The first government funded research on cultured meat took place in the Netherlands.
The Dutch government agency SenterNovem funded cultured meat research from 2005 to 2009, in part because of conversations between New Harvest founder Jason Matheny and the Dutch Minister of Agriculture in October of 2004.
In 2008, part way through the project, Dr. Carlijn Bouten had to pass on her project responsibilities. Dr. Mark Post was a part-time professor at Eindhoven Technical University at the time, and took the reins of the tissue engineering part of the project by supervising Dr. Bouten's PhD students. Motivated by the potential impact of cultured meat, Mark continued research even after the grant ended.