How is being vegetarian "green"?

Question

I can understand (although disagree with) the vegan argument that dairy/poultry/beef production is inhumane, but I do not understand the aspect that being vegetarian is somehow better for the earth. What about all the agrichemicals, diesel fuel, and vast amounts of water used to produce any ag product? People who also buy only organics (the minority) can argue the first item somewhat, but it still requires a lot of water and energy to produce your soy, wheat germ, and vegetables. Not to mention, organic vegetable production is far from being overwhemingly successful (if it were, it would be the norm). So, without being combative, what say you?

A few of you have very faulty logic and a very narrow (read PETA) view. The food for animals is GROWN for animals. You cannot (or wouldn't) want to eat it. And how about the offset of the feed crops creating anti-greehouse effects (cooling, O2)? Not to mention, how would your organic produce be grown without the animal byproducts? Where would we dispose of our green waste (not your lawn, more like rotten tomatoes)? I make my living from agriculture. I am sorry to burst your collective bubbles, but your views are oversimplified and biased against the realities of the market, the system, and the truth.
For instance, all can agree that no one wishes to harm their own investments, yes? And conditions harmful to livestock or the fields would result in inferior products or lower production. Therefor, it stands to reason that producers are the best stewards of the land anywhere. Not protecting our interests harms us most directly of anyone.

JR>
Where do you think YOUR s**t goes?
An acre of houses uses about the same quantity of water as an acre of farmland (which DOESN'T pave the earth).
Cows don't burn diesel. Cows are only transported a max of two or three times. Vegetables are planted/cultivated/fertilized/harvested/transported all using diesel fuel. And last time I checked, 40,000 pounds of vegetables (a typical load) weighs the same as 40,000 lbs of animals. So the arguement a vegetable truck burns less fuel than a stock truck makes no sense at all.

People! When was the last time a dairy pond overflowed and polluted ANYone's water supply???? You are debating on pure emotion!
Want the facts? (Probably not. Never good to cloud an arguement with facts) Diary ponds are treated using biotic organisms (same as your local municipal s**t ponds) and when the water is adequately treated, is spread back on the fields to act as ORGANIC fertilizer to grow the feed to produce teh cows. The solids are composted and used the same way. You should LOVE dairies. They are a model of a complete system.

Answer 1

Why all the anger and hatred towards vegetarians? Your question and comments border on being a rant! The last line of your questions additional details says you don't want to be combative but your additional comments (and what I've seen of your YA history here in V&V shows that isn't your style!).

I thought you were a wine maker? What possessed you to get into a low profit industry like dairy? Are high feed prices with no increase in government tax subsidies making you cranky or maybe is it that you've been sampling a little too much of your wine? ;-)

Just so you know where I'm coming from I grew up on farms and ranches, my family is heavily involved in the ag business and I've worked all aspects of the biz.

The simple unavoidable FACT is that no matter how efficient the end processor (like a dairy or slaughterhouse) is, the entire animal industry is based on a highly inefficient economic model, which is why it would have collapsed decades ago without government support in the form of tax breaks, price supports and direct subsidies!

I'm sure you're aware that until the recent ethanol mania 90% of the US grain crop was sold as animal feed and not to directly feed people. Those same statistical sources show that most of the top quality grains didn't go to humans, but instead were used to feed cattle. If you've been in the business for long you already are aware of these facts since dairy industry publications have been pointing out those facts for *decades*.

Let's bring cattle feed a little closer to home. We both know that a bare minimum daily dietary requirement for a producing dairy cow is 10lbs of grain based feed, right? You aren't going to disagree with that amount are you (except to say it's too low)? That 10lbs of feed will have (again, at a bare minimum) 5lbs of corn, soymeal, wheat and sorghum that in point of fact are *perfectly* edible and nutritious for humans and would easily feed 3 people without first being 'processed' by a cow. You aren't going to argue that it's more efficient to feed those grains to a cow are you? To put it direct perspective I get at *least* two gallons of soymilk per pound of soybeans, can your cow beat that inherent efficiency? Didn't think so! And in making soymilk I've got the Yuba and Okara to make more 'meat' than I get from your cow!

Green is all about being efficient and reducing waste, your dairy (and the entire animal industry) just can't compete with the inherent efficiency of direct conversion of grains into milk and meat replacement products.

In your comments you attack assumed peta supporters by saying that grains are grown for animal feed. That's just not even *close* to being the truth! Farmers grow grains to sell to whatever market will give them the highest profit; historically that has been the animal feed market and NOT direct to human markets! Can you name one grain that isn't usable by humans? I suppose you could *try* to argue that hay production isn't directly edible by humans but the simple FACT is that if the hay market vanished (my everyone magically going vegan) that same land is *perfectly* suitable for growing grains!

As to the 'green waste'? Ever hear of compost? mulch? Ever examine no-till methods of growing crops? That 'green waste' breaks down into perfectly bio-available fertilizer and is quite valuable in preventing soil erosion and maintaining stable soil moisture levels! Mayhaps you should do some extra research into modern farming methods?

You really tore into JR and you're comments are shortsighted (to put it mildly). How many truckloads of cattle feed are you receiving on a daily basis? How much fuel are you personally burning mucking out your feeding area, queuing station, milking parlor? Do I really need to go into details on how much extra diesel is burned in the production of milk/meat over direct conversion of grains into people food?

Don't even PRETEND to claim you don't know about how MASSIVE a problem waste lagoon containment (or lack thereof) is! As a dairyman you'd know this has been a MAJOR issue for well over 30 years! EVERY dairy publication covers the subject at LEAST once a year!! Ask your local ag extension agent about the subject, since you feign ignorance of water sources being polluted by flooded lagoons! I don't know the numbers for CA, but I know the TCEQ lists them as being a BIGGER water pollution source than the petrochemical industry in Texas! Go look up the subject at the EPA website!

To more specifically answer your question "When was the last time a dairy pond overflowed and polluted Anyone’s water supply?"... The correct answer is TODAY and at least TWICE! That's based on figures from the EPAs enforcement division. Texas alone investigates at least 300 cases per year! Why don't you look up records for CA about the problem?

And finally, instead of coming into the section looking to pick fights with vegetarians&vegans why don't you try to learn from us? We could HELP you become more profitable!!! How? First off, since you do wine, why don't you pay attention to the problem vegans have finding wine made without animal by-products? If you convert your winery to being vegan friendly you'd gain access to a niche market that is willing to pay a premium price for wine (hint, hint).

Since your land and water supply is suitable for grapes and a dairy why don't you get rid of the cattle and start growing soybeans and producing soymilk? The profit margin is MUCH higher for soymilk! Don't forget that the Yuba and Okara 'waste products' are also highly profitable! Have you ever looked into how much those products sell for? You could turn your winery/farm into a veggieland theme park and even get some tourist money showing off how green you are!

Instead of coming into the V&V section and being an irritant, why don't you try learning how much more profit there is on the greener side of the world! You'll then learn what a REAL model of efficiency looks like. '-)

Answer 2

You can't ask a question and then get upset because you don't like the answer.

But for the record, the United Nations says that animal industry causes more pollution than cars.

The EPA says that animal industry does more to pollute the waterways than all other industrial resources combined.

Cows belch and fart methane, a greenhouse gas into the air.

There are 10 billion animals slaughtered for food in the U.S. every year (50 billion worldwide). They produce far more waste than humans do, hellooooo! And if people stopped eating meat, no tney wouldn't take over the world. There are that many animals because factory farmers BREED them.

I did my research on this issue for a letter I wrote in response to an article on global warming in Ms. magazine. Try Googling "vegan diet global warming."

Answer 3

More that 1/3 of all fossil fuels produced in the United States go towards animal agriculture. Each animal that is slaughtered for food must be fed with grains, soy and other crops. The production of these crops requires energy consumption. This feed must then be harvested, transported to feedlots. From the feedlots, animals are then transported to a slaughterhouse, the carcasses are often trucked (in refrigerated trucks – another energy consumer) to yet another processing plant before the meat is ready to be transported to a grocery store.
With the energy needed to produce a single hamburger, you could drive a small car twenty miles.

For each hamburger that originated from animals raised on rain forest land in Central America, approximately 55 square feet of forest have been destroyed. And its not just the rain forest. In the United States, more than 260 million acres of forest have been clear-cut for animal agriculture.

I could go on and mention the Ocean as well but I don't feel that I have to do the research when you haven't even bothered to do it yourself.

Answer 4

Being a Veggie or Vegan can be GREEN. I also think it can not be green too.
Buying local vs shipped in. Growing your own when possible. Buy less 'pre-made" foods, eating made from scratch foods etc.
There is alot of expense on Natural Resources; water is one of the biggest one, followed by waste disposal, all that & more to raise an animal of any sort for human food, compared to being Veggie or Vegan.

Answer 5

True organic farming requires animals to be successful. Commercial fertilizers are petroleum products while organic farmers use manure.

If you really want to twist the 'greens' in a knot, ask them why petroleum isn't green. It's just dead plants and dinosaurs, after all.

What a lot of people don't realize about the chemistry of the Earth is that plants don't clean CO2 from the atmosphere; they only capture it. When a tree dies and decomposes, it gives off all the CO2 it captured when it was alive. Anaerobic decomposition (which is where oil comes from) is the only way to trap CO2 permanently, which is why oil is so heavy in CO2.

Organic composting of vegetable matter is a source of greenhouse gasses, as are animals whose manure is used for fertilizer. Under the Kyoto Protocol, New Zealand has to buy carbon offsets even though they have almost no industry. This is because they have so many sheep which emit methane (farts, which is actually in their breath). Wonder Bread is closing its plants in California because the natural process of making bread puts them in violation of the CO2 emissions standards (yeast gives off CO2 in the process of bread making).

For every solution, there is a whole new set of problems. Nothing we do is a zero-net-sum-gain. Everything has its trade-offs.

Answer 6

I'm just quoting here..."More than half of the water used in the United States today goes to animal agriculture, and since farmed animals produce 130 times more excrement than the human population, the run-off from their waste is fouling our waterways. Animal excrement emits gases, such as hydrogen sulfide and ammonia, that poison the air around farms, as well as methane and nitrous oxide, which are major contributors to global warming. Forests are being bulldozed to make more room for factory farms and feed crops to feed farmed animals, and this destruction causes soil erosion and contributes to species extinction and habitat loss. Raising animals for food also requires massive amounts of food and raw materials: Farmed animals consume 70 percent of the corn, wheat, and other grains that we grow, and one-third of all the raw materials and fossil fuels used in the U.S. go to raising animals for food..." Is this just made up? True, not true? Discuss amongst yourselves.

Answer 7

The logic is pretty straight forward. We consume millions of pounds of meat a year. This meat has to come from somewhere – cattle ranches, turkey farms, etc. In nature, there would never be more animals than an ecosystem can handle. Humans, however, create an artificial over-population that wouldn’t be there if it wasn’t for our demand for meat and animal products.

Many of the species of animals raised for food are not native to those environments in which they’re raised. Cows, for instance, were introduced to America by Europeans, as were many other species around the world. The presence of these animals changes the entire composition of the ecosystem. Native species who need the same food supply begin to starve and dwindle in numbers. Areas of lush vegetation become overgrazed and turn into arid wastelands. Trees and forests are cut back to allow more open range for the cattle. The list goes on…

Remove factory farming from the equation and the farms used to grow their food also cease to exist. If you had 1 acre for raising cattle and 1 acre for growing their food, you’re dedicating 2 acres of land for the purpose of raising cattle. If you remove the cattle, both acres can be used to grow human grade food and the pollution caused by the cattle will also be removed from the environment.

Vegans no longer demand these products and by not demanding them, they stop contributing to the problems the products create. This is where the laws of economics work in. If there’s little demand, there’s no need for a large supply.

If you really want more information, search for something called "Earthship". You'll see how little demand there really could be for these animal products.

Answer 8

A noted environmentalist once said that the two worst things Americans do for the environment are driving inefficient cars and eating factory farmed beef. Yes, growing any food takes water, fuel and energy, but animal products are overwhelmingly more wasteful and polluting than plant foods. For one, if you or I eat wheat, we are responsible for the energy, fuel and water it took to grow and transport that wheat. If we eat grain-fed beef, we are responsible for the energy, fuel and water that went into growing and transporting the grain the cow ate AND the energy, fuel and water that went into raising and slaughtering the cow. Eating lower on the food chain cuts out all that extra expenditure of resources. Then you have to take into account the amount of methane that cattle release into the atmosphere; intensive agribusiness is responsible for measurable global warming from methane alone. Also, the American appetite for cheap beef has provided an economic incentive for less affluent Central American nations to cut down vast swaths of rainforest in order to graze cattle beef for export to the US. Replacing trees with cows is an enormous loss of oxygen and increase in CO2. Then, there's the tons and tons of manure created by the animal food industries. While we all know that manure can be used to fertilize fields (and in organic agriculture this is actually done,) there is far and away too much waste produced on feedlots and it often stored in "swamps" that have been known to pollute the groundwater and even spill over into ponds and streams where it upsets the balance of flora and fauna (of course, some of it doesn't pollute our water because instead it's fed back to food animals, which is another argument against agribusiness entirely!) Organic agriculture IS overwhelmingly successful as evidenced by it's exponential growth over the last couple of decades; change doesn't happen overnight and there are people with a lot of money at stake in chemically-assisted agriculture and a lot of influence in government.

Answer 9

The reason vegetarianism is better for the earth is because it uses less energy. Think about it: it is much more efficient for humans to eat vegetables than to feed the vegetables to animals and then eat the animals. I don't know the exact figures, but I believe you need to feed an animal around 10 lbs. of grains/vegetables for every pound of meat you get from it. So obviously we would save a lot of energy by eating the grains and vegetables directly. Remember that when they say it uses X amount of water, fuel and so on to produce meat, they usually don't include the amount needed to produce the feed for the animal.

Answer 10

To put it frankly, s*** ponds are bad for the environment.

When you cram thousands of animals in a tight space, you have to create a place for excrement (s***) to go. Ranchers create lagoons (a.k.a. s*** ponds) to hold all of the bulls*** (or pig s***). These lagoons then seep into the water supply via ground water or runoff into streams/lakes/etc.

There is a lot of deforestation going on to make more land for cattle seeing as how we (I mean we as in people, not veg*ns) can't stop eating double cheeseburgers.

It takes about 16 pounds of grain to produce 1 pound of beef, but only 1 pound of grain to produce 1 pound of bread. Imagine what could be done with 15 extra pounds of grain.

Last I heard, well over half of the U.S. water supply is used for raising animals for food.

Agrichemicals are bad. Hormones and animal antibiotics are worse.

Diesel fuel is used, but the same goes for transporting animals to slaughter, then to stores. Plus, since animals are so much heavier, more fuel is needed.

Organics are the fastest growing sector of the food market.

Hope this helps you.

EDIT:
If you didn't want our answers, why bother asking a question. You're nitpicking about the least cited reason people become vegetarians/vegans. I assume you try to argue to make yourself feel better about the dead things on your plate. Or do you even care? Try as you might, YOUR biased information is ineffective. We know what happens, and we choose not to partake in such a corrupted system. If you want to stick your head in the sand, go ahead.

Answer 11

It is very difficult to have an honest discussion around these parts, sadly.

I usually make all the people who have great answers/discussion points my contacts, just for this reason.

I starred your question, because I would like to see the responses you get, as I've often wondered about vegan "green"-ness myself.

Good luck on your quest for a true answer!