustainable’, ‘disease prone’ and bad for the planet.

Human beings must therefore be ‘transitioned’ over to an ultra-processed diet made up of GMOs, protein alternatives and synthetic biology.

In Queensland, the government is partnering with precision fermentation food manufacturer, “Cauldron”, in developing the technology for manufacturing dairy products, using genetically engineered microbes, instead of cows.

According to Cauldron’s Founder and CEO, Michelle Stansfield:

“Australia has a unique opportunity to become a regional powerhouse in precision fermentation and unlock future breakthroughs in science, technology and medicine, in combination”.

Combining ‘Medicine’?

The partnership is regarded as a “key plank” in the government’s delivery of the state’s 10 Year Biofutures Roadmap and Action Plan, which would see biotechnology eventually takeover real food production.

According to the government’s Roadmap:

“Tools such as genome editing will allow precise genetic changes, with the potential to improve yields and quality in both crops and livestock”.

Cauldron and the Qld government are also planning to build a new commercial-scale, high tech fermentation facility – aka a Future Food Manufacturing BioHub – in the Mackay region.

The goal of this $300 million facility is to provide the large-scale ‘fermentation’ capacity Queensland needs, to produce ‘synbio dairy’ products ‘at scale’.

According to the US-Australian food tech company, ChangeFoods’, Mackay is “uniquely positioned to benefit from the shift to synthetic biology” and ‘future foods’ manufacturing, due to its proximity to the Queensland Sugar industry.

It seems the favourite feedstock of these genetically engineered “little critters” is the sugar from cane, molasses and other by-products.

There appears to be a lot of local support for the facility amongst community groups such as the Greater Whitsunday Alliance (GW3), whose CEO was reported as saying:

“the project … will position Mackay at the forefront of the global biotech industry”.

Mackay Sugar is also on board, despite its chief executive, Jannik Olejas’ admission to the ABC that: “the project would likely see a reduction in sugar exports”. Despite this, Olejas said he was still “confident” the industry would see “an economic boost and crop growth”.

Which of course is GREAT news for the Queensland Sugar Industry.

Less great, perhaps, for countries currently faced with a worldwide sugar shortage and skyrocketing sugar prices.