15 ms·

USDA: We will not steer people away from meat to protect the environment

21 points by noondip 11y ago

hugh4 11y ago
Wow, it's like there's a government department which sees its job as serving the people instead of ruling over them.
- emj 11y ago
  Because the meat worship we have today is totally a grass root movement.
  - 001sky 11y ago
    WTF they already pushed carbs for 30 years turns out cheetos and coke is a vegan diet that strategy backfired massively, tho
    - kristopolous 11y ago
      I don't understand what you are saying here. Can you clarify? Thanks.
      - 001sky 11y ago
        The last time the feds tried to influence the nations diet, it was a disaster. That disaster involved pushing macro-nutrient consumption away from meat/dairy (fat, protein) and into vegan/vegetarian (carbohydrate) sources. That should be abundantly clear, but you can google it as it is very well known in the usa, see for example this article front page WaPo this morning: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/10/06/for-decades-the-government-steered-millions-away-from-whole-milk-was-that-wrong/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/10/06/f... and for background, an left-wing politics view on usda the old food pyramid that has been discredited http://www.healthy-eating-politics.com/food-pyramid.html http://www.healthy-eating-politics.com/food-pyramid.html
        kristopolous 11y ago
        Thanks for the expansion. Interesting thoughts
        xsmasher 11y ago
        The U.S. dietary guidelines discussed in that article encourage more dairy (but low-fat, not high fat) and "Increase seafood intake by replacing some meat or poultry with seafood." The also encourage us to "Reduce intake of refined grains and replace some refined grains with whole grains." http://health.gov/dietaryguidelines/dga2010/dietaryguidelines2010.pdf http://health.gov/dietaryguidelines/dga2010/dietaryguideline... Painting them as pushing vegan/vegetarian eating or increased carb consumption doesn't match the facts.
        001sky 11y ago
        Wrong article--The food pyramid pushed corn based sweetener and other plant-basey carnohydrates grains and gluten based products at the expense of animal protein and (saturated) fat.
  - venomsnake 11y ago
    It is. Also grass fed. Tasty tasty grass fed. Meat has always been the food of the rich, of the higher classes and is damn tasty. Meat is also terrific source of proteins, fat soluble vitamins and fats.
    - noondip 11y ago
      It's also a great source of saturated fat and cholesterol. Besides, fruits, vegetables, grains and legumes have all the protein and nutrients you need, so why filter them through an animal's body?
  - hugh4 11y ago
    I'm not sure what you're saying. Perhaps if you could say what you mean instead of sarcastically saying something you don't mean, you could communicate more clearly. If you're implying that a meat-heavy diet is some kind of US government conspiracy as opposed to the sort of diet which people across many cultures and eras have gravitated towards when they were able to afford it then I think a better study of history might be in order.
    - emj 11y ago
      Thanks for the advice, it's a fairly bad trait. But then you go on say lots of things about that mirrors you rather than me. I say meatie vs. veggie is not a grass root vs. government issue, and absolutly not a thing that stems from some bad version of cultural darwinism. The meat loving of today is bad for our health, not only the environment, and to say that any culture in history has been able to afford meat production is in my view not a very accurate view on history.
ghubbard 11y ago
USDA: The United States Department of Agriculture The U.S. federal executive department responsible for developing and executing federal government policy on farming, agriculture, forestry, and food. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Agriculture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Ag...
marricks 11y ago
This is a sad day, this really should have been established... at least the discussion brought attention to the thunderous impact of animal ag on the environment, given that it produces more CO2 emissions than the combined exhaust from all transportation.[1] Also quite revealing the meat industry's objection, > The meat industry disputed the claim, and the notion that dietary guidelines ought to consider the environment. They, of course, didn't dispute the impact, just that people should even consider it in a dietary guideline. [1] http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.HTM http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.HTM
Reason077 11y ago
I always assumed that USDA was some kind of industry body set up to promote the U.S. beef industry. I'm surprised to learn that it actually has other roles!
mc32 11y ago
The USDA should advise on nutrition not on environment, likewise the EPA should advise on environment and not nutrition. So, while I eat little meat, I think they made a good call. It's not in their direct scope. At the same time, the meat producers should be reserved, one day they may find that less meat is better nutritionally and if they do find so, tell it like it is. Not sure what the WAPO is trying to imply here. It's as if they want the USDA to go outside their scope --you know, not printing newspapers might also be beneficial to the environment, WAPO, but I don't see you ditching printing out of benevolence but rather necessity as fewer people buy newspapers.
- sdenton4 11y ago
  On the contrary, the mandate of the USDA is to provide guidance and regulation relating to the meat and dairy industries. As the meat and dairy industries have definite environmental impact, they have space to make recommendations relating to the intersection of the meat industry and the environment. It's foolish to think that we should all live in tiny, proscribed silos of expertise, and simply ignore all areas which other silos might have some claim to...
  - mc32 11y ago
    That's why we have other departments of the gov't to advise on their proscribed silos of expertise. No, I think this is the right thing to do. Stick to your area of expertise. I don't want gov't departments going rogue using up resources. They should stick to their scope like nutrition, food safety, etc. They have too few food inspectors as it is.
    - PavlovsCat 11y ago
      They are sticking to their scope, actually. They're just not sticking to your baseless claim of what their scope is. http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/usda/usdahome?navid=USDA_MISSION_AREAS http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/usda/usdahome?navid=USDA_MISS... > Natural Resources and Environment ensures the health of the land through sustainable management. Its agencies work to prevent damage to natural resources and the environment, restore the resource base, and promote good land management. http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/ http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/ "going rogue, using up resources" -- doesn't apply to the USDA, does apply to meat production. And it's not like the industry just shuts up and makes meat, sticking to wasting resources that way; they also advertise and lobby, do they not?
qrendel 11y ago
There is no shortage of meat consumption in the US to the point of adverse health effects - in fact the opposite would seem to be the case. The amount of meat consumed per capita has increased around 54% since 1950 (up to something like an average of 222 lbs per person per year)[1]. There is likely a shortage of healthy vegetable consumption compared to what's been reported to reduce all-cause mortality.[2] Meanwhile beef production uses something like 160x the amount of land per calorie of crops like potatoes, wheat, rice, and around 28x that of other meats.[3] [1] http://grist.org/article/2010-03-25-corn-ethanol-meat-hfcs/ http://grist.org/article/2010-03-25-corn-ethanol-meat-hfcs/ [2] http://jech.bmj.com/content/early/2014/03/03/jech-2013-203500.full http://jech.bmj.com/content/early/2014/03/03/jech-2013-20350... [3] http://arstechnica.com/science/2014/07/among-meats-beef-has-a-beefy-environmental-footprint/ http://arstechnica.com/science/2014/07/among-meats-beef-has-...
- 001sky 11y ago
  Isn't the issue that poor people cannot afford fresh food? The calorie/dollar of veg+fruit is not a good value because in places like NYC or SF the markets are completely gentrified and the prices are astronomical. The other consideration is that the poor cannot live in nice real estate areas -- they live in grocery ghettoes. Take a look at the un-even distribution of places like trader joes around the uS and compare that to wal-mart. TJs is only in NFL metros for the most part (with upscale exceptions proving the rule). All of these public health "concerns" reeek of 1st world problems by weatlthy urban people who don't farm or have extensive familiarity with subsistence living. Remember that food stamps were created for poor white people in rural appalccia. The urban poor have completely different health concerns tied to the economics of real estate and transportation. None of this is served or in the scope of normal by the usda.
  - qopp 11y ago
    Here's the actual price data of U.S. cities compared to the midwest: http://www.bls.gov/regions/mid-atlantic/data/AverageRetailFoodAndEnergyPrices_USandMidwest_Table.htm#ro3xg01apmw.f.1 http://www.bls.gov/regions/mid-atlantic/data/AverageRetailFo...
peterwwillis 11y ago
It's possible that we could run out of food by ignoring the environment. If we overfish, there will be no more fish for the FDA to regulate. If we pollute the earth, water and air, there will be less clean earth, water and air with which to grow crops to eat. The crops are fed to the land animals we farm, too, so those are also affected. There is no government agency dedicated to making sure we have both good quality food and enough ("sustainable") food. The FDA and USDA are concerned with food safety and not availability or quality. There aren't ecosystems, there is one giant ecosystem that everything is a part of. Until the majority of our food is grown in underground caves, both the FDA and USDA should make an interest in the environment a major priority so we can have the best quality (and most abundant) food possible. But this doesn't happen. Why? Because the people with the greatest financial incentives to create food will profit more now by caring about the environment less now. Politicians don't get increased campaign funds to make sure your tomatoes are healthier for you. They get increased campaign funds to make sure the tomato seeds are copyrighted by a corporation. Fish fall through the cracks in a big way because we never needed to "grow" them before. Between 1970 and 2010, fish stocks worldwide fell to 26% of their former levels. About 70% of current worldwide fish stock is overfished or at its limit. But USDA only regulates farmed fish like catfish. The rest is handled by the U.S. Department of Commerce National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fisheries Service. The EPA in collaboration with the FDA sets limits on acceptable levels of contaminants in fish products.
thephyber 11y ago
USDA was the department that bought us the "food pyramid"[1] and somewhat controversial[2] plate[3][4] marketing campaigns. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_pyramid_%28nutrition%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_pyramid_%28nutrition%29 [2] Controversial due to the details surrounding the including the replacement of a water drink with a dairy drink placeholder. See [4] [3] http://www.webmd.com/diet/20110602/plate-replaces-pyramid-as-diet-guideline-icon http://www.webmd.com/diet/20110602/plate-replaces-pyramid-as... [4] http://friedmansprout.com/2011/10/04/harvard-vs-usda-dishing-out-controversy-over-dietary-guidelines/ http://friedmansprout.com/2011/10/04/harvard-vs-usda-dishing...
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

21 points by noondip 11y ago

hugh4 11y ago

Wow, it's like there's a government department which sees its job as serving the people instead of ruling over them.

emj 11y ago
Because the meat worship we have today is totally a grass root movement.
- 001sky 11y ago
  WTF they already pushed carbs for 30 years turns out cheetos and coke is a vegan diet that strategy backfired massively, tho
  - kristopolous 11y ago
    I don't understand what you are saying here. Can you clarify? Thanks.
    - 001sky 11y ago
      The last time the feds tried to influence the nations diet, it was a disaster. That disaster involved pushing macro-nutrient consumption away from meat/dairy (fat, protein) and into vegan/vegetarian (carbohydrate) sources. That should be abundantly clear, but you can google it as it is very well known in the usa, see for example this article front page WaPo this morning: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/10/06/for-decades-the-government-steered-millions-away-from-whole-milk-was-that-wrong/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/10/06/f... and for background, an left-wing politics view on usda the old food pyramid that has been discredited http://www.healthy-eating-politics.com/food-pyramid.html http://www.healthy-eating-politics.com/food-pyramid.html
      - kristopolous 11y ago
        Thanks for the expansion. Interesting thoughts
      - xsmasher 11y ago
        The U.S. dietary guidelines discussed in that article encourage more dairy (but low-fat, not high fat) and "Increase seafood intake by replacing some meat or poultry with seafood." The also encourage us to "Reduce intake of refined grains and replace some refined grains with whole grains." http://health.gov/dietaryguidelines/dga2010/dietaryguidelines2010.pdf http://health.gov/dietaryguidelines/dga2010/dietaryguideline... Painting them as pushing vegan/vegetarian eating or increased carb consumption doesn't match the facts.
        001sky 11y ago
        Wrong article--The food pyramid pushed corn based sweetener and other plant-basey carnohydrates grains and gluten based products at the expense of animal protein and (saturated) fat.
- venomsnake 11y ago
  It is. Also grass fed. Tasty tasty grass fed. Meat has always been the food of the rich, of the higher classes and is damn tasty. Meat is also terrific source of proteins, fat soluble vitamins and fats.
  - noondip 11y ago
    It's also a great source of saturated fat and cholesterol. Besides, fruits, vegetables, grains and legumes have all the protein and nutrients you need, so why filter them through an animal's body?
- hugh4 11y ago
  I'm not sure what you're saying. Perhaps if you could say what you mean instead of sarcastically saying something you don't mean, you could communicate more clearly. If you're implying that a meat-heavy diet is some kind of US government conspiracy as opposed to the sort of diet which people across many cultures and eras have gravitated towards when they were able to afford it then I think a better study of history might be in order.
  - emj 11y ago
    Thanks for the advice, it's a fairly bad trait. But then you go on say lots of things about that mirrors you rather than me. I say meatie vs. veggie is not a grass root vs. government issue, and absolutly not a thing that stems from some bad version of cultural darwinism. The meat loving of today is bad for our health, not only the environment, and to say that any culture in history has been able to afford meat production is in my view not a very accurate view on history.

ghubbard 11y ago

USDA: The United States Department of Agriculture The U.S. federal executive department responsible for developing and executing federal government policy on farming, agriculture, forestry, and food. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Agriculture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Ag...

marricks 11y ago

This is a sad day, this really should have been established... at least the discussion brought attention to the thunderous impact of animal ag on the environment, given that it produces more CO2 emissions than the combined exhaust from all transportation.[1] Also quite revealing the meat industry's objection, > The meat industry disputed the claim, and the notion that dietary guidelines ought to consider the environment. They, of course, didn't dispute the impact, just that people should even consider it in a dietary guideline. [1] http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.HTM http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.HTM

Reason077 11y ago

I always assumed that USDA was some kind of industry body set up to promote the U.S. beef industry. I'm surprised to learn that it actually has other roles!

mc32 11y ago

The USDA should advise on nutrition not on environment, likewise the EPA should advise on environment and not nutrition. So, while I eat little meat, I think they made a good call. It's not in their direct scope. At the same time, the meat producers should be reserved, one day they may find that less meat is better nutritionally and if they do find so, tell it like it is. Not sure what the WAPO is trying to imply here. It's as if they want the USDA to go outside their scope --you know, not printing newspapers might also be beneficial to the environment, WAPO, but I don't see you ditching printing out of benevolence but rather necessity as fewer people buy newspapers.

sdenton4 11y ago
On the contrary, the mandate of the USDA is to provide guidance and regulation relating to the meat and dairy industries. As the meat and dairy industries have definite environmental impact, they have space to make recommendations relating to the intersection of the meat industry and the environment. It's foolish to think that we should all live in tiny, proscribed silos of expertise, and simply ignore all areas which other silos might have some claim to...
- mc32 11y ago
  That's why we have other departments of the gov't to advise on their proscribed silos of expertise. No, I think this is the right thing to do. Stick to your area of expertise. I don't want gov't departments going rogue using up resources. They should stick to their scope like nutrition, food safety, etc. They have too few food inspectors as it is.
  - PavlovsCat 11y ago
    They are sticking to their scope, actually. They're just not sticking to your baseless claim of what their scope is. http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/usda/usdahome?navid=USDA_MISSION_AREAS http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/usda/usdahome?navid=USDA_MISS... > Natural Resources and Environment ensures the health of the land through sustainable management. Its agencies work to prevent damage to natural resources and the environment, restore the resource base, and promote good land management. http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/ http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/ "going rogue, using up resources" -- doesn't apply to the USDA, does apply to meat production. And it's not like the industry just shuts up and makes meat, sticking to wasting resources that way; they also advertise and lobby, do they not?

qrendel 11y ago

There is no shortage of meat consumption in the US to the point of adverse health effects - in fact the opposite would seem to be the case. The amount of meat consumed per capita has increased around 54% since 1950 (up to something like an average of 222 lbs per person per year)[1]. There is likely a shortage of healthy vegetable consumption compared to what's been reported to reduce all-cause mortality.[2] Meanwhile beef production uses something like 160x the amount of land per calorie of crops like potatoes, wheat, rice, and around 28x that of other meats.[3] [1] http://grist.org/article/2010-03-25-corn-ethanol-meat-hfcs/ http://grist.org/article/2010-03-25-corn-ethanol-meat-hfcs/ [2] http://jech.bmj.com/content/early/2014/03/03/jech-2013-203500.full http://jech.bmj.com/content/early/2014/03/03/jech-2013-20350... [3] http://arstechnica.com/science/2014/07/among-meats-beef-has-a-beefy-environmental-footprint/ http://arstechnica.com/science/2014/07/among-meats-beef-has-...

001sky 11y ago
Isn't the issue that poor people cannot afford fresh food? The calorie/dollar of veg+fruit is not a good value because in places like NYC or SF the markets are completely gentrified and the prices are astronomical. The other consideration is that the poor cannot live in nice real estate areas -- they live in grocery ghettoes. Take a look at the un-even distribution of places like trader joes around the uS and compare that to wal-mart. TJs is only in NFL metros for the most part (with upscale exceptions proving the rule). All of these public health "concerns" reeek of 1st world problems by weatlthy urban people who don't farm or have extensive familiarity with subsistence living. Remember that food stamps were created for poor white people in rural appalccia. The urban poor have completely different health concerns tied to the economics of real estate and transportation. None of this is served or in the scope of normal by the usda.
- qopp 11y ago
  Here's the actual price data of U.S. cities compared to the midwest: http://www.bls.gov/regions/mid-atlantic/data/AverageRetailFoodAndEnergyPrices_USandMidwest_Table.htm#ro3xg01apmw.f.1 http://www.bls.gov/regions/mid-atlantic/data/AverageRetailFo...

peterwwillis 11y ago

It's possible that we could run out of food by ignoring the environment. If we overfish, there will be no more fish for the FDA to regulate. If we pollute the earth, water and air, there will be less clean earth, water and air with which to grow crops to eat. The crops are fed to the land animals we farm, too, so those are also affected. There is no government agency dedicated to making sure we have both good quality food and enough ("sustainable") food. The FDA and USDA are concerned with food safety and not availability or quality. There aren't ecosystems, there is one giant ecosystem that everything is a part of. Until the majority of our food is grown in underground caves, both the FDA and USDA should make an interest in the environment a major priority so we can have the best quality (and most abundant) food possible. But this doesn't happen. Why? Because the people with the greatest financial incentives to create food will profit more now by caring about the environment less now. Politicians don't get increased campaign funds to make sure your tomatoes are healthier for you. They get increased campaign funds to make sure the tomato seeds are copyrighted by a corporation. Fish fall through the cracks in a big way because we never needed to "grow" them before. Between 1970 and 2010, fish stocks worldwide fell to 26% of their former levels. About 70% of current worldwide fish stock is overfished or at its limit. But USDA only regulates farmed fish like catfish. The rest is handled by the U.S. Department of Commerce National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fisheries Service. The EPA in collaboration with the FDA sets limits on acceptable levels of contaminants in fish products.

thephyber 11y ago

USDA was the department that bought us the "food pyramid"[1] and somewhat controversial[2] plate[3][4] marketing campaigns. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_pyramid_%28nutrition%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_pyramid_%28nutrition%29 [2] Controversial due to the details surrounding the including the replacement of a water drink with a dairy drink placeholder. See [4] [3] http://www.webmd.com/diet/20110602/plate-replaces-pyramid-as-diet-guideline-icon http://www.webmd.com/diet/20110602/plate-replaces-pyramid-as... [4] http://friedmansprout.com/2011/10/04/harvard-vs-usda-dishing-out-controversy-over-dietary-guidelines/ http://friedmansprout.com/2011/10/04/harvard-vs-usda-dishing...

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]