Meatonomics

by David Robinson Simon

  17. Adam Merberg: “The Grain Inputs on Polyface Farm: Joel Salatin's Take,” Say What, Michael Pollan (blog) (2011), accessed October 27, 2012, http://saywhatmichaelpollan.wordpress.com.

  18. Organic Trade Association, “Industry Statistics and Projected Growth” (2001), accessed November 21, 2011, http://www.ota.com.

  19. C. Foster et al., “Environmental Impacts of Food Production and Consumption: A Report to the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs,” Eldis (2006), accessed August 20, 2011, http://www.eldis.org.

  20. Data expressed in hectares converted to acres. A. G. Williams, E. Audsley, and D. L. Sandars, “Determining the Environmental Burdens and Resource Use in the Production of Agricultural and Horticultural Commodities” (2006), Main Report, UK Department of Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs Research Project IS0205.

  21. Williams, Audsley, and Sandars, “Environmental Burdens in Production of Agricultural Commodities”; David Pimentel and Marcia Pimentel, Food, Energy, and Society (Niwot, CO: Colorado University Press, 1996).

  22. US Environmental Protection Agency, “Methane: Science” (2010), accessed October 27, 2012, http://epa.gov.

  23. L. A. Harper et al., “Direct Measurements of Methane Emissions from Grazing and Feedlot Cattle,” Journal of Animal Science 77, no. 6 (1999): 1392–1401.

  24. ChartsBin, “Total Water Use per Capita by Country,” accessed December 23, 2012, http://chartsbin.com.

  25. Assuming the animal weighs 1,200 pounds; metric units converted to imperial. T. Oki et al., “Virtual Water Trade to Japan and in the World” (presentation, International Expert Meeting on Virtual Water Trade, Netherlands, 2003), accessed November 22, 2011, http://www.waterfootprint.org.

  26. Pimentel and Pimentel, Food, Energy and Society.

  27. Peter H. Gleick et al., The World's Water: The Biennial Report on Freshwater Resources vol. 7 (Washington, DC: Island Press, 2011), 337–38; USDA National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, “Release 25: Content of Selected Foods per Protein (g) Common Measure, Sorted Alphabetically” (2012), accessed December 23, 2012, https://www.ars.usda.gov.

  28. World Health Organization, Safer Water, Better Health: Costs, Benefits, and Sustainability of Interventions to Protect and Promote Health (2008), accessed December 19, 2011, http://www.who.int.

  29. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, “North American Drought Monitor—July 2012” (August 2012), accessed August 27, 2012, http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov.

  30. Ibid., 4.

  31. As measured by the Palmer Hydrological Drought Index. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, “National Drought Overview,” State of the Climate: Drought (November 2011), accessed December 19, 2011, http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov.

  32. Pimentel and Pimentel, “Meat-based and Plant-based Diets.”

  33. Christopher L. Weber and H. Scott Matthews, “Food-Miles and the Relative Climate Impacts of Food Choices in the United States,” Environmental Science and Technology 42, no. 10 (2008): 3508–13.

  34. Rich Pirog et al., “Food, Fuel, and Freeways: An Iowa Perspective on How Far Food Travels, Fuel Usage, and Greenhouse Gas Emissions,” Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture (2001), accessed December 21, 2011, http://www.leopold.iastate.edu.

  35. Caroline Saunders and Andrew Barber, “Carbon Footprints, Life Cycle Analysis, Food Miles: Global Trade Trends and Market Issues,” Political Science 60, no. 1 (2008): 73–88.

  36. Ibid.

  37. Ibid.

  38. Ibid., 87.

  39. McWilliams, Just Food, 214.

  40. Peter Miller and William E. Rees, “Introduction,” in Ecological Integrity: Integrating Environment, Conservation and Health, eds. David Pimentel, Laura Westra, and Reed F. Noss (Washington, DC: Island Press, 2000), 6.

  41. Dennis vanEngelsdorp et al., “A Survey of Honey Bee Colony Losses in the U.S., Fall 2007 to Spring 2008,” PLoS ONE 3, no. 12 (2008): e4071, accessed October 24, 2011, http://www.plosone.org.

  42. Ibid.

  43. George Raine, “Many Causes Blamed for Honeybee Die-off: Colony Collapse Disorder Could Cost $15 Billion,” San Francisco Chronicle (June 1, 2007).

  44. US Department of Agriculture, The Second RCA Appraisal: Soil, Water, and Related Resources on Nonfederal Land in the United States: Analysis of Conditions and Trends (Washington, DC: USDA, 1989).

  45. D. Pimentel et al., “Environmental and Economic Costs of Soil Erosion and Conservation Benefits,” Science 267, no. 5201 (1995): 1117–23.

  46. Steinfeld et al., Livestock's Long Shadow, 168.

  47. Research found $17 billion in “off-site” losses in 1992 dollars, or $27.9 billion in 2012 dollars. I ignore “on-site” losses of roughly $27 billion—$44.2 billion in current dollars—because these costs are internalized and incurred by the producers. 27.9 x 0.55 = 15.4. Pimentel et al., “Environmental and Economic Costs of Soil Erosion,” 1120.

  48. Robert Goodland and Jeff Anhang, “Livestock and Climate Change: What if the Key Actors in Climate Change Are . . . Cows, Pigs and Chickens?” World Watch (November/December 2009), accessed October 25, 2011, http://www.worldwatch.org.

  49. Noreen Malone, “This Weather Is What Global Warming Looks Like,” New York Magazine (July 3, 2012), accessed September 9, 2012, http://nymag.com.

  50. This report, commonly known as AR4, proposes several scenarios for mitigating CO2 emissions by 2030, at various levels of aggressiveness and related cost. The most aggressive scenario, and arguably the most sensible, calls for stabilizing CO2 emissions at 445–535 parts per million (ppm) by 2030. Stabilization at the midpoint of this range, 490 ppm, would mean the average planetary temperature would rise above preindustrial levels by 4.7°F and above today's levels by 3.3°F. Although it's almost 100 points higher than today's level of 395 ppm, acceleration in the ppm growth rate means we'll get there much faster than we think. Incidentally, the present concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is the highest it's been in the past 650,000 years. The rise in CO2 over the past century increased the planet's average temperature by 1.3°F. Not only does CO2's ppm increase each year, but the rate of increase also increases steadily. Thus, before 2000, CO2 increased by an average of 1.5 ppm per year; from 2000 to 2007 it increased at 2.1 ppm per year; and from 2009 to 2010 it increased by 3.0 ppm. This trend in rate increases suggests we'll soon see annual ppm increases of 5.0 and higher. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, “Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report” (2007), accessed October 27, 2012, http://www.ipcc.ch.

  51. $15.1 trillion x 0.0012 x 0.51 = $9.2 billion in 2011 dollars or $9.4 billion in current dollars.

  52. Pesticide costs: Research finds $9.6 billion (in 2003 dollars) in costs associated with pesticide use. (D. Pimentel, “Environmental and Economic Costs of the Application of Pesticides Primarily in the United States,” Environment, Development and Sustainability 7 [2005]: 229–52.) The USDA estimates that 52 percent of US cropland is dedicated to raising feed crops; 52 percent of the total pesticide costs attributable to feed crops is $5 billion, or an inflation-adjusted $6.3 billion. (US Department of Agriculture, “Major Uses of Land in the United States, 2002/EIB-14,” USDA Economic Research Service [2002], 20, accessed September 28, 2012, http://www.ers.usda.gov.)

  Fertilizer costs: Research finds total costs of $2.2 billion arising from all US agriculture in 2008 dollars; the 52 percent of this total attributable to feed crops is $1.1 billion, or $1.2 billion in current dollars. Adding this figure to the $6.3 billion in pesticide costs yields $7.5 billion. (Walter K. Dodds et al., “Eutrophication of U.S. Freshwaters: Analysis of Potential Economic Damages,” Environmental Science and Technology 43, no. 1 [2009].)

  53. “New Fear from Hog Lots: Odor May Spread Illness—Evidence Mounts that Neighbors Are at Risk,” The Des Moines Register (October 25, 1998).

  54. Karen McDonald, “Hog Farm Smell Has Residents Racing for Windows,” Peoria Journal Star (September 11, 2005).

  55. Joseph A. Herriges, Silvia Secchi, and Bruce A. Babcock, “
Living with Hogs: The Impact of Livestock Facilities on Rural Residential Property Values” (working paper, 03-WP 342, Center for Agricultural and Rural Development, Iowa State University 2003), accessed October 25, 2011, http://www.ncifap.org; Raymond B. Palmquist, Fritz M. Roka, and Tomislav Vukina, “Hog Operations, Environmental Effects, and Residential Property Values,” Land Economics 73, no. 1 (1997): 114–24.

  56. Research found that the average decline in real property values within a three-mile radius from each CAFO in Missouri was $2.68 million in 1999 dollars, or $3.7 million today. (Mubarak Hamed, Thomas G. Johnson, and Kathleen K. Miller, The Impacts of Animal Feeding Operations on Rural Land Values [Report R-99-02, College of Agriculture, University of Missouri-Columbia, 1999].) Extrapolating this average to the 18,800 CAFOs the EPA says operate in the United States yields $69.6 billion. (US EPA, “Fact Sheet: Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations Proposed Rulemaking June 2006” [2006], accessed July 5, 2012, http://www.epa.gov.) Amortizing this cost figure over the 27.5-year useful life of residential property (as decreed by the IRS) yields an annualized, externalized cost of $2.5 billion in current dollars.

  57. The EPA says animal feed operations produce more than 500 million tons of manure (1 trillion pounds) yearly. US Environmental Protection Agency, “National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System Permit Regulation and Effluent Limitation Guidelines and Standards for Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs)” 68 FR 7176-01 (2003).

  58. US Environmental Protection Agency, “National Water Quality Inventory 2000 Report” (2000), accessed October 24, 2011, http://www.epa.gov.

  59. Researchers have found that the cost to spread waste over cropland instead of storing it would be $1.2 billion per year in 2005 dollars—$1.4 billion in 2012 dollars. (Marcel Aillery et al., “Managing Manure to Improve Air and Water Quality,” Economic Research Report 9, US Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service [2005]: 26, accessed October 24, 2011, http://www.ers.usda.gov.) Further, research estimates that the cost to repair leaky lagoons is $4.1 billion in 2003 dollars ($5.1 billion in 2012 dollars). (C. Volland, J. Zupancic, and J. Chappell, “Cost of Remediation of Nitrogen-Contaminated Soils under CAFO Impoundments,” Journal of Hazardous Substance Research 4, no. 3 [2003]: 1–18; Doug Gurian-Sherman, “CAFOs Uncovered: The Untold Costs of Confined Animal Feeding Operations” [2008], 6, accessed October 27, 2012, http://www.ucsusa.org.) Because even manure destined to be spread on cropland must be stored for some time to allow solids to decompose, these two costs—spreading and repairing—are not mutually exclusive. To convert the repair cost to an annual figure, it is amortized over the repair's useful life of five years (per the IRS), and assuming that normal wear and tear requires further repairs, it is expected that similar costs will arise every five years. This yields an annual repair cost of about $1 billion, and added to the spreading costs, a total annual cost to deal with manure problems of about $2.4 billion.

  60. US Government Accountability Office, “Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations: EPA Needs More Information and a Clearly Defined Strategy to Protect Air and Water Quality from Pollutants of Concern” GAO-08-944 (2008), 6.

  61. William W. Simpkins et al., “Potential Impact of Earthen Waste Storage Structures on Water Resources in Iowa,” Journal of the American Water Resources Association 38, no. 3 (2002): 759–71.

  62. US Geological Survey, “Fact Sheet FS-027-02, Pharmaceuticals, Hormones, and Other Organic Wastewater Contaminants in U.S. Streams” (2002), accessed October 24, 2011, http://toxics.usgs.gov.

  63. US Government Accountability Office, “Livestock Agriculture: Increased EPA Oversight Will Improve Environmental Program for Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations” (report to the Ranking Member, Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, US Senate, 2003), 3.

  64. Ibid.

  65. Edgar G. Hertwich et al., “Assessing the Environmental Impacts of Consumption and Production: Priority Products and Materials” (report, Working Group on the Environmental Impacts of Products and Materials to the International Panel for Sustainable Resource Management, United Nations Environment Program, 2010), 80, accessed December 20, 2011, www.unep.fr.

  66. US Environmental Protection Agency, “Major Crops Grown in the United States,” accessed December 20, 2011, http://www.epa.gov; Lester Brown, “Soybeans Threaten Amazon Rainforest,” Grist (2010), accessed October 27, 2012, http://grist.org.

  67. McWilliams, Just Food, 119.

  68. Christian J. Peters, Jennifer L. Wilkins, and Gary W. Fick, “Testing a Complete Diet Model for Estimating the Land Resource Requirements of Food Consumption and Agricultural Carrying Capacity: The New York State Example,” Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems 22, no. 2 (2007): 145–53.

  69. Square kilometers converted to acres. Brazil Ministry of Science and Technology, National Institute for Space Research, “INPE Estimates a Reduction of 11% in Amazon Deforestation” (2011), accessed December 20, 2011, http://www.inpe.br.

  70. P. M. Fearnside, “Deforestation in Brazilian Amazonia: History, Rates and Consequences,” Conservation Biology 19, no. 3 (2005): 680–88.

  71. Kilograms converted to pounds. Pimentel and Pimentel, “Meat-Based and Plant-Based Diets.”

  72. Ibid.; UN Food and Agriculture Organization, “The State of Food Insecurity in the World: Addressing Food Insecurity in Protracted Crises” (2010), accessed December 21, 2011, http://www.fao.org.

  73. Vaclav Smil, Feeding the World: A Challenge for the Twenty-First Century (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001).

  74. US Environmental Protection Agency, “Ag 101: Land Use Overview,” National Agriculture Center, accessed December 21, 2011, http://www.epa.gov.

  75. McWilliams, Just Food, 120.

  76. Hertwich et al., “Assessing the Environmental Impacts of Consumption and Production.”

  77. Ibid., 82.

  78. US Environmental Protection Agency, “Methane: Sources and Emissions” (2011), accessed October 29, 2012, http://www.epa.gov.

  Chapter 8

  1. James D. Rose, “Do Fish Feel Pain?” (2000), accessed July 19, 2012, http://www.coloradotu.org.

  2. Matthew Scully, Dominion: The Power of Man, the Suffering of Animals, and the Call to Mercy (New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2002), 258–59.

  3. See, for example, F. Bailey Norwood and Jayson L. Lusk, Compassion by the Pound: The Economics of Farm Animal Welfare (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 344–45: “75 percent [of survey respondents] say they would vote for a law in their state requiring farmers to treat their animals better.”

  4. Ron Torell, “Cow Camp Chatter: Replacement Rate,” Sage Signals: Voice of the Nevada Livestock Industry (November, 2011): 6, accessed August 22, 2012, http://www.nevadacattlemen.org.

  5. Nicholas Fontaine, Memories Pour Server a l'Histoire de Port-Royal (Cologne, 1738): 52–53; quoted in From Beast-Machine to Man-Machine: The Theme of Animal Soul in French Letters from Descartes to La Mettrie, L. Rosenfield (New York: Oxford University Press, 1940).

  6. Lynne Sneddon, “The Evidence for Pain in Fish: The Use of Morphine as an Analgesic,” Applied Animal Behaviour Science 83, no. 2 (2003): 153–62.

  7. D. A. Denton et al., “The Role of Primordial Emotions in the Evolutionary Origin of Consciousness,” Consciousness and Cognition 18, no. 2 (2009): 500–14.

  8. Lynne U. Sneddon, Victoria A. Braithwaite, and Michael J. Gentle, “Do Fishes Have Nociceptors? Evidence for the Evolution of a Vertebrate Sensory System,” Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 270, no. 1520 (2003): 1115–21.

  9. Sneddon, “Pain in Fish.”

  10. Ibid.

  11. Janicke Nordgreen et al., “Thermonociception in Fish: Effects of Two Different Doses of Morphine on Thermal Threshold and Post-Test Behaviour in Goldfish (Carassius Auratus),” Applied Animal Behavior Science 119, no. 1 (2009): 101–7.

  12. Quoted in Brian Wallheimer, “Fish May Actually Feel Pain and React to It Much Like Humans,” Purdue University News (April 29, 2009). />
  13. T. G. Pottinger and A. D. Pickering, “Genetic Basis to the Stress Response: Selective Breeding for Stress Tolerant Fish,” in Fish Stress and Health in Aquaculture, ed. G. K. Iwama et al. (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1997).

  14. Aquaculture Innovation Network, “Cataracts in Farmed Fish,” accessed August 26, 2011, http://www.aquamedia.org.

  15. P. J. Midtlyng et al., “Current Research on Cataracts in Fish,” Bulletin of the European Association of Fish Pathologists 19, no. 6 (1999): 299–301.

  16. Mark D. Powell and Steve F. Perry, “Respiratory and Acid-Base Pathophysiology of Hydrogen Peroxide in Rainbow Trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss Walbaum),” Aquatic Toxicology 37, no. 2 (1997): 99–112.

  17. N. W. Ross et al., “Changes in Hydrolytic Enzyme Activities of Naive Atlantic Salmon (Salmo salar) Skin Mucus Due to Infection with the Salmon Louse (Lepeophtheirus salmonis) and Cortisol Implantation,” Diseases of Aquatic Organisms 41, no. 1 (2000): 43–51; S. C. Johnson and L. J. Albright, “Effects of Cortisol Implants on the Susceptibility and the Histopathology of the Responses of Naive Coho Salmon Oncorhynchus kisutch to Experimental Infection with Lepeophtheirus salmonis (Copepoda: Caligidae),” Diseases of Aquatic Organisms 14 (1992): 195–205.

  18. D. Mackay, “Perspectives on the Environmental Effects of Aquaculture,” (presentation, Aquaculture Europe Conference, Norway, August 1999).

  19. S. C. Kestin, S. B. Wotton, and S. Adams, “The Effect of CO2, Concussion or Electrical Stunning of Rainbow Trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) on Fish Welfare,” in Quality in Aquaculture, Special Publication 23, eds. N. Svennevig and A. Krogdahl (Gent, Belgium: European Aquaculture Society, 1995); D. H. F. Robb et al., “Commercial Slaughter Methods Used on Atlantic Salmon: Determination of the Onset of Brain Failure by Electroencephalography,” Veterinary Record 147, no. 11 (2000): 298–303.

  20. European Food Safety Authority, “Scientific Report of the Scientific Panel on Animal Health and Welfare” (2004), accessed August 27, 2011, http://www.efsa.europa.eu.

  21. S. C. Kestin, D. H. F. Robb, and J. W. van de Vis, “Protocol for Assessing Brain Function in Fish and the Effectiveness of Methods Used to Stun and Kill Them,” Veterinary Record 150 (2002): 302–7.