Essay on The Meat Industry

Red meat contains high biological protein and significant micronutrients that would required for great health for life. It also contains a range of fats, including vital omega-3 polyunsaturated fats. Recent analyses need indicated that there has been a huge pattern to leaner cuts for meat over two decades [3]. Same time the dietary creation will differ sort of as stated by breed, feeding regimen, season and meat cut, as a rule in general red meat has a low fat content, is moderate in cholesterol and rich in protein and huge numbers crucial vitamins and minerals (79).

Do you really know what is in your meat? What about what happens to the meat after it is slaughtered? Fortunately, the conditions have gotten much better throughout the years. But many years ago, in the early 1900s meat consumers bought spoiled and rat infested hams that were produced by the meat industries. Nowadays, the meat industry has improved to a certain extent. Today, about 80% of all U.S. feedlots are injected with hormones (Lerner). Americans should know what they are eating. This is important in the meat industry because they are the producers of all the meat that we eat. The meat industry has improved and is much better than the 1900s, but still not at as ideal as everyone thinks it really is.

The ethics of animal production for food did not represent a concern by society until about 25 years ago. The public's awareness of both environmental consequences and effects of production systems on the animals welfare have become perpetually evident over the years. From an environmental perspective, the local grass-fed beef production will have a much smaller impact on the environment compared to the grain-fed production method. Grain-fed beef have to be shipped to the feedlots, incurring high energy costs in the transportation process. Manure at feed lots is not always properly disposed of, leading to foul odors, harmful natural gases, and the potential for leaching into the groundwater, contaminating local groundwater/drinking water supplies. Water pollution is by far the largest environmental impact. Research has shown that runoff resulting from cattle production has polluted at least 170,000 miles of river, 2,000,000 acres of lakes, and 1,800 square miles of estuaries. This is a major ethical issue, as water is our number one resource

There are six slaughterhouses in the world, to nourish a growing population companies have to provide transportation of the meat. The meat is either being transported by airplane or large trucks. The large trucks, airplanes, and even the factories practices, machinery and the disposing of animal waste are contributing to pollution. The environment due to these aspects is getting worse. As a result, the federal government should mandate a program and reduce farmer’s subsidies to manage farmer’s chemical fertilizer and animal waste. Also, the federal government should regulate farmers to reduce their tons of soil erosion and implement dietary strategies to reduce methane emission to the atmosphere.

During the past 30 years, deforestation in the Amazon has been a huge problem. The Amazon Rainforest is home to an estimated one-third of all known animal species and makes up about half of the world’s rainforests. The reasons for the deforestation is to expand pastures for cattle production, and fields to grow soybeans. ("Brazil Geography-Introduction." N.p., n.d. Web. 4 May 2016.)

Statistics derived from the United States Department of Agriculture show that approximately 10 billion animals raised each year are killed for food in the United States. The toll taken to the environment by mass meat production and the consumption of animal products is never considered. No one to think about how many resources needed to produce enough meat to cater to excessive consumption of animal products all over the world. These animals need to eat and drink. Feeding 10 billion animals in the United States cost more than feeding the whole world. Statistics from the UN show that raising and feeding animals uses approximately 30% of the land mass (Kallen, 2006).

Let me ask you a question. What is your favorite food? If you live in America, chances are the hamburger either tops the list or is located near it. But how much do you know about how that hamburger gets to your plate. Don’t be ashamed if you don’t know much due to the way in which food is produced. The disconnection with food has resulted in Americans knowing very little about how their food is brought to their table. With the growing number of scientific findings arising on the environmental damages of food production, it is now the role of a responsible consumers to understand where their food choices stand. Beef offers a textbook example of the inefficiencies in our food production and the need for consumers to make voluntary changes.

Imagine a world where the meat you eat is a product of a system bred for profit rather than quality. Well, we live in that world today. Cattle Farming operations in the United States have negative effects on the environment and individuals' health. This system of breeding cattle for consumption has caused negative effects for humans and the environment. It was started by Americas' demand for meat in different sectors. However, efforts to change this system have been thwarted by heavy opposition by huge meat companies. Still, Americans can still make this paradigm change with different spending tactics.

     It also needs to be pointed out that meat production industry is highly unfriendly to the environment. It has been proved that the results of this mindless actions are extremely harmful to the whole planet: trees are lost in creating farms for animal food, land is taken away from wildlife, additional erosion is caused, topsoil is lost, groundwater is wasted, and pesticide is excessively used. In fact, one chicken farm uses as much water as a little city. Few may know that this industry, compared to others, causes the biggest pollution at all.

When you break it down its easy to see how much of an impact the meat and dairy industry has on the planet. Animal agriculture contributes between 18 and 51% of total greenhouse gas emissions. Another impact the meat and dairy industry has is consuming 60 and 70% of grain crops grown and agriculture is responsible for 93% of water depletion worldwide. The meat and dairy industry is also responsible for a lot of soil destruction on our planet, this takes a long time to repair and if we don’t give it time to repair we won’t be able to grow food and other plants won’t be able to thrive. These are concerning numbers and the meat and dairy industry is predicted to double or triple by 2050. The year 2050 is important because the UN has reported that we need to keep the temperature from rising 2° by that year. Unfortunately, we’ve already gone up 0.8° and at the rate were going it is expected that it raises another 1.5°. Tt.is could mean terrible things for our planet and for us. We have made great moves with

The impact that meat productions have on the environment varies due to the variety of agricultural practices, unsustainable and sustainable, employed around the world (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United States, 1995). All practices of agriculture have a variety of effects on the environment. Some effects have been found to have an assortment that have been affiliated with the meat production are: air pollution, land consumption: deforestation and over-grazing, pollution through fossil fuel usage: transport and processing, and water pollution: runoff containing manure (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United States, 1995). “Livestock production contributes 40 percent of global agricultural gross domestic product, provides income for more than 1.3 billion people and uses on-third of the world’s fresh water.” (Walsh, 2013). In North America a cow consumes about 165.4 pounds to 661.4 pounds of dry grass or grain to only produce 2.2 pounds of protein (Walsh, 2013). The cows that emit carbon output in the forms of methane gas from their manure, reducing carbon absorption in the soil results when forested area are converted into pasture – major soil erosion (Walsh, 2013). Over grazing or “ranch induced deforestation” by the cows can cause soil degradation and destroy and kill plant life, making it difficult to use (Walsh, 2013). Unless well

Many concerns with clean meat are related to the cost, but the prices are, “falling about 15 to 20 percent per month, as the company improves yields and finds less expensive nutrients.” Within the next several years, as prices decrease, clean meat products will become publicly available through stores around the world. Cause and effect could eventually drive slaughterhouses into the ground, halt climate change, and change how the world views what they are eating, changing how we perceive the human diet for eternity (Scharfenberg).

Agriculture is one of the leading causes for deforestation, unlike the belief that logging is the main cause. Farmers clear the land by setting fire to it when the rain forest is dry enough to burn. Not only does burning the trees greatly increase the deforestation of the amazon, but it impacts the living organisms that live there. “The agricultural blitzkrieg into previously unplowed natural ecosystems represents one of the leading causes of contemporary and past extinctions of native plant and animal populations” (Peres, Schneider, 65). The amazon rainforest contains 20-30% of the planet’s biodiversity and is rich in fauna and flora, which means that deforestation, causes high ecological harm, such as ecological degradation and destruction. All the ecological damage that is done destroys plants and animal species because their habitat and food is destroyed.

In the next few decades, meat consumption is expected to increase. Currently, U.S is the highest meat-consuming nation in the world. In order to produce meat, livestock has to be raised, fed, and slaughtered. At the moment, livestock production is responsible for contributing to the negative environmental effects because livestock production results in greenhouse gas emissions, livestock production requires a lot of water, and livestock production takes up a lot of agricultural land. One way to minimize the environmental damages of livestock production is to replace regular meat with cultured meat. Studies that compared the environmental impact of cultured meat to the environmental impact of regular meat were analyzed. The findings of few scholars who objected to the idea of the cultured meat were also studied. Current research suggests that large-scale production of cultured meat might not be feasible. Also, cultured meat may not be nutritionally on par with regular meat and may pose health risks. To conclude, although there are environmental benefits that can spring up from replacing regular meat with cultured meat, the complications and the disadvantages involved with the science and the production of cultured meat outweigh the potential environmental advantages.

Many rainforests in the Central and Southern America have been burnt down to make space for cattle farming, which supplies cheap beef for North America, China and Russia. It is estimated that for every pound of meat that is produced, 200 square feet of rainforest is being destroyed. The causes of rain forest destruction are agriculture and in drier areas, fuelwood collection. The main cause of forest degradation is logging. Mining and industrial development also have a serious impact. Tourism is becoming a larger threat to the forests. Wildfire could cause it and putting too much farm animals on farms which causes them to finish the food. The future consequences if rainforest destruction is not addressed are a loss of habitat for millions of species. Eighty percent of Earth’s land animals and plants live in forests, and many cannot survive the deforestation that destroys their homes. Many former forest lands can quickly become deserts, more extreme temperature swings that can be harmful to plants and animals, and increased speed and severity of global