The Problem with Meat

Meat production and consumption has long been a topic of debate. From Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle exposing the public health concerns of the meat industry in the early 20th century to The Smith’s infamous song “Meat is Murder” highlighting the problematic ethics behind the industry, the topic has been examined from a number of lenses. The purpose of this article is not to preach my personal point of view on the subject, but rather to inform on the environmental impacts of meat, and what you can do to curb your personal carbon footprint.

Before I get into the effects meat production has on the environment, it is important to explain the issue with factory farming. In Jeffery Sach’s book The End of Poverty, he outlines how economic prosperity has spread over the past 200 years, citing the western world as being able to sustain consistent and successful economic growth. The result of this increased prosperity, he says, shifted the way in which we live by five main factors, but for the purposes of this article, we will be focusing on one: urbanization. The mass migration from rural to urban settings in the 1920s coincided with a sharp decline in the number of farms, which in turn correlated to a sharp increase in the size of each individual farm. Because the burden of supply now rested on the shoulders of significantly fewer producers, farming was forced to become more and more efficient to keep up with demand. In order to maximize productivity, farms began to specialize until the majority of farms in North America were producing a single commodity.

This market pressure led to the creation of Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations or CAFOS. These industrial complexes each have over 1000 animal units which are raised in confinement. The majority of our meat comes from these farming operations, and they are very loosely regulated.

The livestock industry devastates the environment on many levels. The large number of forests that need to be cleared to graze and feed these animals causes the loss of millions of carbon dioxide absorbing plants. Moreover, livestock accounts for 36% of annual methane emissions in the world. These factors combined mean the top three meat producers in the US emitted more greenhouse gases than the country of France in 2017 . Moreover, each kilogram of meat produced requires an average 8,500 litres of freshwater. Lastly, a combination of fertilizers, manure, antibiotics, and artificial hormones from CAFOs seep into water and air, degrading overall quality and causing pollution.

One week ago, the NGO EAT released research that concluded that, in order to be able to adjust to future population growth and curb climate change, the entire world must adopt a plant based diet by 2050. The most uplifting facet of this issue is that our individual choices can actually have a profound impact. If you can make a change in your diet to eat red meat just once a month, substituting your daily protein for beans and the occasional poultry or pork serving, as recommended by the Mediterranean diet, you can exponentially decrease your personal carbon footprint. And if you’re willing to sacrifice even more for the environment, consider going vegetarian or vegan to further reduce your impact!