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"A large amount of beef is grown in areas that are not suitable for crop farming in the United States. In fact, 85% of the land used to graze cattle in the U.S.

"A large amount of beef is grown in areas that are not suitable for crop farming in the United States. In fact, 85% of the land used to graze cattle in the U.S. is marginal land, which means it's not suitable for growing crops. Marginal land is either untouched or used for grazing livestock, mostly cattle" Grain finishing is another matter. But it's not a 1 grain : 1/10th beef type situation. Now chopping and burning down the amazon to create grazing land for cattle? yeah that's going to probably kill us all.

verisimi 2y ago
> Now chopping and burning down the amazon to create grazing land for cattle? yeah that's going to probably kill us all. How? I mean, I'm not a fan of destroying forests, etc, but around here, there is no unmanaged land so presumably all the forests were already burnt etc for farmers... But we're all around, right? I don't get how burning the Amazon for food people want will actually kill us.
- adrianN 2y ago
  The Amazon is pretty important for the global climate
- jterrys 2y ago
  Because the rainforest is important in regulating global temperature and oxygen production, much more so than the (probable) temperate climate forests you are from. You are living in a post destruction area, with new forests planted to supplement the destruction that was there before. Most of these forests aren't more than 70 years old, that's about when we finally made an effort to fix how badly we totally fucked up and why people needed clean air to not die from lung cancer (among other things). The loss of biodiversity, air quality, etc. already occurred. You are a survivor. What's more, your survival was in part supported by the air quality of other virgin forests further away from you that weren't yet cut down. But now that they are being cut down, there's less left to support you. In short, you're asking yourself why you shouldn't shoot yourself in the foot again, because you managed to survive the first shot and it looks to you like it healed just fine (it didn't).
  - verisimi 2y ago
    I didn't shoot myself in the foot. Someone around here did clear the forests for farmland... and people are doing ok. Its not that everyone died, as the comment I responded to said.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - chinupbuttercup 2y ago
      To substantiate your point, I was thinking about deforestation for farming in Indiana (where I live) and Ohio last week and learned that Indiana was 90% forest until taxes got in the way. It's crazy that something as silly as taxes can cause most of your forests to become farmland. https://woodlandsteward.squarespace.com/storage/past-issues/indiana%27s%20forest.htm https://woodlandsteward.squarespace.com/storage/past-issues/... We are still alive. I wish we had the forests, but we have survived and the environment has adjusted.
      - verisimi 2y ago
        Yeah, it's crazy to insentivise deforestation. But people need to eat. And, depending on who you listen to, there is even some evidence that the rainforest may have been a cultivated environment itself, in the dim and distant past.
      - smallerfish 2y ago
        The US has increased in forest cover over the last 100 years. The loss in your state(s) is somewhat offset by gain in others. https://www.wri.org/insights/tracking-global-tree-cover-gain https://www.wri.org/insights/tracking-global-tree-cover-gain And, the Amazon is pretty damn big. The potential effects of its loss are detailed here: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-is-the-amazon-so-important-for-climate-change1/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-is-the-amazon... Finally, tropical forests (/jungles) are a lot more productive in terms of growth (and carbon capture) than temperate forests. https://news.mongabay.com/2011/06/tropical-forests-more-effective-than-temperate-forests-in-fighting-climate-change/ https://news.mongabay.com/2011/06/tropical-forests-more-effe...
lukas099 2y ago
“Not suitable for crop farming” =/= “ecologically unimportant”
- jeffbee 2y ago
  Seriously, the is a big problem in the US. Cattle are grazed on BLM land and they trample all the stream banks to such an extent that riparian ecosystems are totally destroyed. And in exchange the grazing fee is only $1/head/month! If you stand at the point where a stream crosses from a fenced conservation area into a grazing area, the difference across the boundary is stark.
  - Amezarak 2y ago
    How did did the riparian ecosystems thrive when there were tens of millions of bison? There is the same order of magnitude of cows in the US today (90 million) as bison hundreds of years ago (30-60 million.) Bison are also generally much heavier, meaning they eat more and trod the ground more deeply.
    - jeffbee 2y ago
      The historical range of the American bison was largely not overlapping with BLM grazing lands. The bison, a sensible animal, wasn't found in California, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington.
      - Amezarak 2y ago
        The historical range of the bison did extend into those states, but granted, not into most of that land area. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_bison_belt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_bison_belt
        jeffbee 2y ago
        I think we are safe in describing the pre-columbian bison range as not marginal, and the post that started this thread is about how most of our cattle grazing is on marginal lands. The way Americans do this is the worst possible way: grow feed on the excellent grazing range, and feed it to an animal that spends most of its life either grazing a desert or standing in parking lot. We'd get more of everything, easier and cheaper, if we just grazed bison where we currently grow corn.
whywhywhywhy 2y ago
They're gonna chop and burn it down either way, it'll either be for cattle or if you make eating meat illegal they'll chop and burn it for something else like palm oil. Like it's obvious the people who own and control that land don't care about it anywhere near as much as you do so if you want them to stop chopping it down essentially you're gonna need to start paying them not to. Just seems naive to think stopping specifically poor people from eating meat is the solution to this.
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  If you take away one of the profitable reasons to chop down the Amazon, it’ll reduce people doing it at the margin - that is simply facts. > Poor people from eating meat Yeah and a carbon tax will stop poor people from using as much gas, etc. - if we want to solve climate change we cannot just insulate all poor people from externality pricing.
  - mytailorisrich 2y ago
    At global scale we can't solve the environmental crisis in general (climate is only one aspect) and solve poverty at the same time with 10 billion people. Solving the environmental crisis means reducing our consumption of resources. Solving global poverty means a significant increase in consumption of resources. So the only way forward is to let the global population decrease ASAP so that we can both live well and preserve the planet.
    - whimsicalism 2y ago
      Resource intensity is decreasing. We can solve both at the same time, but we can’t solve both with maximum possible speed at the same time, true.
      - mytailorisrich 2y ago
        Resource intensity may or may not be decreasing but that's not solving the issue if you look at global numbers of poor people versus economic and consumption growth needed to bring everyone to, say, European level of living standard. We are already wreacking havoc on the planet and marginal decrease in resource intensity is not going to make a difference because our total impact needs to be slashed. I never understand the insistence of some of ignoring population in the equation, which is the key parameter.
nolverostae 2y ago
Yes, but now give out the statistics on how much of the calories fed to cows in total in the US or worldwide is actually grazing and how much is from crops that need extra area apart from where the animals graze. Even cattle that grazes is often supplemented with grain, and the grain is of course much more calorie-dense. The world wide land area for farming would reduce from 4 to 1 billion hectares if we didn't use livestock to feed humans. https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-diets https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-diets So the answer to "what would we do with all that land we can't put crops on" is "whatever we want". For example, we could just leave it be nature, since we don't need it for farming.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

verisimi 2y ago

> Now chopping and burning down the amazon to create grazing land for cattle? yeah that's going to probably kill us all. How? I mean, I'm not a fan of destroying forests, etc, but around here, there is no unmanaged land so presumably all the forests were already burnt etc for farmers... But we're all around, right? I don't get how burning the Amazon for food people want will actually kill us.

adrianN 2y ago
The Amazon is pretty important for the global climate
jterrys 2y ago
Because the rainforest is important in regulating global temperature and oxygen production, much more so than the (probable) temperate climate forests you are from. You are living in a post destruction area, with new forests planted to supplement the destruction that was there before. Most of these forests aren't more than 70 years old, that's about when we finally made an effort to fix how badly we totally fucked up and why people needed clean air to not die from lung cancer (among other things). The loss of biodiversity, air quality, etc. already occurred. You are a survivor. What's more, your survival was in part supported by the air quality of other virgin forests further away from you that weren't yet cut down. But now that they are being cut down, there's less left to support you. In short, you're asking yourself why you shouldn't shoot yourself in the foot again, because you managed to survive the first shot and it looks to you like it healed just fine (it didn't).
- verisimi 2y ago
  I didn't shoot myself in the foot. Someone around here did clear the forests for farmland... and people are doing ok. Its not that everyone died, as the comment I responded to said.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - chinupbuttercup 2y ago
    To substantiate your point, I was thinking about deforestation for farming in Indiana (where I live) and Ohio last week and learned that Indiana was 90% forest until taxes got in the way. It's crazy that something as silly as taxes can cause most of your forests to become farmland. https://woodlandsteward.squarespace.com/storage/past-issues/indiana%27s%20forest.htm https://woodlandsteward.squarespace.com/storage/past-issues/... We are still alive. I wish we had the forests, but we have survived and the environment has adjusted.
    - verisimi 2y ago
      Yeah, it's crazy to insentivise deforestation. But people need to eat. And, depending on who you listen to, there is even some evidence that the rainforest may have been a cultivated environment itself, in the dim and distant past.
    - smallerfish 2y ago
      The US has increased in forest cover over the last 100 years. The loss in your state(s) is somewhat offset by gain in others. https://www.wri.org/insights/tracking-global-tree-cover-gain https://www.wri.org/insights/tracking-global-tree-cover-gain And, the Amazon is pretty damn big. The potential effects of its loss are detailed here: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-is-the-amazon-so-important-for-climate-change1/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-is-the-amazon... Finally, tropical forests (/jungles) are a lot more productive in terms of growth (and carbon capture) than temperate forests. https://news.mongabay.com/2011/06/tropical-forests-more-effective-than-temperate-forests-in-fighting-climate-change/ https://news.mongabay.com/2011/06/tropical-forests-more-effe...

lukas099 2y ago

“Not suitable for crop farming” =/= “ecologically unimportant”

jeffbee 2y ago
Seriously, the is a big problem in the US. Cattle are grazed on BLM land and they trample all the stream banks to such an extent that riparian ecosystems are totally destroyed. And in exchange the grazing fee is only $1/head/month! If you stand at the point where a stream crosses from a fenced conservation area into a grazing area, the difference across the boundary is stark.
- Amezarak 2y ago
  How did did the riparian ecosystems thrive when there were tens of millions of bison? There is the same order of magnitude of cows in the US today (90 million) as bison hundreds of years ago (30-60 million.) Bison are also generally much heavier, meaning they eat more and trod the ground more deeply.
  - jeffbee 2y ago
    The historical range of the American bison was largely not overlapping with BLM grazing lands. The bison, a sensible animal, wasn't found in California, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington.
    - Amezarak 2y ago
      The historical range of the bison did extend into those states, but granted, not into most of that land area. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_bison_belt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_bison_belt
      - jeffbee 2y ago
        I think we are safe in describing the pre-columbian bison range as not marginal, and the post that started this thread is about how most of our cattle grazing is on marginal lands. The way Americans do this is the worst possible way: grow feed on the excellent grazing range, and feed it to an animal that spends most of its life either grazing a desert or standing in parking lot. We'd get more of everything, easier and cheaper, if we just grazed bison where we currently grow corn.

whywhywhywhy 2y ago

They're gonna chop and burn it down either way, it'll either be for cattle or if you make eating meat illegal they'll chop and burn it for something else like palm oil. Like it's obvious the people who own and control that land don't care about it anywhere near as much as you do so if you want them to stop chopping it down essentially you're gonna need to start paying them not to. Just seems naive to think stopping specifically poor people from eating meat is the solution to this.

whimsicalism 2y ago
If you take away one of the profitable reasons to chop down the Amazon, it’ll reduce people doing it at the margin - that is simply facts. > Poor people from eating meat Yeah and a carbon tax will stop poor people from using as much gas, etc. - if we want to solve climate change we cannot just insulate all poor people from externality pricing.
- mytailorisrich 2y ago
  At global scale we can't solve the environmental crisis in general (climate is only one aspect) and solve poverty at the same time with 10 billion people. Solving the environmental crisis means reducing our consumption of resources. Solving global poverty means a significant increase in consumption of resources. So the only way forward is to let the global population decrease ASAP so that we can both live well and preserve the planet.
  - whimsicalism 2y ago
    Resource intensity is decreasing. We can solve both at the same time, but we can’t solve both with maximum possible speed at the same time, true.
    - mytailorisrich 2y ago
      Resource intensity may or may not be decreasing but that's not solving the issue if you look at global numbers of poor people versus economic and consumption growth needed to bring everyone to, say, European level of living standard. We are already wreacking havoc on the planet and marginal decrease in resource intensity is not going to make a difference because our total impact needs to be slashed. I never understand the insistence of some of ignoring population in the equation, which is the key parameter.

nolverostae 2y ago

Yes, but now give out the statistics on how much of the calories fed to cows in total in the US or worldwide is actually grazing and how much is from crops that need extra area apart from where the animals graze. Even cattle that grazes is often supplemented with grain, and the grain is of course much more calorie-dense. The world wide land area for farming would reduce from 4 to 1 billion hectares if we didn't use livestock to feed humans. https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-diets https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-diets So the answer to "what would we do with all that land we can't put crops on" is "whatever we want". For example, we could just leave it be nature, since we don't need it for farming.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]