Warming temperatures due to climate change, pollution and overfishing put not only fish at risk, but also the diets of populations that depend on them.
“Asia itself consumes about 70% of the world’s seafood,” Palermo said. “Understanding that that’s the No. 1 protein produced and consumed — and that is also the area of the world that’s having the largest population boom — what we’re going to see is that due to overfishing and climate change, we’re running out of fish in the sea. So the only real solution that we have is alternative seafoods. Because if people continue to eat fish at the rates they are, there’s not going to be any left.
They’ll share this much: Their copy-fish are made of a mushroom root called mycelium, which is fermented and manipulated. “It is very clean-label,” Chibe said. “Our product is two ingredients and then we can add color and flavor downstream to create different species that we want to replicate.”