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"Eating Meat: Wrecking The Planet And Creating A Global Food Shortage “In environmental terms, meat-eating is a costly habit. The world’s livestock herds consume increasing quantities of land, energy and water. A quarter of the earth’s landmass is used as pasture for farmed animals; more than half the farmland in the USA is devoted to beef production. “While it takes, on average, 25 gallons (113 litres) of water to produce a pound of wheat in modern Western farming systems, it requires an astonishing 2,500 gallons (11,250 litres) of water to produce a pound of meat. “Throughout the world, livestock herds accelerate erosion and desertification; 85% of topsoil loss in the USA is attributed to livestock ranching, for example” Joni Seager, The State of The Environment Atlas, Penguin Books 1995 Environmental Devastation Caused By Sheep Farming Sheep suffer terribly during floods and bad weather, and flooding that looks set to become increasingly common. Thousands of animals literally drown in the fields or die as a result of the relentless rain and wind, from which they have no shelter. But as well as the price imposed on the animals themselves, sheep farmers are identified as being part responsible for the flooding. “We’ve focused on the water, but it’s not the river that generates floods,” Ann Sansom, a rural land use officer in the northeast region, told The Guardian (Nov 15, 2000). She believes that a huge increase in sheep numbers has stopped the moors functioning as they always did – as giant sponges. In the 1860s, Britain’s sheep population was about eight million. Today, thanks to EU subsidies, there are more than 35 million. Sansom and other ecologists say that the fragile uplands can’t support more than 1.5 sheep per hectare. But some moors have seven to the hectare and never get the chance to recover because animals remain there all year, trampling the land and stripping back the vegetation, including heather. With vegetation stripped away and the land puddled, the water pours off the hills ever faster. Doubling a river’s speed increases its erosive power fourfold and its power to carry sediment 64 times. As riverbeds are gouged deeper and deeper, lethal flash floods become common. Meanwhile, topsoil is washed into the rivers, killing fish and wildlife, and reservoirs become choked. Overstocking of sheep also prevents water soaking into the ground as a result of the surface becoming sealed. With water unable to percolate into the aquifers that are a crucial source of drinking water, they fail to recharge and floods are followed by droughts. (From The Guardian Society, November 15, 2000). factfile www.animalaid.org.uk • tel: 01732 364546 Environmentally Deadly Pig And Chicken Farms Nitrogen emissions from intensive pig and chicken farms are as bad for the atmosphere as belching chimney stacks and emissions from power stations, according to a survey by the Institute of Terrestrial Ecology in Grange-over-Sands in Cumbria. (The Observer July 25, 1999). These nitrogen emissions are killing woods and forests at the same rate as the effects of industrial pollution. Plumes of nitrogen chemicals, mostly compounds of ammonia, have been detected pouring into the air from animal farms, stripping local coniferous forests of their pines and suffocating them. The emissions – most of them from the animal farms’ growing piles of manure – are causing serious damage to woodland in some areas. In Denmark and Holland, where large pig and chicken farms are a major industry, precious heathlands are being destroyed. and phosphorus levels, as animals can only absorb a limited amount contained in their food. Up to 80% of dietary nitrogen is excreted in faeces and urine and end up polluting groundwater and aquatic ecosystems. Excess nitrogen causes algae to grow on water surfaces, choking other surface plant life and blocking light from reaching below the water surface causing loss of life (eutrophication). As well as being a major cause of pollution, animal farming is incredibly wasteful in its use of water. Huge amounts of water are needed by the livestock industries not only to give to the animals themselves to drink, but vast quantities are also needed to grow crops to feed to them, and furthermore, in the processing of the carcasses at slaughterhouses. Currently up to 90% of all managed water is used to grow food. ‘Western diets, which depend largely on meat, are already putting great pressures on the environment. Meat-eaters consume the equivalent of about 5000 litres of water a day compared to the 1000-2000 litres used by people on vegetarian diets in developing countries. All that water has to come from somewhere.’ International Water Management Institute Animal Farming And Global Warming Farmed cows and sheep generate about one-fifth of the world’s methane production – thus contributing significantly to global warming. With 2.2 million dairy cows in the UK, that is 230,000 tonnes of methane every year, to which must be added the output from beef cattle and sheep. (The Guardian August 9, 2000). Carbon dioxide is another important contributor to global warming, according to David Gee, former Director of Friends of the Earth. He believes that the amount of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere from the production of each pound of steak is equivalent to driving 25 miles in a car. Global Food Shortage Human populations are on the increase, but world food production has not and will not be able to keep pace with a modern western meat-eating diet, which is becoming more popular in developing countries as they look to the developed world for influence. Roughly 70% of UK agricultural land is utilised for livestock production. The vast majority of this is used for growing grain to be fed to animals farmed intensively. Various estimates put the amount of the world’s harvest fed to animals between one third and almost 50%. The UN World Food Council has estimated that transferring ‘ten to fifteen per cent of cereals now fed to livestock is enough to raise the world’s food supply to feed current levels’ of the human population. CIWF. The Global Benefits of Eating Less Meat. 2005 ‘In cycling our grain through livestock, we waste 90% of its protein and 96% of its calories. An acre of cereal can produce five times more protein than an acre devoted to meat production; and legumes (beans, lentils, peas) can produce ten times as much. Thus the greater the human consumption of animal products, the fewer people can be fed.’ Joni Seager, The State of the Environment Atlas, Penguin Books. ‘Those who consume livestock products and fish are competing directly with those who need grain for food’. Lester Brown, president of the Worldwatch Institute, USA. Rainforest Destruction www.animalaid.org.uk • tel: 01732 364546 Livestock farming is also a major source of rainforest destruction. Forests are cleared so that cattle can be grazed to produce beefburgers. Eventually, grazing destroys the fertility of the soil and the cattle are moved on to yet more cleared forest. This process is known as “hamburgerisation”. Since 1970, “farmers and ranchers have converted more than 20 million hectares of Latin America’s moist tropical forests to cattle pasture.” (Taking Stock, Worldwatch Paper No 103, Alan B Durning and Holly B Brough). Livestock Farming And Water Pollution/Consumption Livestock farming is one of the biggest sources of water pollution. The Meat Trades Journal itself has stated that, in the UK, “the list of companies which have been prosecuted by the National Rivers Authority for pollution offences reads like a Who’s Who of the meat and food industry”. Around one quarter of the agricultural water pollution incidents recorded by the UK National Rivers Authority are related to dairy farming. Dairy farming produces silage effluent, slurry and dirty water from parlour and yard washings. According to UK government figures, dairy cows produce an average 57 litres of excreta every day and utilise 18-35 litres of cleaning water. The liquid waste from dairy farms is hundreds of times more polluting than human sewage. Liquid slurry from farmed animals contains excess nitrogen factfile For more information see factsheet: How Not To Feed The World ..."

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