I still think meat vs not meat is the wrong approach when addressing the climate: is eating a chicken you raised on your land worse for the environment than consuming the equivalent number of calories from fruits and vegetables imported from another continent? My hunch is no. You can be an environmentally conscious omnivore or an not-so environmentally conscious herbavore. The meatiness of what you eat has absolutely nothing to do, necessarily, with your actual environmental impact.
The ethical issues of consuming animals are another can of worms.
> is eating a chicken you raised on your land worse for the environment than consuming the equivalent number of calories from fruits and vegetables imported from another continent?
Out of the universe of possible alternatives one could present, this pair seems rather carefully chosen.
I live in a temperate zone. During the colder months there are not a lot of options for local plant based foods. They are for the most part shipped long distance from somewhere else. Local animals are available year round though.
I attended year round "local food" potlucks in Indiana. People had local food available year around. During the winter it kept in cool storage (like onions), or had been frozen, dehydrated, canned, or grown in a greenhouse.
If year-round local plant-food was more of a priority for people, more could be produced.
Besides, where are the local animals getting their food during the winter? The options are basically the same: either they have local food that's been preserved or their food is getting shipped in too, making a rather inefficient way to deliver calories to humans.
I was with you until your position that animals eat the same food humans do (because if people can't find local food, how can animals?). This is very, very wrong - even in pretty bad climates where nothing edible will grow for humans it isn't impossible to raise some sort of cattle that grazes. That's more or less the point of cattle: to take a thing you cannot eat and turn it into something you can.
This isn't entirely unrelated to how many marginal ecosystems are currently being destroyed by domesticated grazing animals, which are typically invasive species that will overpopulate the area either because of lack of predators or because humans are protecting them from predators.
This maybe wasn't such a big deal centuries ago when natural forces also placed stronger limits on the size of the human populations in those areas. Nowadays, though, I think we very much have to think about the possibility that, regardless of any romantic notions about traditional ways of life, using livestock to live in places we otherwise couldn't is not something we do to respect nature, it's something we do that's destroying it.
This is the sort of black and white rhetoric that I think does not do a service to the reality involved. Of course you are correct that overgrazing is a problem, but to go from that to "using livestock to live in places we otherwise couldn't is something we do to destroy the environment" is plain wrong. I would instantly concede your point if you could moderate it to "we need to stop overdoing things", which I think is compatible with what we both see and still has merit.
Sure thing, but if you look at the first example I found regarding meat consumption by type [1], what you claim seems disconnected the reality, because only 1.1 percent of all meat consumed is lamb or mutton. And I'm sure most of it is produced in ways that pay off (that is big scale operations, same as with all the other meat on the market).
You are replying to statements I have not made. Even if what you say is technically true, I have not made any claims about percentages or majorities - I was merely pointing out a configuration of reality that exists and was not kept in mind when the person I was responding to wrote his comment.
I also don't understand why you are bringing up lamb and mutton, as those are far from the only animals you can keep in the conditions I mentioned. It's not unthinkable that you are making a point of some sort there, but without elaborating on it further the reader is left guessing.
If you read the research that indicates that climate change is conributed to by eating meat there is a very wide variation in the contribution within each industry. Most of them had a +/- of 50% based on the individual practices of the farmer, and butcher/processing plant.
It is a contrived example but also a realistic example. While there was no situation in the article I can remember where the best farming practices produced less green house gases than plant based food, it was a pretty wide spectrum.
It’s an interesting question. It’s not only how local the farm is, it’s also the type of farming practices. Not every small farm is going to farm sustainably. However, most big farms today do not farm sustainably. Farming meat at the scale demanded by consumers today means lots of derforestation and soil erosion, which means more carbon in the atmosphere. Of course, there are ranchers out their who farm sustainably — but again, exceptions to the rule.
My guess is that this level of consumption can’t be sustained, environmentally. Buying from small farms would likely be more expensive, which would in turn lead to a decrease in consumption.
> However, most big farms today do not farm sustainably
Is this true in the West though? It's not like we have a lot more forest to destroy... Soil erosion is definitely an issue, but AFAIK it primarily applies to growing plants (with e.g. artificial, fossil-carbon-based, unsustainable fertilizers), not animals.
The problem here is that a huge amount of the plants grown go towards feeding animals. [1] That’s probably one explanation for why estimates regarding the carbon impact of meat production vary widely.
Obviously it was a cherry picked example, but to me the falsity is in the claim that “if you are eating vegetables you are necessarily more environmentally conscious than those who eat meat”. There are degrees of environmental friendliness on both sides and, certainly,
I think most people would agree that most meat-eaters do not appropriately weigh the effects of their consumption. But I think the same is true of many vegetarians who just assume because they are eating vegetables they are definitely making more environmentally aware choices than all omnivores.
I have neighbors that used to raise chickens. When they went on vacation, I used to care for them for a week or so at a time. It's a lot easier than you might think. They are fairly low-maintenance, as animals go. And if you just eat eggs, it keeps things simple.
Also, the eggs were way better than anything you get from a supermarket.
Someone concerned about the environment can consider both plant-based food and more local, seasonal foods. There's no need for the two approaches to be considered at odds.
But if you care to, you can check out a ranked order of top solutions to climate change. We need to work all items on the list, not just the top ones, but you'll find "Plant-Rich Diet" as #4 on the list:
Improving transportation doesn't even show up until #25 on the list.
Consider that 3% of calories that go into beef production end up as calories that a human consumes. The practice is so inefficient that about 50% of the land in the US is devoted to grazing cows:
Imagine how much more local food we could grow across the country if we weren't so inefficiently filtering our calories through cows, adding cholesterol and saturated fat in the process.
The ethical issues of consuming animals are another can of worms.
Exit: spelling.