Interesting piece pointing out some possibly non-obvious considerations about future food supply. However, it fails miserably at answering "How" the suggested change in diet for first-world eaters will come about. Sure, most who care to look realize that feeding grain to animals is an inefficient way to produce edible calories, but in order for there to be a mass shift away from meat consumption in first-world countries, that inefficiency has to be accurately reflected (if not exaggerated) in the relative prices of meat and grains. Should there be a meat tax? It seems that the alternative is years of fluctuation in food prices (as we flail about seeking the new equilibrium) that mostly have a negative effect for the world's poor.
There is a "meat tax" which is exactly equal to/accounts for the inefficiency that you're worried about. That inefficiency is in the price of meat because suppliers pass the cost of grain through to their customers.
People don't always buy the most efficient. Get over it.
I recently discovered Quinoa, which is quite delicious and very nutritious (it has a balanced set of essential amino acids). It's also pretty cheap. I'm not sure how hardy the plant is though. Googling shows that it's on the short list of foods often mentioned as being able to play a significant role in world hunger.
[update] Probably one of the easiest and most nutritious meals I know is some quinoa, chopped veggies and sriracha. Hell, quinoa and sriracha isn't bad in a pinch.
I discovered it as well, loved the idea of having something so balanced, unfortunately I can't eat it. After trying it, I had a severe allergic reaction, ending in the hospital the first time, and the second riding the pain out for three hours. An odd food to be allergic too, but too bad.
Really interesting piece, but the end falls short. I would have loved to see concrete solutions and possible implementations. It felt like the article was building up to that.
One of the key factors has to be the unlocking of previously 'unfarmable' into a self sustaining fertile alternative. Big agro-business contends that this is not possible and that we need to use oil based fertilisers and pesticides, machine intensive techniques and pumped water irrigation. It turns out that this does not seem to be the case at all.
This 'Greening the Desert' projects shows a promising way forward using long term (5-8 years) permaculture techniques to render arid, salty and previously unproductive land into productive land able to capture and sustain the majority of the water it needs with minimal irrigation.
I recommend watching the videos, truly inspiring stuff. The original greening the desert project transformed an arid, salt ridden area in Jordan into a fruit producing farm within a few years. The locals laughed initially at their efforts but then started queuing up to learn how it was done.
The other thing we need to do (in the West) is appreciate the value and privilege of eating meat and stop expecting to base a large part of our diets on it. A given amount of land can feed 7x the number of people when used to grow plant crops eaten directly as opposed to feeding it to livestock.
And I would add the issue of food waste, if you go through the whole chain, a lot of food produced is wasted because of inefficiencies in each steps of the transformation and distribution chain
Putting your head in the sand and saying "eat less meat" is not going to fix the problem. As billions of people come out of poverty, they're going to rightly demand their share of meat.
As has been pointed out, it's easy to feed 9 billion people on grain alone. But feeding 9 billion people meat and a healthy variety of vegetables is a much more difficult challenge.
But luckily, there are ways to fix this problem and still let people eat their meat:
1) cows eat grass. Currently, modern cows eat grain. Historically, cows ate grass. Grass-fed cows are healthier, happier and much more nutritious. Grain fed cows also waste most of the grain they're fed: a cow fed corn needs 12 calories of grain to produce a single calorie of meat. But a chicken needs far fewer pounds of grain since birds evolved to eat grains & insects. Cows eat grass. A grass-fed cow doesn't "steal" any food from humans.
So why do we feed them grain instead of grass? Because it's cheaper. Huge numbers of dollars have been invested in increasing our production of wheat, corn and rice, to great success: yields today on non-virgin farmland are 4-10 times as large as they were 150 years ago. A comparable effort to raise the production of crops such as alfalfa will provide huge benefits. It's insane that it's more efficient to to plant a crop of barley, harvest the seeds to feed to cows and throw away the rest of the plant than it is to plant something else and feed the whole plant to the cow.
The other part of the solution is to eat a wider variety of meats and less beef. Bacon is the only form of pork that Americans eat, yet it's tastier than beef, IMO. Luckily, most Asians already know that.
2) fix our fishing: Current fishing practices are hugely wasteful. We've got a huge number of boats chasing a small number of fish, reducing stocks well below the most efficient breeding population size. Properly managed oceans could produce far more meat calories for humans than it currently does. We'd have to reduce our fishing now, but do we want a few calories now or a large number of calories later? Through the tragedy of the commons, we're saying a "few calories now".
Sadly the idea that eating less of things like meat and other 'expensive' to produce foods will help feed the world is a bit short sighted. Not to mention that the majority of first world diets which are more heavily carb based is slowly killing us. There are many diseases that are caused by our diets and continuing to eat the way the government and many health officials recommend is detrimental to our health. Meat is an important facet of our diet, and it is a lot more healthy than the last 40 years of medical rhetoric has led us to believe.
I think locally we can do better by focusing on local produce and other food products. Maybe to the point of having vertical farms inside cities which could feed the local populace and cut down on pollution from shipping the food around as well as give higher quality fresher food to the local community. As another poster mentioned, we shouldn't try and force our mechanized techniques to third world countries, they just don't work.
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 40.5 ms ] threadThere is a "meat tax" which is exactly equal to/accounts for the inefficiency that you're worried about. That inefficiency is in the price of meat because suppliers pass the cost of grain through to their customers.
People don't always buy the most efficient. Get over it.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/20/world/americas/20bolivia.h...
[update] Probably one of the easiest and most nutritious meals I know is some quinoa, chopped veggies and sriracha. Hell, quinoa and sriracha isn't bad in a pinch.
This 'Greening the Desert' projects shows a promising way forward using long term (5-8 years) permaculture techniques to render arid, salty and previously unproductive land into productive land able to capture and sustain the majority of the water it needs with minimal irrigation.
http://permaculture.org.au/2007/03/01/greening-the-desert-no...
I recommend watching the videos, truly inspiring stuff. The original greening the desert project transformed an arid, salt ridden area in Jordan into a fruit producing farm within a few years. The locals laughed initially at their efforts but then started queuing up to learn how it was done.
The other thing we need to do (in the West) is appreciate the value and privilege of eating meat and stop expecting to base a large part of our diets on it. A given amount of land can feed 7x the number of people when used to grow plant crops eaten directly as opposed to feeding it to livestock.
The problem is distribution. Politics finds food distribution - or creative hinderance thereof - a powerful tool in controlling populations.
As has been pointed out, it's easy to feed 9 billion people on grain alone. But feeding 9 billion people meat and a healthy variety of vegetables is a much more difficult challenge.
But luckily, there are ways to fix this problem and still let people eat their meat:
1) cows eat grass. Currently, modern cows eat grain. Historically, cows ate grass. Grass-fed cows are healthier, happier and much more nutritious. Grain fed cows also waste most of the grain they're fed: a cow fed corn needs 12 calories of grain to produce a single calorie of meat. But a chicken needs far fewer pounds of grain since birds evolved to eat grains & insects. Cows eat grass. A grass-fed cow doesn't "steal" any food from humans.
So why do we feed them grain instead of grass? Because it's cheaper. Huge numbers of dollars have been invested in increasing our production of wheat, corn and rice, to great success: yields today on non-virgin farmland are 4-10 times as large as they were 150 years ago. A comparable effort to raise the production of crops such as alfalfa will provide huge benefits. It's insane that it's more efficient to to plant a crop of barley, harvest the seeds to feed to cows and throw away the rest of the plant than it is to plant something else and feed the whole plant to the cow.
The other part of the solution is to eat a wider variety of meats and less beef. Bacon is the only form of pork that Americans eat, yet it's tastier than beef, IMO. Luckily, most Asians already know that.
2) fix our fishing: Current fishing practices are hugely wasteful. We've got a huge number of boats chasing a small number of fish, reducing stocks well below the most efficient breeding population size. Properly managed oceans could produce far more meat calories for humans than it currently does. We'd have to reduce our fishing now, but do we want a few calories now or a large number of calories later? Through the tragedy of the commons, we're saying a "few calories now".
I can't agree with you there. Think of all the ham, barbeque, and ribs, and pork chops.
Maybe you are talking about fast food (lots of beef, not much pork)?
I think locally we can do better by focusing on local produce and other food products. Maybe to the point of having vertical farms inside cities which could feed the local populace and cut down on pollution from shipping the food around as well as give higher quality fresher food to the local community. As another poster mentioned, we shouldn't try and force our mechanized techniques to third world countries, they just don't work.