Another Inconvenient Truth
Researched* and Presented by Jim Hicks - July 23, 2006
Recently Al Gore was featured in a documentary film entitled "An Inconvenient Truth." Apparently the movie has enlightened many people to the very dangerous effects of global warming and many of those people have been inspired to do something to reverse this very scary situation. This is a good thing. Unfortunately Al and his friends only covered part of the story.
The way in which we feed ourselves causes at least as much damage to the environment as the colossal waste of energy associated with our automobiles. You see, 85% of all U.S. agricultural land is used in the production of animal foods and that leads to a host of ecological problems. Consider these eight facts for starters:...Jim Hicks
1. CO2. It now takes the equivalent of a gallon of gasoline to produce a pound of grain fed beef in the United States. To sustain the yearly beef requirements of an average family of four requires the consumption of over 260 gallons of fossil fuel. When that fuel is burned, it releases 2.5 tons of additional CO2 into the atmosphere...as much CO2 as the average car emits in six months of operation.
2. Methane. The 1.3 billion head of cattle in the world emit an estimated 150 trillion quarts of methane gas into the atmosphere annually, the second most significant contributor (behind CO2) to the greenhouse effect.
3. Energy. The value of raw materials consumed to produce food from livestock is greater than the value of all oil, gas and coal consumed in this country. In contrast; growing grains, vegetables, and fruits is a model of efficiency, using less than 5% of the raw material consumption as does the production of beef. As for fossil fuels, if the whole world were to eat according to U.S. agricultural practices, the planet's entire petroleum reserves would be exhausted in 13 years.
4. Water supply. The water required to produce just ten pounds of steak equals the consumption of the average household for a year. Consider that 97.5% of Montana's water goes into some form of livestock production…and we're asking people to save the environment by showering less.
5. Water Pollution. Every 24 hours, the animals destined for America's dinner tables produce 20 billion pounds of waste. That is 250,000 pounds of excrement a second, most of which ends up in our water supply. Animal wastes account for more than ten times as much water pollution as the total amount attributable to the entire human population.
6. Deforestation. An area about the size of Maine is cleared from the Amazon annually and 70% of the clearing is for cattle pasture. Being fragile, the mineral base of rain forest topsoil is exhausted after only a few short years of producing grass, and luxurious jungle degrades to desert in a wink of history. Deserts are expanding globally by 27,000 square miles per year.
7. Topsoil. The U.S. Soil Conservation Service reports that over 4 million acres of cropland are lost to erosion in this country every year; an area about the size of Connecticut. Our annual topsoil loss amounts to 7 trillion tons…that's 60,000 pounds for each member of the population. Of this staggering topsoil loss, 85% is directly associated with the raising of livestock.
8. Global Warming. Saving the best for last, according to the 2006 U.N. Report below, the raising of livestock causes 30% MORE global warming than ALL of the world's transportation combined...cars, trucks, planes, ships, trains, etc. How could our Nobel Prize winner have forgotten to mention that little tidbit?
For the latest on the environmental impact of animal foods, please take a look at the special report issued by the United Nations in November 2006. Among other things, this well-researched report states that the worldwide raising of agriculture causes considerably more global warming than all of the cars, trucks, buses, trains, ships and airplanes in the world. Take a look at my special page devoted to this topic by clicking the link below.
Special U.N. Report Published by the Food & Agricultural Organization
of the United Nations in November of 2006.
In addition to all the environmental damage, consider that some 40,000 children starve to death every day on this planet. Did you know that it takes about 1/6 of an acre to feed one human being who eats a pure vegetarian diet? How much land do you think is required to feed one person with a meat habit? About 20 times as much land...some 3.25 acres.
By cycling our grain through livestock, we not only waste 90 percent of its protein; in addition, we sadly waste 96 percent of its calories, 100% of its fiber and 100% of its carbohydrates. Think about these facts when you hear people agonizing about how we're going to feed the world when the population doubles again to about 12 billion. Then consider that the world's cattle alone, not to mention pigs and chickens, consume a quantity of food equal to the caloric needs of 8.7 billion people---nearly double the entire human population of the planet. (This was 1985 data, it is worse today).
It is all so very simple: Feed more people far more nutritious food, with no killing, less disease and a greener earth .
Sounds to me like what "the big guy" up there had in mind when he built this place called Earth.
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Our basic problem is twofold: Too many people on the planet and the unsustainable manner in which we live. And most of our problems have developed in the last 100 years. During the agricultural revolution the world's population grew from 6 million people in 8500 BC to 150 million at the time of Christ. Since then, we grew to 1 billion in the next 1800 years and grew another 5 billion over the next 200 years to the 6 billion that we have today. Two thirds of the total human population growth over the past 65,000 years has occurred in the last 75 years.
After learning the truth about nutrition four years ago, I shifted to a near vegan diet purely for health reasons. Since then, I have learned that what is best for the human body is also best for our environment…and that there are lots of reasons (besides health) for choosing a plant-based diet. We have a very serious problem on planet Earth and the few facts presented above are just the tip of the iceberg.
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*All of the "facts" contained in this article were well-researched by the authors of Mad Cowboy, Diet for a New America, and The Pleasure Trap. Summaries of these and other excellent books can be found in the BOOKS section above.
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