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Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

cam.ac.uk

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Re: Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

#31

Post by avdempsey »

The temporal dimension is just as important as space. Adding a year between eating meat and a plant-based diet also makes the alternatives more appealing.

After being meat and dairy free for awhile my cravings changed. I guess our brains are plastic? I ate (and loved!) meat for 28 years, but today I don't even crave it, and can report I enjoy food just as much as I used to. If being plant-based required will-power, I don't think I'd be able to do it.

I think it's actually easier to go all the way, and avoid meat completely, than it is to cut back. If meat is a regular, if limited, part of your diet the craving never goes away.

Re: Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

#32

Post by missedthecue »

cj wrote: post #21
war1025 wrote: post #2

> Meat-heavy diets not only risk our health but that of the planet, as livestock farming on a massive scale destroys habitats and generates greenhouse gases. Well that's a bit over the top... Seems like they could have stuck with the "vegetables are good for you" line and had just as relevant of an article.

The article isn’t about vegetables being good “for you”. It’s about a college cafeteria experimenting to reduce carbon emissions and the amount of land required to serve meals: > Last year, University cafeterias (separate from the colleges) announced a 33% reduction in carbon emissions per kilogram of food purchased, and a 28% reduction in land use per kilogram of food purchased.

Something I dont think very many people realize is that cattle are raised on land that is unsuitable for practically any other purpose.

They aren't ranching in Manhatten. Leasing land for grazing brings in about $70 an acre while doing it for crops will bring in around $280 an acre. Development of course would bring in amounts that are several orders of magnitude higher. Where cattle are raised, raising cattle is the only purpose available. This is why ranches are out west in the US or in the outback in Australia.

If the world stopped raising cattle, a lot of steppes around the world would go back to being completely useless. We wouldnt free up valuable land.

Re: Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

#33

Post by cj »

tito wrote: post #22
gvjddbnvdrbv wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it rather exaggerated? Doesn't agriculture as a whole cause around 11% of emissions but car driving and heating/cooling causes around 30%? So if we all stopped eating meat we could cut emissions but a couple of % but if we all stopped driving and turned our heating down/up we could actually make a real difference? Edited with real numbers from https://www.c2es.org/content/international-emissions/

Wish there was a good tool to give you an answer on this, or a way to poke around and be curious. http://energyliteracy.com/ gets close but it's USA only. This article suggests livestock greenhouse gas emissions are equivalent to the entire transportation sector. Basically because methane and carbon dioxide have different effects on warming: https://www.ecowatch.com/which-is-worse-for-the-planet-beef-...

I found that infographic very enlightening. Thanks for sharing.

Re: Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

#35

Post by tito »

A pound of meat isn't the same as a pound of carrots.

In case you're wondering about climate impact per calorie instead of per pound/kg, here's an interesting article from the Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/food/vegetarian-or-...

I see a lot of these charts that a pound of beef vs carrots. Just seems dumb, I would have to eat far more than a pound of carrots to match the calories of a pound of beef. Most data/infographic stuff in a climate world bugs me because it's just not well presented. The overall conclusion is the same -- eating meat is a huge carbon footprint compared to vegetables. Climate change has a marketing problem.

Re: Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

#36

Post by OnlyOneCannolo »

tito wrote: post #25
OnlyOneCannolo wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It implicitly distorts the contribution of agriculture to greenhouse gas emissions relative to other sources. And it ignores the health effects of going meatless.

What most people miss is that methane (ie from cows) is more than an order of magnitude as impactful as carbon dioxide. This source says methane is 84x the impact of carbon dioxide: https://www.edf.org/climate/methane-other-important-greenhou...

That article you linked also says that the largest source of man-made methane is the oil and gas industry.

Re: Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

#37

Post by cj »

missedthecue wrote: post #32
cj wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article isn’t about vegetables being good “for you”. It’s about a college cafeteria experimenting to reduce carbon emissions and the amount of land required to serve meals: > Last year, University cafeterias (separate from the colleges) announced a 33% reduction in carbon emissions per kilogram of food purchased, and a 28% reduction in land use per kilogram of food purchased.

Something I dont think very many people realize is that cattle are raised on land that is unsuitable for practically any other purpose. They aren't ranching in Manhatten. Leasing land for grazing brings in about $70 an acre while doing it for crops will bring in around $280 an acre. Development of course would bring in amounts that are several orders of magnitude higher. Where cattle are raised, raising cattle is the…

I’d be interested to read more about this. Any sources you’d recommend?

Re: Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

#38

Post by [deleted] »

gvjddbnvdrbv wrote: post #13
kqr wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it? As a rule of thumb, each layer of indirection in the food chain retains only 10% of the energy from the previous layer. If we eat the stuff we give to cows (which is what vegetarians do) then we would need only 10% of the land to farm it.

Being pedantic. If we eat the stuff they feed to the cows I eat we would die. Grass is not human digestible. My point being the problem is not meat which is a natural part of our diet (and is traditionally raised on land not well suited to crops) but the crazy frankenmeat many are reduced to eating due to overpopulation.

[deleted]

Re: Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

#39

Post by jschwartzi »

cj wrote: post #28
gvjddbnvdrbv wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it rather exaggerated? Doesn't agriculture as a whole cause around 11% of emissions but car driving and heating/cooling causes around 30%? So if we all stopped eating meat we could cut emissions but a couple of % but if we all stopped driving and turned our heating down/up we could actually make a real difference? Edited with real numbers from https://www.c2es.org/content/international-emissions/

Quick googling: “ Livestock takes up nearly 80% of global agricultural land, yet produces less than 20% of the world’s supply of calories” It’s not just about emissions. It’s also about the massive amount of land required to produce meat vs. crops for human consumption. Re: cutting out meat vs. driving, only one of those activities is necessary to survive for the very high percentage of the population who don’t have…

And in particular it's about the amount of virgin forest being cut down in places like Brazil to satisfy the global export market for beef cattle.

Re: Adding a metre between meals boosts vegetarian appeal – study

#40

Post by resu_nimda »

maxharris wrote: post #24

Stop trying to nudge me. Focus instead on cultured meat, because that actually solves the fundamental problem.

The nudge is unavoidable. Every store in the world has to choose what people see when they first walk in, and what goes in the back corner.

Besides, how does your proposal not amount to a nudge?

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