Just trollin'
No Need To Cut Back On Red Meat? Controversial New 'Guidelines' Lead To Outrage : NPR
https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2019/09/30/765722916/no-need-to-cut-back-on-red-meat-controversial-new-guidelines-lead-to-outrage
I wonder who funded it.
Certainly not the IPCC.
#BS
Quote from: Rupert on October 06, 2019, 06:53:40 AM
Certainly not the IPCC.
I have seen a lot of pushback from the beef industry on that score lately as well. I think they don't like the overall trend. Beef consumption is at or near an all-time low since 1970 according to the Ag Econ Institute.
https://aei.ag/2018/02/19/wheres-meat-u-s-meat-consumption-continues-higher/
However, it's not all the buzz about plant-based burgers or worries about climate that are driving it. The big winner is chicken, and that (I believe) is driven by effective marketing by the poultry industry (touting lower fat, even though huge amounts of chicken is consumed breaded and fried).
I find the whole narrative about food depressing - pretty much the only criterion that ever gets discussed in the mainstream media is "Is it good for me?" All other factors in our food production and distribution system tend to be ignored.
There is the green house gas emissions too. The US standard for beef is pretty high compared to other meats. The math is quite different for grass-fed beef though. There are people advocating a specific method of grazing that can actually increase grass lands carbon uptake.
In my household the overall biggest factor is price. Chicken can be very inexpensive, sometimes less than $1 a pound.
Quote from: littleman on October 06, 2019, 05:25:36 PM
The math is quite different for grass-fed beef though. There are people advocating a specific method of grazing that can actually increase grass lands carbon uptake.
I've seen this calculated both ways. I've seen it asserted that grass-fed beef have the food in their stomachs for longer and that increases methane emissions. I've also recently saw an article reporting on a study that showed that these methods that were supposed to sequester all sorts of carbon in the soil failed to do so.
>>$1 per pound
You won't find grass-fed beef at that price though. You'll need to wait for the kids to leave the house if you want go that route!
Grass fed, range fed or Bison, I'm all for red meat. So in our war on global warming we go after cutting the fossil fuel emissions first, cows last so I don't have to eat pesky tofu exclusively for the next 20 years. By that time I'll be dead. Hhh.
https://www.economist.com/international/2019/01/19/how-chicken-became-the-rich-worlds-most-popular-meat?
Quote from: Brad on October 08, 2019, 10:15:29 AM
cows last so I don't have to eat pesky tofu
You eating beef is not the problem and you giving up beef is not the solution. Better to eat beef and support politicians of either party willing to address the problem than to stop eating beef and do nothing else.
With my tinfoil hat on, my brain tells me that it helps certain powerful interests for you to feel guilty instead of angry.
There's a lot more to say there... but I'll leave it at that.
I feel NO guilt 8)
Cardiologist Explains the Latest Red Meat Research (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxaDaSARCPU) -- video
Quote
I have attempted to be as neutral as possible. I love steak but I also love the planet. The video format is an objective analysis of the data with no personal opinions or bias until the last 2 minutes.
>cardiologist
Th3core is comprised of members who routinely ignore warnings that bacon is a known carcinogen. Do you think we're going to listen to a cardiologist whining about red meat?
Yes, bacon really is killing us The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/01/bacon-cancer-processed-meats-nitrates-nitrites-sausages
Well, the video is interesting. He says that the the lower risk is marginal, and that many other life style choices (including other diet choices) are a bigger factors.
>>Cardiologist Explains the Latest Red Meat Research
Good video and explanation of the study. I have seen similar points raised in a few different articles questioning those studies. Put down the cigarette, don't drink soda, and take a walk around the block and then enjoy your steak.
I have a LOT of thoughts on meat and probably think about it more than most. For the past week or two I have been formulating a blog post for my meat site (the focus will be something along the lines of "How I think about meat for my family") that will probably end up being a few thousand words by the time it is all done. It won't necessarily be focused on environmental or health impacts but as it plays out both of those will come into play. But the rough bullet points:
- Meat isn't bad
- Americans eat a lot of meat
- Small farms are better than big feedlots (not a grass fed vs. grain fed argument)
- Families have limited food budgets they need to make work
- Shift some of your meat budget away from grocery store meat to local farms or other small farm sources of meat
- The small farms produce a much higher quality of meat
- Eat less meat overall but eat higher quality meat
That will probably morph and change as I write but that is at least what I have in my head for now.
Quote from: Rupert on October 06, 2019, 06:53:40 AM
I wonder who funded it.
Certainly not the IPCC.
https://twitter.com/weatherchannel/status/1207003315369906176 which links to https://art19.com/shows/warming-signs/episodes/2d99d84b-afd6-4138-ae63-4ecec1b54cb6
QuoteMeatless options are popping up everywhere you look. Some are touting them as a game-changer in a warming world. Join Kait for a chat with Dr. Jason Rowntree, an agricultural expert who specializes in resilience farming. You'll want to hear his insights before you say bye-bye to burgers.
This is a link to what is actually a very good podcast by The Weather Channel. In short, a guy who studies ag carbon says that with proper grazing techniques, you can raise beef at a breakeven. Of course, that still means people need to cut back on beef consumption by a lot, since "proper" grazing technique takes a huge amount of habitat.
On the other hand, proper grazing techniques are more compatible with cattle sharing habitat, so that offsets the habitat destruction to some extent. It doesn't make up for the mass deforestation, obviously, but let's just say that very expensive grass-fed beef could be farmed sustainably at a certain level. So though we need to cut back by a lot, it's not like you couldn't enjoy a steak in a zero-carbon world.
Anyway, interesting... uh... food for thought.
>known carcinogen
But the bark sure is tasty.
>>Small farms are better than big feedlots (not a grass fed vs. grain fed argument)
Actually, based on the guy on the podcast, it's both - it's the open-pasture grazing that matters (not small or large, but pasture vs feedlot and grass vs grain) and, in particular, having enough pasture so that they do not graze it every year. That's how the bison roamed the Great Plains and sequestered a lot of carbon in the soil. It's the graze then rest then graze cycle that brings down the carbon footprint of beef.
>>carbon footprint of beef
There is a good chapter in a book I read talking about carbon sequestration and how properly managed pastureland can be carbon positive in many cases. They can also turn land that can't really be used for much else into a healthy, green pasture in just a few years.
Meat raised on these kind of ranches is easily twice as expensive as commodity beef so if people shifted their eating habits to eat more of this type of meat they would most likely eat less meat as well since they just don't have the budget for it.
>> can't really be used for much else
I think the question there is, by whom/what? This issue also comes up in the podcast. In some circumstances, grazing properly done can increase biodiversity of an area. The flip side is, again, massive habitat destruction (deforestation in South America) to make forest into pasture. That's neither good for the carbon cycle or biodiversity.
In other words, grazing traditional grasslands appears as though it can be done in ways that sequester carbon and increase biodiversity. Feedlots and grazing on what should be forest or some other habitat is, on the other hand a big issue.
>>price
Ya, that's the problem. Most of the negative impacts of beef are driven by the push to make it cheap and plentiful. To tie into that other thread, I think the sustainable version of beef consumption in the future will be that all the cheap, factory meat currently being produced by cattle, gets produced by fermentation factories etc without the intermediate step of an animal. And a small amount of high-quality, pasture-raised beef will be around as a luxury item for special occasions.
A price on carbon would even out some, maybe all, of the cost differences between factory beef and pasture beef.
>feedlots
Utah adopts cage-free law with 2025 start date | Food Safety News
https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2021/03/utah-adopts-cage-free-law-with-2025-start-date/
>feedlots
EPA Considers Tougher Regulation of Livestock Farm Pollution
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/michigan/articles/2023-01-23/epa-considers-tougher-regulation-of-livestock-farm-pollution