Did you know the average American eats 209 pounds of meat per year. Americans need to drastically cut down on the amount of meat we eat because the animal agriculture industry is not sustainable, livestock have created more than 500 nitrogen flooded dead zones around the world in our oceans, and it's responsible for up to 80% of destruction done to the Amazon rain forest.
Meat production requires 18 times more land than vegetable production. For example you can produce 37,000 lbs. of vegetables on 1 1/2 acres. That same 1 ½ acres can produce only 375 lbs of meat. To feed one person for one year on a vegan diet takes ⅙ of an acre. A vegetarian diet takes three times as much land which is ½ acre. But to eat the amount of meat we do requires about three acres or eighteen times more land. That is 3 acres per person times the population of 319 million people equals about 957 million acres. We’ve already used this amount of acres in the United States for grassland, pastures, and cropland.
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Livestock operations on land have created more than 500 nitrogen flooded dead zones around the world in our oceans. There wiping out animals,they caught wild horses and wiped out the wolf population, they also killed elephants just so animal agriculture could have room to roam.
Animal agriculture is responsible for up to 80% of destruction done to the amazon rain forest. Livestock covers over 45% of amazon's total land. 136 million acres have been cleared in the Amazon due to animal agriculture. (cowspiracy.com) Dorothy Stang’s was a lady who was against them cutting down the forest so she was killed. She demanded Brazil’s government crack down on the illegal seizure and clearance of the rain forest to graze cattle that's why she was killed.
Animal testing has been one of the issues that people are fighting overtime because of its moral. Even though some results of tests are successful on people, many people are still fighting for the animal’s rights. They believe that animals should have their own rights to live a free life where they belong, just like their species. In scientists point of view, animals have been one of the main subjects to test on, but a lot of them are currently looking forward to use and develop alternatives for the cruel act of animal testing.
Every year the meat industry is said to kill more than 66 billion animals for human consumption.
Firstly,animals uses 3 to 15 times as much water than plant vegetation and secondly eating meat increases the chances of you getting heart disease America’s #1 killer.Humans loves animals but why do you kill them or eat them? and also cows gives us milk, chickens gives us eggs and cows or goats milk makes cheese and suddenly out of nowhere no more animals no more milk,no more eggs nothing just nothing because us humans ate them. Oh yea also do you want to be obese? statistics show that 60% of saturated fat comes from meat. another
The world has a need for meat, and it is almost obsessive. Most cultures typically consume some sort of domesticated animal in agriculture. Whether it is cows, chicken, lamb, deer, turkey, or fish, many people are not educated to the fact that the alternative diets are better for their health. There are different animal products for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Hundreds if not thousands of diverse chain restaurants dedicated to meat consumption.There are also many different holidays around the world such as Thanksgiving and Christmas where meat is consumed. With affordable prices and an acquired taste, it is likely to be a lifelong habit. There are vast miles of subsidized agricultural land dedicated to the cultivation of animals. According to Amir Khan, staff writer for U.S.News, reporting on the American Meat Institute, Americans consume, “57 pounds more meat than they were in the 1950s”(Khan).
Many people challenge the rules for several different reasons. It’s always appropriate to challenge the rules when the rules are unfair, or against what you think is right. You can challenge the rules to make them fair and equal for everyone. Just how the two excerpts, Animal Farm by George Orwell, and Texas vs. Johnson, by the U.S. Supreme Court. These two excerpts explore the issue of when it is appropriate to challenge the rules. Challenging the rules can lead to positive or negative outcomes. You can change the rules for a good reason, or a bad one, but it’s always better to challenge the rules in order to make them more equal.
In discussion of meat production one controversial issue has been limited resources. On the one hand you have PETA and other health organizations which argue that meat production is terrorizing our environment. On the other hand, millions of people rely on eating meat. My view would relate to PETA and other health organizations about how the mast production of meat is harmful. As stated by PETA, “Cows must consume 16 pounds of vegetation in order to convert them into 1 pound of flesh. Raising animals for food consumes more than half of all water used in the U.S. It takes 2,500 gallons of water to produce a pound of meat but only 25 gallons to produce a pound of wheat” (How Does 1.2). Meaning that if we were to put more time into wheat, which creates a wide variety of food like pasta, rice, cereals and other products we would be saving water and other resources. Especially now, you have states in the U.S, like California, who have been in a drought for quite some time and would probably enjoy water like the majority of the country. If the amount of meat being produced and eaten by the average American was reduced, it could be probable that droughts that bad in California could be refrained from happening. Food and water is needed in everyday life to survive, but that’s not the only thing meat production is doing harmfully to our
About a year ago, I asked myself a question why am I not a vegetarian? After all, I am one of the green kids. I grew up with my vegetarian dad in a small town. I even joined a club called “Tree Huggers”. I knew that eating a mere hamburger a day could increase my risk of dying by a third. I knew that the 10 billion animals we raise each year for meat are raised in factory farmed conditions that we hypocritically wouldn’t even consider for our own cats, dogs and other pets. I knew that I was not alone, we as a society are eating twice as much meat as we did in the 50s. So, what was once the special little side treat now is the main course much more regular. What if I told you, that we can change our world through our food choices. The fact
One would think, if the whole United States went vegan we would be killing more plants, because we are consuming more of them…but it is just the opposite. With production mainly being from grains; which in turn are so much better for your health, than a piece of steak. In addition, the percentage of greenhouse gases would decrease a hefty amount; almost ¼
In the year of 2012, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) estimated that Americans ate an average of 52.3 pounds of beef, 57.4 pounds of chicken and 43.5 pounds of pork per person.(citation?) Only 5% of Americans are vegetarians and with that much meat eaten by Americans, in one year alone why should you to forced to become vegetarian? With meat being the main staple in the Americans diet there is no reason we should take that of the table. That fact alone shows that most Americans’ diets are made up of meat sources. According to the United States Census Bureau (USCB) the U.S. population was 313.8 million; meaning that 16 billion pounds of beef, 18 billion chicken and 13 billion pounds of pork was eaten by Americans alone in
As more and more of the planets population grows, more foods are in demand to keep everyone in the world fed. Foods such as meats, vegetables, fruits, and more are produced by the millions throughout the world, but many consumers have no clue how much energy is used to produce them. One of the food groups, the production of meat, is the biggest threat to the environment next to cars. Additionally it is known that production of meat has led to methane, and carbon dioxide emission, large amount of land and water use, and unhealthy eating habits that can lead to obesity. Now imagine a society where red meat is not available for consumption, and everyone converted to vegetarianism. People will be overall healthy and fed, carbon emission would drastically go down, and many acres of land will be available for use. In my utopian project, in a span of 25-50 years, I will propose a plan to completely ban the consumption of meat and incorporate more fish farms and futuristic farming to the United States. This plan will result to less carbon dioxide emissions, less water use and completely change the health of the citizens in the United States. My vegetarian/pescetarian utopia will be successful in addressing the issues of the overall health of both the planet and the people of the United states.
Ironically, the industry also wastes massive amounts of food. The amount of grain consumed by America's livestock - about five times the grain consumed by humans in the U.S. - could feed 800 million people (Corliss). Jean Mayer, a nutritionist at Harvard, estimates that a reduction in meat consumption by the American people by just ten percent would produce enough grain to feed 60 million people (Motavelli), and former Environmental Minister of India Maneka Gandhi is quoted as saying, "Were all of [the grain fed to livestock] consumed directly by humans, it would nourish five times as many people as it does after being converted into meat, milk and eggs" (qtd. in Hurley 40). The problem is exacerbated by the fact that meat production is such an inefficient use of land: while a ten-acre farm could support 60 people growing soybeans or 24 people growing wheat, the same ten acres could support only two people raising cattle (Motavelli).
Animal agriculture is the biggest threat to our environment. It is an immense waste of water. According to Dr. George Borgstrom, Chairman of Food Science and Human Nutrition Dept of College of Agriculture and Natural Resources at Michigan State University, it takes about 2,500 gallons of water to make just one beef burger. Water consumption from animal agriculture ranges from 34-76 trillion gallons annually. This doesn’t just hurt the environment—it hurts people too. How can we accept that there are currently 844 million people without access to clean water, and we are wasting it on producing meat? In fact, we’re not only wasting water, we are wasting land and crops. Animal agriculture takes up a vast amount of land, leading to deforestation, and causing more animals to become endangered. With the growing population of our planet, this isn’t sustainable. It’s expected that in the U.S alone, meat consumption will double over the next forty years. Crop farming only takes up ⅓ of the land that animal agriculture does. The chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) found that about 2.5 acres of land producing fruit, vegetables, and grain can feed up to 30 people. The same area if used to produce meat, can only feed up to 10 people. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations estimates that Animal agriculture also contributes to 18%
Each day, millions of Americans flock to grocery stores, picking out the food they plan to eat, often placing a beef product in their shopping cart. Most people set it down in their shopping cart and keep going along their day, not even thinking about how the animal it came from lived its life, was killed, and how the meat was packed. However, there are many people who oppose the meat industry’s execution of these processes, regardless of it being very efficient and inexpensive. There have been many inside investigations attempting to expose the meat industry, making it known to the public how poorly these animals, predominantly cows, are treated, in order to make a new law that would change the methods used. These exploitations have been
Consumption of meat by humans creates several problems. First and foremost, raising animals for food compromises the environment. For example, it takes a large amount of natural resources to sustain the meat industry. The use of water, land, and food to raise animals for human consumption is not an efficient use of our limited resources. In contrast, it is more efficient to feed humans directly than to use land, food, and water to feed animals to be used as food. There are shortages of fertile land, clean water, and food in several third world countries. Many of these countries’ resources are allocated to produce feed for animals in developed countries around the world. As a result, the citizens of these countries are stricken with water and food shortages, while their crops are feeding cattle from across the globe. However, this problem can be solved by adopting a vegan diet. The vegan diet will allow a more efficient use of resources that in turn can be used to feed starving men, women, and children throughout the world. Consequently, more people in the world could be fed if the land used to grow feed for animals was used to grow food for humans.
Vegetarianism is also another alternative that many consider will help feed more mouths. Since 1980, Brazil's meat consumption has more than doubled to 197 pounds a year and China's intake of meat has quadrupled to 109 pounds per person. It requires a lot of time and energy to produce animals for consumption. It takes about 7 pounds of corn to produce 1 pound of beef, 6.5 pounds of corn to produce 1 pound of pork, and 2.6 pounds of corn to produce 1 pound of chicken. From an energy efficiency standpoint then it makes sense to phase out the “middleman” of meat as it means that more calories are received per person and not lost. Moreover, animal agriculture accounts for 50% of water use worldwide so by reducing this activity, more water can be