Huh, I hope this becomes a part of a bigger trend. The agricultural industry, especially when it involves livestock, have been absolutely devastating to the Amazon rainforest. Since I've often...
Huh, I hope this becomes a part of a bigger trend. The agricultural industry, especially when it involves livestock, have been absolutely devastating to the Amazon rainforest.
Since I've often been told it's 'not that bad' - I want to give an easy to understand analogy in advance. Think about how much you had to eat and drink before your body became that of an adult. Now, how much actual flesh did that produce?
People think it’s not that bad because they are in denial. I know this because I lived it. I remember very clearly when those studies came out about the water usage for beef production and...
People think it’s not that bad because they are in denial. I know this because I lived it. I remember very clearly when those studies came out about the water usage for beef production and thinking it was bullshit because of the water cycle. That was long before I had heard that Saudi dairy companies had alfalfa farms in the Arizona desert siphoning away their groundwater so they could export the resulting hay to be used as food for their cows.
I think a lot of people are at least psychologically addicted to meat. And the thing about addicts is that they don’t like to hear about the damage that their fix does. They do what they can to minimize or deflect those messages.
Soy is less of a problem than animal agriculture, largely because (as your linked article mentions) most of it is used as animal feed, or as biofuel. If we were to stop eating animals, the need for soybeans would likely drop dramatically, even when considering an uptick in human consumption.
Oil palm is another problem altogether. The world has a food oil addiction and the same site you linked to also has a graph showing the meteoric rise of global oil consumption if you check their palm oil article. The thing about palm oil that is notable is that most cultures do not cook with it; its use is entirely industrial, and in particular it is used as a cheap oil in ultra processed foods. If we could also stop consuming so much palm oil somehow, it would not only stop a form of deforestation but it could be a small step towards stopping the obesity epidemic.
Huh, I hope this becomes a part of a bigger trend. The agricultural industry, especially when it involves livestock, have been absolutely devastating to the Amazon rainforest.
Since I've often been told it's 'not that bad' - I want to give an easy to understand analogy in advance. Think about how much you had to eat and drink before your body became that of an adult. Now, how much actual flesh did that produce?
Meat is incredibly inefficient. And much of the food from livestock comes from soybeans produced in the Amazon. Soybean and palm oil are a big driver of deforestation. And we need the trees now more than ever.
People think it’s not that bad because they are in denial. I know this because I lived it. I remember very clearly when those studies came out about the water usage for beef production and thinking it was bullshit because of the water cycle. That was long before I had heard that Saudi dairy companies had alfalfa farms in the Arizona desert siphoning away their groundwater so they could export the resulting hay to be used as food for their cows.
I think a lot of people are at least psychologically addicted to meat. And the thing about addicts is that they don’t like to hear about the damage that their fix does. They do what they can to minimize or deflect those messages.
Soy is less of a problem than animal agriculture, largely because (as your linked article mentions) most of it is used as animal feed, or as biofuel. If we were to stop eating animals, the need for soybeans would likely drop dramatically, even when considering an uptick in human consumption.
Oil palm is another problem altogether. The world has a food oil addiction and the same site you linked to also has a graph showing the meteoric rise of global oil consumption if you check their palm oil article. The thing about palm oil that is notable is that most cultures do not cook with it; its use is entirely industrial, and in particular it is used as a cheap oil in ultra processed foods. If we could also stop consuming so much palm oil somehow, it would not only stop a form of deforestation but it could be a small step towards stopping the obesity epidemic.
Yeah livestock is a big contributor to a lot of climate related issues. Also in the US and many other parts of the world.