RALEIGH, N.C.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 31, 2024--
Believer Meats, a leader in the cultivated meat industry, announced today its partnership with the Bezos Center for Sustainable Protein at North Carolina State University (NC State). Established through a $30 million award from the Bezos Earth Fund, the center aims to advance alternative protein production and commercialization to address the projected global protein supply gap in the coming decades.
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“At Believer Meats, we are on a mission to make it possible for all future generations to eat meat. We are doing this not only through great product development, but also by focusing on the core fundamentals that ensure a lasting business," said Gustavo Burger, CEO of Believer Meats. “The Bezos Earth Fund grant is a testament to the great work being done in North Carolina and reinforces our decision to locate here. We are excited to partner with the center to contribute our innovative, real-world solutions to meet the increasing demand for protein and nutrition.”
Bezos Earth Fund’s investment strengthens North Carolina’s position as an emerging world-leader for the alternative protein industry, anchored by Believer Meats’ first-of-its-kind commercial-scale production facility in Wilson, N.C., which is set to be operational by the end of 2024. The factory will have a capacity to produce over 26 million pounds of cultivated meat annually once fully operational. Featuring a state-of-the-art innovation center and tasting kitchen, the 200,000 sq. ft. facility will create up to 100 new jobs in food production, food science, and more.
“Innovation alone cannot solve our global nutrition needs in the future. We need to ensure that innovation reaches the market,” said Andy Jarvis, Director of the Future of Food at The Bezos Earth Fund. “With NC State and their industry partners like Believer Meats, we see a path to take great products from discovery to commercialization. We’re excited to partner with them to create a future abundant with nutritious and sustainable proteins.”
The Bezos Center for Sustainable Protein at NC State will unite academia, industry, chefs, and policymakers to develop and commercialize advanced protein manufacturing such as cultivated meat, plant-based products, and precision fermentation. The center will form part of an international network of alternative protein centers supported through the Bezos Earth Fund’s Future of Food program.
“Creating alternative protein products that are delicious, appealing, and affordable for consumers is critical if we are going to solve the future demands on our food supply,” said Bill Aimutis, Executive Director of NC Food Innovation Lab (NCFIL) and co-director of the new center. “The partnership between our center and Believer Meats presents a truly unique opportunity to help diversify our food supply and supplement animal proteins, giving consumers more choice.”
The center will complement North Carolina’s deep-rooted history in agriculture and bioscience innovation, and its supportive business environment.
“The creation of the Research Triangle as a life science powerhouse was made possible by the vision of our business and political leaders,” said Ryan Combs, Executive Director at the Research Triangle Regional Partnership. “The emergence of the alternative protein ecosystem is a logical, adjacent industry that builds on many of the same type of talent. I believe it’s a great complement to our state’s agricultural tradition and positions us as a natural leader in the alternative protein industry.”
About Believer Meats
Believer Meats is a cultivated meat company pioneering the first scalable cultivated meat production system that can feed the world. Based in Chicago, Believer's mission is to ensure that future generations can enjoy the meat we know and love. Believer is building a better future for people, animals and the planet with meat that is delicious, sustainable, nutritious, and broadly accessible. For more information, visit us at believermeats.com.
(Left to right) Ryan Combs, Executive Director of Research Triangle Regional Partnership; Gustavo Burger, CEO of Believer Meats; Bill Aimutis, Executive Director of NC Food Innovation Lab (NCFIL) and Co-Director of the Bezos Center for Sustainable Protein at North Carolina State University; and Andy Jarvis, Director of the Future of Food at The Bezos Earth Fund. (Photo: Business Wire)
BRUSSELS (AP) — Pope Francis promised Saturday to “offer all the help we can” to aid clergy sexual abuse victims, after a group of Belgian survivors told him first-hand of the trauma that had shattered their lives and left many in poverty and mental misery.
Francis’ visit to Belgium has been dominated by the abuse scandal, with King Philippe and Prime Minister Alexander De Croo both blasting the Catholic Church’s dreadful legacy of priests raping and molesting children and its decades-long cover-up of the crimes.
Francis met for more than two hours late Friday with 17 survivors who are seeking reparations from the church for the trauma they suffered and to pay for the therapy many need. They said they gave Francis a month to consider their requests, which the Vatican said Francis was studying.
“There are so many victims. There are also so many victims who are still completely broke,” survivor Koen Van Sumere told The Associated Press. “I have also been lucky enough to get a diploma and build a life for myself. But there are so many people who are completely broke and who need help and who cannot afford it and who really need urgent help now.”
Van Sumere said he was encouraged by the “positive” meeting with the pope, but was waiting to see what comes of it. The meeting itself was intense, victims said, “It was at certain moments very emotional and at certain moments it was very rough. When the pope was told things he did not agree with, he also let it be known so there was real interaction," Van Sumere said.
He said he hoped as a first step that the pope would receive the victims at the Vatican in the spring during Holy Week. “And then we can not only celebrate the resurrection of Christ but perhaps also the resurrection of all victims in Belgium,” he said.
On Saturday, during a meeting with Belgian clergy and nuns at the Koekelberg Basilica, Francis acknowledged that the abuse scandal had created “atrocious suffering and wounds,” and undermined the faith.
“There is a need for a great deal of mercy to keep us from hardening our hearts before the suffering of victims so that we can help them feel our closeness and offer all the help we can,” he said.
He said the Belgian church must learn from victims and serve them. “Indeed, one of the roots of violence stems from the abuse of power when we use the positions we have to crush or manipulate others,” he said.
Francis has met with victims in the United States, Ireland and Canada, as well as in multiple occasions at the Vatican. He has cracked down on some bishops who failed to protect their flocks by passing new church rules on investigations and punishments. But the scandal has continued to fester, and Francis' record is uneven, with several high-profile cases still pending or seemingly ignored.
Most galling to Belgians was that it took the Vatican 14 years to laicize Bruges Bishop Roger Vangheluwe, who admitted in 2010 to having abused his nephew for 13 years. Francis defrocked him in March in a move widely seen as attempting to remove a problem before his visit.
After the encounter, Francis went to the royal crypt in the Church of Our Lady to pray at the tomb of King Baudouin, best known for having refused to give a parliament-approved bill legalizing abortion his royal assent, one of his constitutional duties.
Baudouin stepped down for one day in 1990 to allow the government to pass the law, which he was required to sign, before he was reinstated as king.
Francis praised Baudouin's courage when he decided to “leave his position as king to not sign a homicidal law,” according to the Vatican summary of the private encounter, which was attended by Baudouin's nephew, King Philippe, and Queen Mathilde.
The pope then referred to a new legislative proposal to extend the legal limit for an abortion in Belgium, from 12 weeks to 18 weeks after conception. The bill failed at the last minute because parties in government negotiations considered the timing inopportune.
Francis urged Belgians to look to Baudouin’s example in preventing such a law, and added that he hoped Baudouin’s beatification cause would move ahead, the Vatican said.
With the visit, Francis waded straight into Belgian politics and dragged the royal family along with him.
The royals are bound by strict neutrality and the palace immediately issued a statement distancing itself from the visit. The statement said the “spontaneous visit, on the pope’s request, was not part of the official program” and added the king and queen were there only “out of hospitality toward the pope."
Francis started the day by having breakfast — coffee and croissants — with a group of 10 homeless people and migrants who are looked after by the St. Gilles parish of Brussels.
They sat around a table at the entrance of the parish church and told him their stories, and gave him bottles of beer that the parish makes, “La Biche de Saint-Gilles.” The proceeds of the beer sales help fund the parish’s charity works.
Francis thanked them for the beer and breakfast and told them that the church’s true wealth was in caring for the weakest.
“If we want to truly know and show the church’s beauty, we should give to one another like this, in our smallness, in our poverty, without pretexts and with much love.”
The breakfast encounter was presided over by Marie-Françoise Boveroulle, an adjunct episcopal vicar for the diocese. The position is usually filled by a priest, but Boveroulle’s appointment has been highlighted as evidence of the roles that women can and should play in the church.
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Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
Pope Francis have a breakfast together with people who are experiencing homelessness and are assisted by the parish church of St. Gilles in Brussels, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Francis have a breakfast together with people who are experiencing homelessness and are assisted by the parish church of St. Gilles in Brussels, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Francis have a breakfast together with people who are experiencing homelessness and are assisted by the parish church of St. Gilles in Brussels, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Francis have a breakfast together with people who are experiencing homelessness and are assisted by the parish church of St. Gilles in Brussels, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
A priest waits attends meeting of Pope Francis with bishops, deacons, and religious people in Koekelberg Basilica of the Sacred Heart, in Koekelberg, Belgium, Saturday Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)
Nuns attend a meeting of Pope Francis with bishops, deacons, and religious people in Koekelberg Basilica of the Sacred Heart, in Koekelberg, Belgium, Saturday Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)
Pope Francis arrives at a meeting with bishops, deacons, and religious people in Koekelberg Basilica of the Sacred Heart, Belgium, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Faithful gather in the Koekelberg Basilica of the Sacred Heart during the meeting of Pope Francis with bishops, deacons, and religious people, in Brussels, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Francis attends a meeting with bishops, deacons, and religious people in Koekelberg Basilica of the Sacred Heart, in Brussels, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Francis arrives for a meeting with bishops, deacons, and religious people in Koekelberg Basilica of the Sacred Heart, in Koekelberg, Belgium, Saturday Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)
