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Eating one-fifth less beef could halve deforestation
- raarts 4y ago'Could' being the operative word here.
- downrightmike 4y agoBrazil is burning down rainforest to graze cattle and grow soybeans for that cattle, which is then sold to Mcdonalds and burger king among others.
- abernard1 4y agoIndeed. And this is because lumber export bans made them unable to trade extremely precious resources like Mahogany. So they did the obvious thing that any impoverished, developing country would do and burned it down for farmland and agriculture. This article could be entitled: "Unintended consequences: why UN export bans are the key driver of deforestation for the last 50 years."
- sebular 4y agoIf they could export mahogany, then they’d be cutting the rainforest down to export mahogany. What is your point?
- yywwbbn 4y agoThere is a chance they might replant them so that they could harvest it again in 30-50 years while a switch to farmland is pretty permanent.
- hcarvalhoalves 4y agoWrong. This is happening at alarming rates now due to corrupt government cutting investment on policing the forests and signaling that environmental criminals won’t be prosecuted. Brazil was just as poor 10 and 20 years ago and deforestation levels weren’t as high.
- micromacrofoot 4y agoin april they cleared more rainforest than any other month over the past 7 years (that’s when they started tracking)
- PolygonSheep 4y agoHow much Brazilian beef is in a US Big Mac/Whopper?
- mytailorisrich 4y agoI think this has to be balanced with the increased meat demand that follows economic development and poverty reduction. IMHO, 10 billion people with 'developed country' living standards simply does not work.
- rantallion 4y agoBeing an inhabitant of a developed country doesn't mean you must eat beef. We can all eat less, no matter our location.
- jerlam 4y agoBeef consumption doesn't appear directly tied to development. According to https://sentientmedia.org/beef-consumption-in-the-us/ https://sentientmedia.org/beef-consumption-in-the-us/, beef consumption has been falling in the US since the 1970s. Even so, the US is only second in consumption per capita for all countries, behind Argentina.
- mytailorisrich 4y agoThere is a correlation between economic development and meat consumption. Meat consumption increased in the West along with economic development and the same is happening worldwide. The US was developed in the 70s. You would need to look at trends from poor and undeveloped to developed. In the US you would need to rewind to early 20th or 19th century to post-WWII golden age to see the increase. https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/cf68bf79-en/index.html?itemId=/content/component/cf68bf79-en#:~:text=Growth%20in%20global%20consumption%20of,by%20income%20and%20population%20growth https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/cf68bf79-en/index.html?i....
- jka 4y agoWithin the U.S. today, do you feel that the most economically-advantaged social groups are increasing or decreasing their meat and beef consumption? And any reasons why if so? (diet, health, politics, ...)
- throw82473751 4y agoCrazy, because actually most people could just eat one-fifth of their current beef consumption and still eat more beef then their ancestors..
- landemva 4y agoMost in north America could eat one-fifth less of their current everything consumption and still eat more than their ancestors.
- IronWolve 4y agoNo worries, eating all that plant based meat! Problem solved.
- ricardobeat 4y agoOr replace one in five meals with a vegetable dish. Then we can skip the whole factory processing and additives to make it feel like meat.
- dumpsterdiver 4y agoFor me that’s a veggie sandwich from Jersey Mikes done “Mike’s way”. With a Tex-Mex heavy diet, a light veggie sandwich with a splash of vinegar hits the spot more than you might guess.
- usrn 4y ago
- fknorangesite 4y ago
- qiskit 4y agoFYI, if ribeyes are out of your price range, chuck steaks are a decent cost effective replacement. Everyone, poor or rich, has a right to a nice juicy steak.
- usrn 4y ago
- 999900000999 4y agoI think it's easier to pitch the health benefits of eating less animal gunk. I've noticed whenever I pig out on dairy I feel really really bad like 2 hours later. It's at a point where I try to avoid most milk, pizza is temping though. Historically meat was way to expensive to consume 3 or 4 times a day. You can see the health effects in real time, countries get "richer", fatter and sicker. Theirs a strong biological impluse to eat stuffed crust Pizza with chocolate on top. For most of human history this would of ether been absurdly expensive or impossible. So yea it tastes good. I really do wish we talked more about diet. Bad diets are behind most health issues, and I'd imagine this includes mental health as well. You feel like crap after eating chemically enhanced chicken, then you eat more chemicals. Your body, in a violent rebellion refuses to act right. Once I had the self control to go vegan for a week. It felt like the first time I had Red Bull.
- acchow 4y ago> Theirs a strong biological impluse to eat stuffed crust Pizza Can you explain how this impulse works? Absurdly expensive is not a biological reason. Side note: I personally do not experience this. This sounds awful to me.
- kevincox 4y agoThe biological impulse is basically "eat as much as you can". This worked well in the past because it was hard to eat too much due to the expense/scarcity. Now that high-energy foods are very accessible this impluse is less helpful.
- rightbyte 4y agoEven my toddler has no such impulse. He eats till he got enough and then starts throwing food on the floor. Eating through your savings was detrimental even for hunter gatherers.
- gruez 4y ago>I've noticed whenever I pig out on dairy I feel really really bad like 2 hours later. >It's at a point where I try to avoid most milk, pizza is temping though. sounds like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactose_intolerance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactose_intolerance to me rather than "less animal gunk". > I think it's easier to pitch the health benefits of eating less animal gunk. > So yea it tastes good. And how well have public health campaigns that told people "stop eating delicious things because they're unhealthy" fared?
- aaron695 4y ago
- Georgelemental 4y agoHalve deforestation associated with beef consumption, not overall
- carlmr 4y agoStill good, but really not the same headline.
- orangepurple 4y agoWhat are the relative proportions?
- carlmr 4y agoSee I think this drives an interesting point, but saying you need a "meat substitute" or "microbial meat" makes it really unattractive. Why not just say eat one fifth less meat and a bit more veggies instead?
- hnplj 4y ago
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- sph 4y agoGood thing that all grains, corn and non-meat alternatives are green, carbon neutral and cruelty free.
- paulryanrogers 4y agoLess costly doesn't mean more costly is morally equivalent