David Pimentel of Cornell University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences says that the grain currently fed to some seven billion livestock in the United States could feed nearly 800 million people directly.
Image: Digital Vision/Thinkstock
-
The Best Science Writing Online 2012
Showcasing more than fifty of the most provocative, original, and significant online essays from 2011, The Best Science Writing Online 2012 will change the way...
Read More »
Dear EarthTalk: I heard that the less meat one eats, the better it is for the environment. How so?
-- Jason K., Sarasota, FL
Our meat consumption habits take a serious toll on the environment. According to the Environmental Working Group (EWG), the production, processing and distribution of meat requires huge outlays of pesticides, fertilizer, fuel, feed and water while releasing greenhouse gases, manure and a range of toxic chemicals into our air and water. A lifecycle analysis conducted by EWG that took into account the production and distribution of 20 common agricultural products found that red meat such as beef and lamb is responsible for 10 to 40 times as many greenhouse gas emissions as common vegetables and grains.
Livestock are typically fed corn, soybean meal and other grains which have to first be grown using large amounts of fertilizer, fuel, pesticides, water and land. EWG estimates that growing livestock feed in the U.S. alone requires 167 million pounds of pesticides and 17 billion pounds of nitrogen fertilizer each year across some 149 million acres of cropland. The process generates copious amounts of nitrous oxide, a greenhouse gas 300 times more potent than carbon dioxide, while the output of methane—another potent greenhouse gas—from cattle is estimated to generate some 20 percent of overall U.S. methane emissions.
“If all the grain currently fed to livestock in the United States were consumed directly by people, the number of people who could be fed would be nearly 800 million,” reports ecologist David Pimentel of Cornell University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. He adds that the seven billion livestock in the U.S. consume five times as much grain as is consumed directly by the entire U.S. population.
Our meat consumption habits also cause other environmental problems. A 2009 study found that four-fifths of the deforestation across the Amazon rainforest could be linked to cattle ranching. And the water pollution from factory farms (also called concentrated animal feeding operations or CAFOs)—whereby pigs and other livestock are contained in tight quarters—can produce as much sewage waste as a small city, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). Further, the widespread use of antibiotics to keep livestock healthy on those overcrowded CAFOs has led to the development of antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria that threaten human health and the environment in their own right.
Eating too much meat is no good for our health, with overindulgence linked to increasing rates of heart disease, cancer and obesity. Worldwide, between 1971 and 2010, production of meat tripled to around 600 billion pounds while global population grew by 81 percent, meaning that we are eating a lot more meat than our grandparents. Researchers extrapolate that global meat production will double by 2050 to about 1.2 trillion pounds a year, putting further pressure on the environment and human health.
For those who can’t give up meat fully, cutting back goes a long way toward helping the environment, as does choosing meat and dairy products from organic, pasture-raised, grass-fed animals. “Ultimately, we need better policies and stronger regulations to reduce the environmental impacts of livestock production,” says EWG’s Kari Hammerschlag “But personal shifting of diets is an important step.”
CONTACTS: EWG, www.ewg.org; David Pimentel, www.vivo.cornell.edu/entity?home=1&id=5774; NRDC, www.nrdc.org.
EarthTalk® is written and edited by Roddy Scheer and Doug Moss and is a registered trademark of E - The Environmental Magazine (www.emagazine.com). Send questions to: earthtalk@emagazine.com. Subscribe:www.emagazine.com/subscribe. Free Trial Issue: www.emagazine.com/trial.
See what we're tweeting about
18 Comments
Add CommentI'm not sure that we are comparing apples to apples here. Humans aren't just engines that take in any energy and value it equally with any other energy source. Grain and meat do not provide the same vitamins, minerals and fats.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPeople can be very healthy on a vegan diet but this requires supplements and careful planning.
A vegetarian diet that includes eggs and dairy requires raising some of the same domestic animals we are talking about eliminating. In that case, cutting back seems a better solution than cutting out all together.
Fish, while a wonderful source of certain types of healthy fats is also higher in mercury and has its own impact on the environment whether fished or farmed.
I think a more helpful article would be one that compared the impact of all parts of a balanced diet with all parts of another heathy diet, not grains to meat or some other subset of the diet.
MissMarnie makes some good points, all food mass is not created equal. I would like to see how much grain it takes to make those 600 billion pounds of meat, and could feed 800 million people.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow many people can 600 billion pounds of meat feed?
My guess:
600,000,000,000 pounds of meat / 800,000,000 people
= 750 pounds per person. Not a full years worth of sustenance for first world adults, but still a lot of food.
This answer to a perfectly valid question relies on doctored data. As it says, "Livestock are typically fed corn, soybean meal and other grains which have to first be grown using large amounts of fertilizer, fuel, pesticides, water and land." If that livestock were raised in the traditional manner on grass the fertilizer, fuel, pesticides and irrigation water would be unnecessary. Additionally corn, soybeans and other grains are grown in monocultures. Should those crops be fed to people, they would still be monocultures--environmental deserts themselves. On the other hand, if the crop lands were returned to pasture, the thousands of species and billions of individual animals would return vastly improving the environment and absorbing carbon dioxide.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTraditionally raised meat is far bette for the environment than any vegetarian diet. And it's better for people, too, because the probability is very high that our current obesity epidemic is caused by the very high carbohydrate diet we would have to consume to use up the corn, soybean meal and other grains.
Vegetarianism is a cult.
Another point to add, according to a 2008 congressional report:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL34080.pdf (pdf link)
<blockquote>China is now the third largest source of U.S. agricultural and seafood imports.</blockquote>
It goes on to say:
<blockquote>In 2005, nearly 15% of the overall volume of U.S. food consumption was imported, compared with 11%-12% in 1995. The proportions (volume) for some food product categories were much higher: in 2005 as much as 84% of all U.S. fish and shellfish was imported (55% in 1995); 43% of all noncitrus fresh fruits (34% in 1995); 37% of all processed fruits (20% in 1995); and 54% of all tree nuts (40% in 1995).</blockquote>
So while we are considering the impact of the production of food we should also be considering the impact of shipping and refrigerating food that is traveling halfway around the world. Is it more harmful to eat a balanced omnivorous diet sourced locally (something I try to do) or is it better to eat no meat but buy food that is produced abroad? What about areas that don't have much in the way of viable agriculture or which is conducive to raising animals but less conducive to raising crops that humans routinely eat?
Like most things in life, if there appears to be one easy answer, you may not be asking the right question.
Your final sentence shows your true colors. It's so sad to see industry shills swarm to stories such as this one. Rather than provide an educated response, it's easier to say vegetarians are part of a "cult". I suppose that would make the overwhelmingly obese people of this country "normal" while they pig out on far more meat than their forefathers.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's laughable for you to insinuate that vegetable and grain crops HAVE to be monocultures. You know that is not true and are disingenuous to imply otherwise. Without promoting vegetarianism, I think it would be wise for society to reduce their meat consumption and purchase meat products from animals allowed to graze in pastures instead of the ones raised unnaturally on intense factory farms.
"Livestock are typically fed corn, soybean meal and other grains which have to first be grown using large amounts of fertilizer, fuel, pesticides, water and land."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat a sweeping statement! Maybe in the US. Here in Australia, the majority of our cattle are fed grass with litlle or no requirement for pesticdes or fertilizer. Grass fed beef is so much better than grain fed beef in so many ways. It's better for the environment it has much more flavour and is not riddled with fat, so it's better for you as well. Real farms still exist.
The guy who wrote FIT FOR LIFE, Harvey Diamond, once wrote a book on this subject called YOUR HEART-YOUR PLANET. One of the most eye-opening, mind blowing books I've ever read. Right on par with John Robbins. A must read if this subject captures your interest.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWow!! If stupid was money you could buy and sell Bill Gates with your pocket change. I truly never thought ANYONE could say something so totally WRONG WRONG WRONG as "Traditionally raised meat is far better for the environment than any vegetarian diet." Yeah, and cigarette smoking is far better for your lungs than fresh, mountain air.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is sloppy. Actually, chicken - small animals - are probably better for the environment than dairy. The milk in dairy comes from cows, and cows are hard on the environment and contribute to global warming. I'm not sure about the eggs part of dairy.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSee for example, "Diet, Energy and Global Warming" at http://pge.uchicago.edu/workshop/documents/martin1.pdf
So a vegetarian who uses a lot of milk might be more energy-intensive than someone who hates milk but eats only chicken. Vegans really do have a less energy-intensive diet, on average.
Probably small animals like rabbits are similarly less energy-intensive.
If this and if that, the report is based on what we actually do today, not what we could be doing instead.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this95%+ of our red meat does not come from a grass pasture fed cow, it comes out of a factory that no one would confuse with a real "farm" if you were to ever see one.
Rent the movie Food Inc. you will never eat meat again, or at least not for a long time.
I certainly won't give up or even cut back on eating meat. I would be ecstatic though, if grass fed beef and free range chicken was more widely available at a competitive price. The only way for this to happen is for the FDA to go after the food industry. If you haven't watched watch Food, Inc. you really should. It brings light as to how the food industry controls farmers, forcing them away from traditional farming.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNonhuman animal rights will hopefully be the biggest step in the progress of ethics since the end of slavery in the western world. Going vegan is not too difficult, it only requires eating enough (as with any diet) & a multivitamin (which is doctor-recommended for any diet anyway)... it means not eating fast food (utter junk) & that is worth doing. It's worth being vegan for the would-be victim animals, for user health & for the environment... grocery stores are have many great vegan options these days (it's not all about tofu!).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"...acquiring two cats may have led to my shrinking consumption of meat..." see New SSPP Blog Post from Sustainability: Science, Practice, & Policy "Cats, Crickets, Cows, and Pigs "
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://ssppjournal.blogspot.com/2012/01/cats-crickets-cows-and-pigs.html
Vegetarianism is NOT a cult; it is , thanks to our evolutionary conditioning, our species-specific correct, natural, feeding formula, as the WHO and many health authorities have stressed umpteen times. Leading American academics, like Professor Colin Campbell, with his landmark research work: The China Study, and Dr. Colin Barnard, founder of the Physicians' Committee for Responsible Medicine, have shown the role diet plays in human health, and the main culprit is meat-irrespective of whether the meat comes from feedlots or not : Australians have one of the highest colon & bowel cancers, as well as breast & prostate cancer rates in the world, along with the highest meat-consuming other nations: New Zealand, U.S.A., Argentina....Many of our old close friends and family members are suffering from cancer, heart disease, arthritis, osteoporosis & diabetes, all of them habitual meat eaters! And yet,due to the intense lobbying of the meat industries, health warnings seem to fall mostly on deaf ears; is is almost as if daily meat consumption were a masculine cult object, ever since Neandertal times, when Man the Hunter had survived the Ice Ages with meat as the only available emergency food, for want of abundant plant food.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEating as much antioxidant- rich raw plant food is the only long-term solution to minimise environmental pollution. Let's begin with our closest environment, our own bodies, by eating more and more solar power food, as in raw fruits and vegetables.
It's easy, energy-saving and liberating! Youthevity.com
One caveat to vegetarian instead of vegan food. Animal protein, particularly cow milk protein, binds with all the healing antioxidants and renders them USELESS to our body! It's so easy and healthier to be vegan!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy would someone choose to be vegan? Here are two uplifting videos to help everyone understand why so many people are making this life affirming choice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKr4HZ7ukSE and http://www.veganvideo.org
To say that vegetarianism is a cult is inaccurate and foolish. I have been a vegetarian for 28 years and I belong to no cults. I used to be a Roman Catholic, however.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt appears many of those commenting here are missing the point of the article. The point is that scientists using objective data have concluded that meat production is depleting our resources and polluting our environment faster than non-meat food production. (Note the word "Scientific" in "Scientific American.") The article quotes several science groups, including the Environmental Working Group, a group of scientists who accumulate environmental data and statistics for a living. I would trust this data before I would trust some opinionated commenter trying to justify their personal diet preferences.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA vegan diet does not require supplements. At all. None. Any new diet requires careful thought. The American Dietetic Association (not a liberal organization), the World Health Organization, the United Nations, the Physicians' Committee for Responsible Medicine, Harvard Medical School, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (the oldest and foremost authority on diet and nutrition in the U.S.) and the American Academy of Pediatrics (the latter two especially endorsing a vegan diet for children as the healthiest) -- these all find that an entirely plant-based diet is the optimal diet for the human being. No supplements required. Just education.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is a reason why Olympic athletes are turning in droves toward a vegan diet. It works. It's healthy. And it provides a profound sense of both physical and moral well-being.