Sustainability Vegetarianism for the Environment

strongvoicesforward said:
When you said my numbers were not quite right, you were referring to the numbers I stated for water usage.
Exactly. As I said: not quite right.

Yep. Don`t you read the OP of threads you join?
Oh, I do, but what matters more is what people post, & that's what I react to. Discussion, you know...

You began going off on the "something has to die" tangent.
That was in regard to a "positive" side effect of those bunkers.

It was clearly stated this thread is about the environment as it pertained to vegetarianism.
Just like my 1st post here was, which you reacted to, then my reaction to your reaction, a.s.o. That's a discussion for you.

If you want to talk about killing cauliflower or brocali in leiu of animals, or go off again on a reductionist argument, then make a thread for that or discuss it on the threads where that has been a focal point of discussion.
"brocali in leiu of animals"? Hmm...
I rarely open threads, I'm just an old reactionary: reacting, reacting...

How do you know I don`t have my forum?
I don't know, & don't even care. As I said, you could open one. Whether you already have one (or actually will open one) is irrelevant to me. I'm sure I wouldn't go there, anyway.

Keep the discussion on the environment, please, -- like the OP sets up the discussion for.
As I said, I'm just a reactionary. If you don't want me to go off-topic, don't post about the stuff that is.

"Should" is implying or insinuating morals or right/wrong as it goes to taking life for consumption. This thread is not about the morals of killing animals or plant life for that matter.
Well, if you don't like "should", maybe I should (oops) rephrase my question again? Okay: Does your above remark (hopefully you remember it) mean that you think its alright for eg. cauliflower or broccoli to be killed for [insert vegetarian's name of your choice here]'s consumption?

The topic here is the environment and the thread was created to focus specifically on that.
Why then do you focus on my posts so much? Just ignore me, & that's it. Nothing to react for me, no reaction by me (well, usually).
 
bossel said:
Why then do you focus on my posts so much? Just ignore me, & that's it. Nothing to react for me, no reaction by me (well, usually).

lol. Good suggestion, since until now, nothing of substance has been offered by you on this topic. Do so, and you will have your discussion.
 
strongvoicesforward said:
There are 3 reasons for choosing to become a vegetarian. Those are:
1. Moral/ethical (may be based on religious beliefs or not)
2. Health
3. Environmental​
This thread will focus on the environmental aspect of the argument for choosing a non-flesh diet.
-----------------------
*New thread opened to clearly separate the issues of health and morals which were being discussed on other threads. Having separate discussions clearly delineated will allow for a smoother flowing discussion staying more focused.

Hello?c.
So an environmentally oriented debate thread then SVF?

Hmm?cMorality and health aside then, lets discuss the Environmental aspects of animal agriculture and plant agriculture.
You seem to believe that if everyone were vegetarians (by this, I assume you mean true vegetarians that don?ft eat or use any animal products rather than say lacto-ovo vegetarians or semi-vegetarians etc, yes?).
Here are some interesting links on water consumption and meat and wheat and things;

Wasteful farming;

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=32601

Water crisis;

http://www.vegansociety.com/html/environment/water/

Fertiliser definitions;

http://www.michigan.gov/mda/0,1607,7-125-1568_2390_19401-49341--,00.html

(More importantly) Fertiliser and crop type usage in the US;

http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs155-99/fs155-99.html



The vast bulk of crops farmed for animals go into poultry. Cows can survive very happily on grass, water to drink and hay (dried grass) alone, they do not need cereal products. Most of the cereal products that go into animal feed are there to feed factory farmed animals because they cannot survive any other way, so the solution is to decrease factory farming and to increase the efficiency of crop farming.
Very little fertilisers go into crops intended for animal feed as they are not fussy about how big their wheat grains are or if their potatoes aren?ft the right shape and stuff, most fertilisers go into food used for human consumption or in countries where they suffer weather problems like water shortages (Potassium found in fertilisers helps facilitate sugar movement through plants, and boosts resistance to stresses such as drought and disease, so potassium rich fertilisers are essential for countries with low water fall, but this inevitably leads to more harmful nutrients running off into the water systems).

Less factory farming= big decrease in crops used for animals
No animal farming at all= big increase in crop farming= more artificial fertilisers= bad for the environment.
More fertilisers=more mining, more fossil fuels, more industrial activity= even worse for the environment.

Fertilisers obtained from animals make up a large percentage of fertilisers(I think something like 37% in the US), these animal fertilisers are often a by-product of animal farming. Without animal farming to supply these fertiliser needs, the need for artificial fertilisers rockets, and thus bad for the environment because that means more mining and more fossil fuels and poisoned rivers and stuff. It would also probably spell some of the Doom of organic farming as that relies heavily on natural fertilisers.
So more GM farming, which is even worse for the environment.

Also, on the subject of wheat versus beef water requirements, I found those statistics very misleading. All those statistics show is the water present in the plant/animal product at its finished state/final product. It does not take into account the serious problems with evaporation on fields or the polluted water run-off from them.
The other thing you need to take into consideration, is do you eat wheat dry? No, you have to mix it with water and other products to make it edible. While a piece of beef can happily fry or roast or whatever in its own water-rich juices, cereal products need to be cooked in some liquid product like water to make them edible- otherwise you?fd just be eating flour, literally. And unless you make that into a soup or something, the water you boil it in goes down the drain unlike the juices from the beef which you consume.

Aside from the problems of crop farming poisoning the environment, you also have to consider what and increased demand for crops would do on the wildlife. Crop farming is NOT good for wildlife. Arable/crop farming as well as the use of pesticides and weed killers result in a loss of biodiversity, and with fields getting larger and larger now days this is becoming a major problem.
Crop farming upsets the ecosystems- for example, where there was once a flourishing meadow with thousands of varieties of grasses, plants and insects- now stands hundreds of acres of one plant, wheat. The natural food chain collapses. The farmer tries to combat the influx of insects that now have no natural food chain to keep them in check by using pesticides?cBiodiversity is lost. The soils and waters are polluted, the hedges cut down because they are no longer needed to act as wind shields for animals. All is left is green deserts?c
Take the plight of the English hare. This beautiful native animal is going extinct because its natural habitats are being destroyed by crop farming- where once it lived by the peaceful traditional life-rich cattle meadows, now it is stranded in a wilderness of endless one-plant crops. The hare needs a variety of types of plants, most found in meadows, to survive. With modern arable/crop farming, this way of life no longer is and it is going extinct.
If everyone ate plants, demand for crops farmed in poor countries would go through the roof, most poor countries in this world are dry and thus artificial fertiliser demand would also shoot through the roof, thus more fossil fuels, industrial activity, mining etc- unbalanced ecosystems would mean more pesticide use, which would be even worse for the environment.
Thousands of species of farm animals would go extinct with no need for them anymore as well- take the plight of the Essex Saddleback pig. Once, it used to be farmed for hundreds of years- until modern pig breeds came along and out-competed it. With no need for it anymore, its practically extinct now days with less than a hundred of them in the world or so. If you think its morally correct to cause animal species to go extinct, then I think you need to re-think your morals.
Think of the financial losses of animal products as well- no wool, no feathers, no leather, no gelatine etc. Seriously bad news for the economies across the world?c


SVF, to say that if everyone ate plants, the environment would benefit, is very delusional IMO.

My solution to all this- decrease factory farming, hopefully crushing its existence. Getting rid of factory farming would mean the high percentage of crops that go into animal feed would no longer be needed.
Secondly, increase efficiency of water and fertiliser management of agriculture across the world- a heck of a lot of water would be saved if this was done and gone about properly.
Thirdly- encourage traditional farming that co-exists with the environment/ecosystems and encourages biodiversity amongst wildlife.
As to the lakes & seas- encourage salt, brackish and freshwater farming instead of relying of the natural harvest of the seas. We are currently taking far more fish/water animals out of the worlds water systems that what nature can provide, what we really need to do is instead of relying on natures bounty, we need to create artificial systems like building lakes or sectioning bits off coastline for our needs instead of just taking life from everywhere- we know better than to act like hunter gatherers, so we shouldn?ft act like them.
Our civilisation was built on farming. The environment and farming used to co-exist fine with each other well for thousands upon thousands of years until we became greedy. We need to stop our greedy ways and learn to live with the environment instead of abusing its ecosystems with the likes of modern farming methods.
I believe in a world where tamed and wild plants and animals can live together, as they once did long ago.
 
Tokis-Phoenix said:

From the first link above:

That conflict can't be resolved without growing food using a lot less water, Gleick said in an interview. "And that won't be achieved if everyone wants to eat as much meat as North Americans," he added.

China's rising meat consumption is cause for concern, he says, and the problem is made worse by the fact that China has badly damaged its aquatic ecosystems and polluted its freshwater limiting how much food it can grow.

Do you actually read the links you provide? This article is clearly hinting at the ill affects to the environment due to meat consumption -- which is what causes the large amounts of land to be cultivated and then in need of irrigation.
 
Tokis-Phoenix said:

And from your second link above:

THE LIVESTOCK CONNECTION

Worldwide, agriculture uses up 70% of fresh water resources. [10] This is largely because a lot of cropland has to be irrigated to make it agriculturally viable and to increase and improve crop yields.

As has been shown, much of this land is entirely wasted by being used to grow feed crops for livestock rather than food for people. The water used on this land - as well as that consumed directly by livestock - represents yet another wasted resource.

There has been much disagreement over precisely how much water is squandered in this way. Professor David Pimentel of Cornell University's Ecology Department has calculated that it takes 500 litres of water to produce 1kg of potatoes, 900 litres per kg of wheat, 3,500 litres per kg of digestible chicken flesh and a massive 100,000 litres for 1kg of beef.

A more conservative estimate comes from Beckett and Oltjen of the University of California's Department of Animal Science. [12] In a study partly financed by the California Beef Council, they concluded that wheat production requires 120 litres per kg and beef 3,700 litres per kg. It is interesting to look a little more closely at these figures as they show that, even by the most conservative of estimates, beef production still represents a scandalous misuse of one of our most precious natural resources.

1 kg of meat yields about 2800 kcal and 174 g of protein. 1 kg of wheat yields 3300 kcal and 110 g of protein (100g after adjustment for digestibility). According to Beckett and Oltjen, the kilogram of beef requires 3,700 litres of water and the kilogram of wheat requires 120 litres of water. If we put all of these figures together, we find that whilst wheat provides us with an average 27.5 kcal for each litre of water used, beef provides only 0.76 kcal per litre. This means that - based on the data presented to show that other figures were "overstated" - beef still requires 36 times as much water per calorie as wheat. When the same calculations are done for digestible protein, wheat comes out as 18 times more water efficient than beef.

By these figures, one kilogram of beef uses as much water as:

40 baths
300 toilet flushes
100 times the clean water needed by an individual according to UNESCO

Since a large percentage of the crops we feed to our farmed animals are grown on 'ghost acres' in developing countries, this wasted water is coming not just from our own reserves but from the very countries where drinking water is most scarce.

Again, your link supports the damage of meat production to the environment.
 
To be fair, bossel did suggest an agrarian solution that would address some of the environmental issues of raising livestock for meat. I'm not sure to what extent it would be a self-sustaining system, but he wasn't given much chance to air out his idea before being dismissed for not agreeing with the original post's contention.
 
strongvoicesforward said:
From the first link above:
That conflict can't be resolved without growing food using a lot less water, Gleick said in an interview. "And that won't be achieved if everyone wants to eat as much meat as North Americans," he added.
China's rising meat consumption is cause for concern, he says, and the problem is made worse by the fact that China has badly damaged its aquatic ecosystems and polluted its freshwater limiting how much food it can grow.
Do you actually read the links you provide? This article is clearly hinting at the ill affects to the environment due to meat consumption -- which is what causes the large amounts of land to be cultivated and then in need of irrigation.

Do you actually read the posts i make? Read through the whole post again and you'll notice i adress those points. I included the links for reference as to what points i was adressing and why i disagreed with them and so forth etc.
So before you accuse me of not reading my links, why don't you read my posts first?
 
strongvoicesforward said:
I never said a vegetarian diet doesn`t result in the use of fossil fuels. Vegetarianism is not a perfect choice leading to Utopia as it concerns the environment. It is merely a better choice of the ones that exist -- and in the case of fossil fuels, it most clearly is the one choice in regards to diet that decreases the use of fossil fuels because of less transportation and less intensive farming due to lesser land area that would be used for the growth of plant food.
My last comment still stands as it is.
Let us try and clear this up.
Being a vegetarian means caring about the environment.
It doesn't in no form whatsoever. What about the huge gas guzzling harvesters used to collect grain crops? Tractors used to haul it off the fields, to farms where it is stored, prepared and shipped out on trucks. Farms use great amounts of electricity whether they are used for meat, diary or grain production, which mainly comes from environmentally unfriendly power stations. It is then shipped out to factories, mills, packing plants, in big gas guzzling trucks. The factories have to maintain hygenic conditions via chemicals. Packing plant use wood, paper, plastic packaging, using resources, no matter what is packed into them be it plant, vegetable or mineral. Then there is storage so you can eat your food out of season. Do you know that there are fruits that have been in storage for over a year before they get to the superstore? Back on food production. Crops require pesticides and fertilizer, not known for their environmental benefits. Plus all the fruit and veg which is not native to your country which are shipped by ship or air. More fuel guzzling. So, please tell me in what way in the above is being a vegetarian caring about the environment?
 
Tokis-Phoenix said:
Do you actually read the posts i make? Read through the whole post again and you'll notice i adress those points. I included the links for reference as to what points i was adressing and why i disagreed with them and so forth etc.
So before you accuse me of not reading my links, why don't you read my posts first?

Tokis, I did read your post. You tried to mitigate the waste of meat production by saying we must move away from factory farming. That is irrelevant because meat production still requires more recourses per calorie than plant foods.

You made some assertions in your first paragraphs as if those points point to the fact that meat does not require more water. You didn`t show us how much that form of meat production by free range taxed water recourses. You just said animals "can survive on dry grass etc..."

70 to 80% of all cropland is harvested so that it can be turned into feed. You said that "most fertilizer" goes into crops meant for human consumption. However, I didn`t see that in the links YOU provided. Are you just guessing at that or is that just your opinion?

The first equation you created:
Less factory farming= big decrease in crops used for animals

You cannot expect the same number of animals in factory farms to be free ranging and still not consuming large quantities of water (not only calculated from what is taken from the plant life). In fact, being confined may allow them to directly consume less due to less affects from water depletion through movement and exertion.

Factory farming has come about because it is more efficient for the farmer allowing them to make more profit. Besides, you are ignoring the trend in farming. The profit incentive is causing more and more farmers to take up factory farming. That trend will not reverse if it means less profit and people want the cheapest product. Farmers will increase their factory farming in order to stay competitive.

No animal farming at all= big increase in crop farming= more artificial fertilisers= bad for the environment.

There would be a net decrease. Your equation is wrong. Can you show me a study that supports that? Your links above even hint at the opposite if you extrapolate the information.

More fertilisers=more mining, more fossil fuels, more industrial activity= even worse for the environment.

You are right in that animal waste is needed and used for fertilizer now. However, that doesn`t have to be for the future and a society that decides to move away from flesh consumption but yet still needs to keep its fields fertile. Human waste could be converted for the same purpose. While it may not be as good it most definitely could be used, and science could probably find a way to make it even better with more rendering of some sorts. While land use for crops for humans would decrease, land use for animal crops would decrease and would not do so proportionately. There would be a net loss in land use for crops and that would help alleviate soil erosion and run off.
 
Mycernius said:
Let us try and clear this up.
It doesn't in no form whatsoever. What about the huge gas guzzling harvesters used to collect grain crops? Tractors used to haul it off the fields, to farms where it is stored, prepared and shipped out on trucks. Farms use great amounts of electricity whether they are used for meat, diary or grain production, which mainly comes from environmentally unfriendly power stations. It is then shipped out to factories, mills, packing plants, in big gas guzzling trucks. The factories have to maintain hygenic conditions via chemicals. Packing plant use wood, paper, plastic packaging, using resources, no matter what is packed into them be it plant, vegetable or mineral. Then there is storage so you can eat your food out of season. Do you know that there are fruits that have been in storage for over a year before they get to the superstore? Back on food production. Crops require pesticides and fertilizer, not known for their environmental benefits. Plus all the fruit and veg which is not native to your country which are shipped by ship or air. More fuel guzzling. So, please tell me in what way in the above is being a vegetarian caring about the environment?

Myrcianus,

You are still not taking into account the value added that comes about from addding another step into calorie production. That is rather than going directly from plant calorie to final consumer, it makes another unnecessary stop to animal. In addition all those things of harvesting plant life is multiplied in field size and time and energy in getting all that to animals. Simply put, a larger space for plant cultivation because animals need large amounts of food, means longer hours of operating machinery over larger areas and requiring more transportation due to larger harvests.
 
nice gaijin said:
To be fair, bossel did suggest an agrarian solution that would address some of the environmental issues of raising livestock for meat. I'm not sure to what extent it would be a self-sustaining system, but he wasn't given much chance to air out his idea before being dismissed for not agreeing with the original post's contention.

I don`t agree with that assessment.

He suggested an SF scenario -- a very improbable one due to economics, which he even admitted to. The water issue was not resolved. Just a general comment on it. He then began to go off on a reductionist ad hominem tangent on the moral issue, which is not the focus of this thread.

People are quite welcome in going against my contention that "vegetarianism is best for the environment." Tokis-Phoenix is doing that without going SF, or off on the moral issues, or off on a reductionist ad hominem tangent.
 
I agree with the sentiments expressed by many people above that factory farming has a negative affect on the environment. I don't think anyone has tried to challenge this.

I also agree with tokis that a completely vegan population would be less effecient than one with some free range farming. I think that some land is unsuitable for crops yet suitable for letting animals graze, I'm thinking more about goats and things here, but feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

While I understand that this thread is specifically about vegetariansim and the environment, I can't help but feel that it is just a part of a larger topic of diet and the environment. Other elements such as locally grown produce and organic farming are important aspects along with eating less factory farmed meat.
 
strongvoicesforward said:
Tokis, I did read your post. You tried to mitigate the waste of meat production by saying we must move away from factory farming. That is irrelevant because meat production still requires more recourses per calorie than plant foods.

You made some assertions in your first paragraphs as if those points point to the fact that meat does not require more water. You didn`t show us how much that form of meat production by free range taxed water recourses. You just said animals "can survive on dry grass etc..."

70 to 80% of all cropland is harvested so that it can be turned into feed. You said that "most fertilizer" goes into crops meant for human consumption. However, I didn`t see that in the links YOU provided. Are you just guessing at that or is that just your opinion?

Firstly, I never said animals can ?gsurvive on dry grass etc?h, if you really did read my post then please quote my statements accurately.
Secondly, it was not 70 to 80% of all cropland is harvested so it can be turned into feed, I remember it accurately more as a round 70%, so lets not exaggerate statistics.
Thirdly, I have experience with farming, both crops and a variety of animals, and to be honest, I am in doubt of some of the statistics in these pro-vegan links.


strongvoicesforward said:
You cannot expect the same number of animals in factory farms to be free ranging and still not consuming large quantities of water (not only calculated from what is taken from the plant life). In fact, being confined may allow them to directly consume less due to less affects from water depletion through movement and exertion.

That is just an assumption- stress makes animals sweat, particularly if they are obese, which many factory farmed animals are. A large amount of water also goes into keeping their crampt conditions sanitised- the dry artificial feeds needed to feed them also often need to be saturated with water to make them edible.

strongvoicesforward said:
Factory farming has come about because it is more efficient for the farmer allowing them to make more profit. Besides, you are ignoring the trend in farming. The profit incentive is causing more and more farmers to take up factory farming. That trend will not reverse if it means less profit and people want the cheapest product. Farmers will increase their factory farming in order to stay competitive.

Er-herm, but it was me who explained to you the trends in farming in another thread- so please do not accuse me of ignoring these facts. I have a solution to this anyway which I will explain later.

strongvoicesforward said:
There would be a net decrease. Your equation is wrong. Can you show me a study that supports that? Your links above even hint at the opposite if you extrapolate the information.

Wheat farming for example is terribly inefficient. Millions of tons of it are wasted due to quality issues- for example, if suddenly you get a problem with wild oats in your fields, you have no way to remove them without weed killers. Wild oats decrease the value of wheat. Wheat that is not pure enough gets wasted.
There are hundreds of things that can lower the quality of wheat apart from weeds, things like mites, rodent droppings, damp, fungus etc. If your wheat gets spoiled then that?fs a couple of hundred tonnes of wheat down the drain (often more though).

Crop farming only would be bad for the economy because of the loss of animal products- to be honest, I cannot think of any uses for wheat other than for it to be eaten, but I can think of at least 10 things cows are useful for other than being eaten. You stop animal farming, then all the other non-edible animal products go with it. Bad news for the economy, which would mean more industry to make up for the losses.

Anyhoo, you seem to believe that more water goes into producing beef than wheat yes because of the statics on the vegansociety website yes? Let me go into some things about those ?gstatistics?h, it says;

?gAccording to Beckett and Oltjen, the kilogram of beef requires 3,700 litres of water and the kilogram of wheat requires 120 litres of water?h

a. Who the heck are ?gBeckett?h and ?gOltjen?h?
b. What experiments were performed to come to those result conclusions?
c. What does ?grequire?h mean exactly? The amount of water fed to the cow and wheat to keep it alive? The total amount of water in the finished product? The amount of water consumed by the cow and wheat? Etc?c

Please answer these questions for me, since you seem to be relying on them heavily, I find these ?gstatistics?h very questionable without any evidence to back up who exactly they were done by, how exactly the experiments were gone about and what part of C. are they about.

strongvoicesforward said:
You are right in that animal waste is needed and used for fertilizer now. However, that doesn`t have to be for the future and a society that decides to move away from flesh consumption but yet still needs to keep its fields fertile. Human waste could be converted for the same purpose. While it may not be as good it most definitely could be used, and science could probably find a way to make it even better with more rendering of some sorts. While land use for crops for humans would decrease, land use for animal crops would decrease and would not do so proportionately. There would be a net loss in land use for crops and that would help alleviate soil erosion and run off.

It shows how much you know about real farming experience- human waste has a hige amount of issues attached to it which is the reason why it is not favoured by farmers- firstly, its not very good for growing crops on. Its often way too acidic.
Plus a lot of crap gets mixed with human waste like bleach/toilet disinfectant, meaning you cannot dump the raw stuff on fields without killing off every bit of life. This means it has to be refined, making it less environmentally friendly (more industry, more pollution).
Thirdly, people don?ft like farmers who dump human waste on fields. If you thought pig poop smells bad, you shouldn?ft check out the human stuff- many villages down here are trying to take legal action against farmers who put human muck on fields because of the god awful smell it creates for weeks on end (no one wants to buy a house for example right next to a sewer, the same thing goes for people not wanting to buy houses next to fields which human sewage is dumped on).
You are also still not addressing the points I made on the loss of biodiversity I made and crop farming- you cannot deny these facts.


On the subject of the issues of profitability on factory farming keeping it alive, I did say I had a solution to that, which I will address now.
One of the main factors why factory farming is so profitable is because the government pays farmers money based on how much food they produce- more food production, more money. This is a major lifeline for GM and factory farming.
I say, lets do another option. Instead of paying farmers to produce loads of food for the country or for export or economy etc, lets pay farmers for how well they look after their animals or how environmentally friendly they go about crop farming etc. This would kill out a lot of factory farms and farms that aren?ft very environmentally in one swipe, and help encourage good farming practices.
 
nice gaijin said:
I'm not sure to what extent it would be a self-sustaining system
Only partially, since food has to be produced & for that you have to put more in than what comes out, but the need for resources (esp. water) would dramatically decrease.


strongvoicesforward said:
He suggested an SF scenario
... which is pretty much always the case if you talk about the possible future.

-- a very improbable one due to economics,
Ah, but didn't you say something like "economy shouldn't play a role in this thread". Then you cannot really dismiss it for that reason. But then again, you don't keep to your own rules, anyway. Well...

He then began to go off on a reductionist ad hominem tangent on the moral issue, which is not the focus of this thread.
Asking for your opinion is going ad hominem?

M-W:
Main Entry: 1ad ho·mi·nem
Pronunciation: (')ad-'hä-m&-"nem, -n&m
Function: adjective
Etymology: New Latin, literally, to the person
1 : appealing to feelings or prejudices rather than intellect
2 : marked by an attack on an opponent's character rather than by an answer to the contentions made

Which feelings did I appeal to or in how far did I attack your character?
 
Tokis-Phoenix said:
Also, on the subject of wheat versus beef water requirements, I found those statistics very misleading.

Do you mean in the links YOU provided? Why provide them if you find the information in them misleading?

All those statistics show is the water present in the plant/animal product at its finished state/final product. It does not take into account the serious problems with evaporation on fields or the polluted water run-off from them.

That still won`t change the fact that more water goes into meat production because larger areas for crops are needed for supplying feed to livestock. That would mean more evaporation and more water run off.

The other thing you need to take into consideration, is do you eat wheat dry? No, you have to mix it with water and other products to make it edible. While a piece of beef can happily fry or roast or whatever in its own water-rich juices, cereal products need to be cooked in some liquid product like water to make them edible- otherwise you?fd just be eating flour, literally. And unless you make that into a soup or something, the water you boil it in goes down the drain unlike the juices from the beef which you consume.

According to the link site YOU provided, and the conservative estimate studies partly financed by the California Beef Council, it takes 3,700 liters of water to create 1kg of beef. As for wheat it takes 120 liters of water to make one kg of wheat. Now, if one needs to take one more liter to add to your 1kg of flour in order to eat it so it isn`t dry, then it would be 121 liters of water for that one kg consumption of wheat -- still far shorter than the 3,700 liters needed to create one kg of beef.
 
You keep on about water usage in meat production and how it is used more. The point is water is a recycleable resource, so how much is used for one or the other is not really applicable for a drain on the environment, especailly in the western world. Any waste of either crop or meat production is treated and returns back to the water cycle, which is a closed system. There is of course one of the most water intensive crop production for vegetarians and that is rice. We see those paddy fields full of water, but rice is a grass and doesn't need to be grown in water logged feilds. It is done so mainly to keep weeds down. Backto production of various meat products. Most meat produced in a lot of c.ountries is from that country, with the occassional import. Well for the UK at least. Beef, Pork, Chicken etc are produced locally and and bee done to feed a population. Vegetables and fruits on the other hand are not only grown locally, but a huge amount is imported. How else do you manage to eat out of season food, or even foods that cannot be grown in your country due to climate or possible pest risks. Soya, something vegetarians must eat to get their proteins comes mainly from China, the US, Argentina and Brazil, all exported vai planes and ships to the rest of the world. Not really very environmentally friendly.
 
Tokis-Phoenix said:
SVF, to say that if everyone ate plants, the environment would benefit, is very delusional IMO.

You have attempted to define me as if I think it is a reality that the world would ever get to a place where everyone ate plants. Where have I ever said that? I live in reality, and I doubt that flesh consumption would ever disappear just as I doubt murder or rape, or crime in general would ever disappear.

I will say that the environment would benefit if as many people as possible could make the switch to a vegetarian diet.

I will continue to list the recourse drain and damages that meat production is wreaking on the environment.
[/QUOTE]
 
strongvoicesforward said:
Do you mean in the links YOU provided? Why provide them if you find the information in them misleading?

Did I ever say you provided those links? There?fs no need to state the obvious here.
And yes, I am questioning the statistics/figures in the links because you have used those very same stats/figures many a time and I?fm sure you have also used those links in the past too- so if you do not like my links, can you provide any other internet sources which also have those exact stats.

strongvoicesforward said:
According to the link site YOU provided, and the conservative estimate studies partly financed by the California Beef Council, it takes 3,700 liters of water to create 1kg of beef. As for wheat it takes 120 liters of water to make one kg of wheat. Now, if one needs to take one more liter to add to your 1kg of flour in order to eat it so it isn`t dry, then it would be 121 liters of water for that one kg consumption of wheat -- still far shorter than the 3,700 liters needed to create one kg of beef.

It never said ?gcreate?h it said ?grequires?h- please answer these previous questions I asked on this part of the statistics debate before you continue to quote/use these statistics etc, particually C.;

?ga. Who the heck are ?gBeckett?h and ?gOltjen?h?
b. What experiments were performed to come to those result conclusions?
c. What does ?grequire?h mean exactly? The amount of water fed to the cow and wheat to keep it alive? The total amount of water in the finished product? The amount of water consumed by the cow and wheat? Etc?c?h

strongvoicesforward said:
You have attempted to define me as if I think it is a reality that the world would ever get to a place where everyone ate plants. Where have I ever said that? I live in reality, and I doubt that flesh consumption would ever disappear just as I doubt murder or rape, or crime in general would ever disappear.

I will say that the environment would benefit if as many people as possible could make the switch to a vegetarian diet.

I will continue to list the recourse drain and damages that meat production is wreaking on the environment.

Erm, I don?ft think I am unjustified in assuming you believe that all animal farming is wrong and immoral and the world would be a better place without it, and that if you had your way you would stop animal farming etc- because you have debated that point of view in many threads with me.
You can do what you want, but it appears there are numerous people that disagree with the water part of vegetarianism being environmentally, and that growing crops is certainly bad for biodiversity.

Oh- and another thing. You apparently have pet dogs. May I ask where the animal products you are feeding them come from or what brand food you are feeding them?
 
Mycernius said:
You keep on about water usage in meat production and how it is used more. The point is water is a recycleable resource, so how much is used for one or the other is not really applicable for a drain on the environment, especailly in the western world. Any waste of either crop or meat production is treated and returns back to the water cycle, which is a closed system. There is of course one of the most water intensive crop production for vegetarians and that is rice. We see those paddy fields full of water, but rice is a grass and doesn't need to be grown in water logged feilds. It is done so mainly to keep weeds down. Backto production of various meat products. Most meat produced in a lot of c.ountries is from that country, with the occassional import. Well for the UK at least. Beef, Pork, Chicken etc are produced locally and and bee done to feed a population. Vegetables and fruits on the other hand are not only grown locally, but a huge amount is imported. How else do you manage to eat out of season food, or even foods that cannot be grown in your country due to climate or possible pest risks. Soya, something vegetarians must eat to get their proteins comes mainly from China, the US, Argentina and Brazil, all exported vai planes and ships to the rest of the world. Not really very environmentally friendly.


I agree, i would also have to say that a nutritious vegan diet without pill supliments is pretty much imposible without imported foods.
 
Mycernius said:
You keep on about water usage in meat production and how it is used more. The point is water is a recycleable resource, ...

Of course water is a recyclable resource in the long run. I mean eventually I would imagine that things do get replenished -- most probably once the heavy burden of population pressures are released, either through the decline of the human species or just a decline in population. However, to talk about water as a recycleable resource as if our use of it does not matter because it is just there in one way or another is wrong -- and I doubt if you will find many articles that say the problems of water shortages are not looming around the corner. Can you?


so how much is used for one or the other is not really applicable for a drain on the environment, especailly in the western world. Any waste of either crop or meat production is treated and returns back to the water cycle, which is a closed system.

I don`t think all run off is treated. Where is there a statement that all run off with pesticides is treated? Do you have that? Where is there a statement that says all fecal waste from factory farm does not spill over into local streams? Aren`t you aware of those kinds of disasters? Keep visiting the thread because I will be posting those disasterous episodes quite soon enough. And once I do, where does that leave your statement above?

There is of course one of the most water intensive crop production for vegetarians and that is rice. We see those paddy fields full of water, but rice is a grass and doesn't need to be grown in water logged feilds. It is done so mainly to keep weeds down.

I have no problem with them being converted to non wet fields. And, I am not aware of any place that says "water intensive crop production" is for vegetarians. Haven`t seen that before. Please direct me to that. The productoin of plant food can always be improved. Won`t deny that. Got to embrace as much efficiency as possible.

Backto production of various meat products. Most meat produced in a lot of countries is from that country, with the occassional import. Well for the UK at least. Beef, Pork, Chicken etc are produced locally and and bee done to feed a population.

As for U.K. pork -- here are some numbers from the industry just 3 yrs ago:

1. 85% of bacon in Britain is imported

2. 70% of these pigs came from countries that do not meet the minimum raising standards in Britain.​

Read it yourself HERE.

Whether meat is imported or exported, its production has a net adverse affect on the world environment.

Vegetables and fruits on the other hand are not only grown locally, but a huge amount is imported. How else do you manage to eat out of season food, or even foods that cannot be grown in your country due to climate or possible pest risks.

Of course there is value added to those products. But, it still does not rival the production of meat and its damages and drain on recourses. I have yet to see a large number, if any, report on the recourse consumption and environment damaging effects of raising strawberries and blueberries. Can you direct me to some?

Soya, something vegetarians must eat to get their proteins comes mainly from China, the US, Argentina and Brazil, all exported vai planes and ships to the rest of the world. Not really very environmentally friendly.

Well, any use of fossil fuels for transportation/value added is not a "plus" in the column for good things about anything. However, DO YOU HAVE a comparative study that shows a net total drain on recourses and damages to the environment giving more responsibility to the growth of plant food for humans against the total impact of plant food grown for meat? I still have yet to see a damning report on crop consumption for human use that exonerates the negative effects of meat production by showing that the former is more damaging. Where are your numbers?
 

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