Here’s the thing about vegetarianism as a more recent — and arguably now somewhat fading — movement. It tended to be framed on animal rights grounds, health, and environmentalism. These are things that, to a certain mind, have been overcome (in terms of meat) in large part thanks to the organic/local movements. That is, meat is cool if you’re eating the good free-range/grass-fed/butchered in a five-star hotel room with a laced cocktail kind of meat. And health-wise, hell, we have paleo!A humanitarian/equity-based argument against eating meat has always existed in different forms, but has tended to get overlooked — as has the looming global food crisis, at least in America in comparison to trendier crises. When I kicked meat it was mainly to stop killing cows and because I thought it was gross. (I eat meat now, though not much of it.)Anyhow, there is a food crisis. In a short amount of time, the world will have to feed 9 billion human beings. Which means we need to double our food production by 2050. The planet remains poorly equipped to do that. You could say it remains poorly equipped to feed its existing population.Can we do it? Mayhaps, but it’ll be tough. A new paper in Nature takes the issue head on. From a New York Times post the other day about said paper.For starters, the [research] group argues that the conversion of forests and grasslands to agricultural use needs to stop now; the environmental damage we are doing chopping down the Amazon far exceeds the small gain in food production, it says.
Next, the paper contends that increases in food supply need to come from existing farmland by a process of intensified production in regions where yields are low: northeastern India, Eastern Europe, parts of South America and large parts of Africa being good examples.
If yields in these regions could be brought to within 75 percent of their known potential using modern farming methods, including fertilizer and irrigation, total global supply of major foodstuffs would expand by 28 percent, the paper found. If yields were brought to 95 percent of their potential, close to those achieved in rich countries, the supply increase would be a whopping 58 percent.OK, so there’s some other stuff we need to do, but not eating as much damn meat is one part of it. It’s inefficient. Cows eat a lot — and so you have to grow a whole lot of grain to feed them. It’s about that simple. Dairy, too. We need to consume less dairy for that reason. At the very least, the authors suggest switching to chicken.The paper’s lead author, Jonathan A. Foley, (see the TED video above) seems a bit skeptical of the organic/local movements in a related article in Scientific American. Instead of hanging on those labels, he suggests, “A system for certifying foods based on how well each one delivers nutrition and food security and limits environmental and social costs would help the public choose products that push agriculture in a more sustainable direction.”So, yeah, time for a new food movement.Reach this writer at michaelb@motherboard.tv.
Advertisement
Advertisement