Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

iopscience.iop.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

281–290 of 360 posts

Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

#281

Post by rayiner »

danaris wrote: post #195
rayiner wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have A/B comparisons in India and Bangladesh keeping the underlying culture constant. Pakistan’s problem seems to be a Pakistan thing.

So..."Pakistan's problem is a Pakistan thing", unrelated to markets.... ...but Bangladesh's success is purely attributable to markets? It's not "a Bangladesh thing"? You might want to check your prejudices there.

There’s a Civilization-game style “tech tree” for cultural and social development. Some societies are further along in that development than others.

Pakistan faces the same cultural problem as Afghanistan and parts of the middle east: in large parts of the country, extended kinship groups dominate society, precluding the development of civic institutions and functioning government. That’s not true for the whole country. Parts of Pakistan are culturally like India or Bangladesh: it has a long history of governance by central institutions, even if that governance is dysfunctional. Imagine if 50% of the U.S. population was Appalachians. The U.S. would be a much less successful country also.

Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

#282

Post by [deleted] »

shafyy wrote: post #158
RhysU wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US agricultural subsidies for 2024 were overwhelmingly for corn ($3.2B), soybeans ($1.9B), cotton ($998M), and wheat ($960M). Pasture comes in 5th ($741M). https://usafacts.org/articles/federal-farm-subsidies-what-da... Tofu and ethanol may be more price-distorted by the US government than is beef, but I dunno how to quickly support that idea with hard data beyond what I cited above.

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

#283

Post by [deleted] »

shafyy wrote: post #158
RhysU wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US agricultural subsidies for 2024 were overwhelmingly for corn ($3.2B), soybeans ($1.9B), cotton ($998M), and wheat ($960M). Pasture comes in 5th ($741M). https://usafacts.org/articles/federal-farm-subsidies-what-da... Tofu and ethanol may be more price-distorted by the US government than is beef, but I dunno how to quickly support that idea with hard data beyond what I cited above.

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

#284

Post by RhysU »

datsci_est_2015 wrote: post #105
RhysU wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US agricultural subsidies for 2024 were overwhelmingly for corn ($3.2B), soybeans ($1.9B), cotton ($998M), and wheat ($960M). Pasture comes in 5th ($741M). https://usafacts.org/articles/federal-farm-subsidies-what-da... Tofu and ethanol may be more price-distorted by the US government than is beef, but I dunno how to quickly support that idea with hard data beyond what I cited above.

Have you been to the Midwest to observe the scale of corn and soybean operations? I would wager the number of calories per dollar subsidy produced by the corn and soybean industries outweighs handily the calories per dollar subsidy produced by cattle operations, especially given the 10% reduction in efficiency per trophic level. Also, how much does beef benefit from cheap feed prices (corn and soy) due to subsidies a…

Beef prices are high right now.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/APU0000703112

If the intent of the government is to pour subsidies into domestic beef production to stabilize prices they're doing a crap job.

Compare corn: https://www.macrotrends.net/2532/corn-prices-historical-char...

Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

#285

Post by RhysU »

Ferret7446 wrote: post #270
shafyy wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I thought most of the corn goes to ethanol

A little over a third of production evidently goes to ethanol: https://afdc.energy.gov/data/10339

No idea if subsidies disproportionately subsidize fuel ethanol over non-fuel usage.

Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

#286

Post by Alupis »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #267
Alupis wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you researched this regulation even a little, you'd see the crops are rarely destroyed. They are far more often exported, diverted to secondary markets, donated, or carried-over into next-season's stock. It's interesting to me how people are quick to comment about things they know nothing about... > It's still food, full of flavor and calories Tart cherries have about 1-2 calories per cherry, and do not taste good…

Coming back later, I realized earlier I looked up the calories but I didn't compare them to anything else. So while tart cherries "only" have 50 calories per 100g, sweet cherries are up around 60, not very different. An apple also has about 50-60 per 100g. So does an orange. Fruit isn't super dense in calories to begin with because it has so much water, but it's still a meaningful amount, and tart cherries are pretty…

Which is to say consuming tart cherries is not a significant source of calories and not something "people in need" are in need of at all.

Maybe just quit being needlessly pedantic? Every point you've attempted to raise in this thread has been entirely pointless and equally ridiculous.

Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

#287

Post by [deleted] »

stvltvs wrote: post #129
RhysU wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US agricultural subsidies for 2024 were overwhelmingly for corn ($3.2B), soybeans ($1.9B), cotton ($998M), and wheat ($960M). Pasture comes in 5th ($741M). https://usafacts.org/articles/federal-farm-subsidies-what-da... Tofu and ethanol may be more price-distorted by the US government than is beef, but I dunno how to quickly support that idea with hard data beyond what I cited above.

Depending on how we measure it, either 58% or 75% of that heavily subsidized soy goes to feed animals. https://insideanimalag.org/share-of-soybean-crop-for-feed/

[deleted]

Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

#288

Post by Alupis »

renewiltord wrote: post #274
boothby wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The amazing thing about people failing to learn from history is that everybody thinks they're too smart to (a) learn history or (b) follow rules enacted to prevent the disasters of yesteryear.

[flagged]

[flagged]

Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal

#289

Post by karmakurtisaani »

plufz wrote: post #103
kshahkshah wrote: post #6

Not trying to be overly flippant... who cares? The paper opens with "to feed a growing population" without asking is that what we need? want? where we are actually heading to? Is feeding the world a real problem? I've yet to see compelling evidence that it really is except as a secondary effect of logistics, energy supply, and war. edit: I understand the environmental impacts. I think we should solve our energy probl…

Solve our energy problems first? How would decreasing cattle stop work on improving our energy system? I think a lot points to that we need to do both (and yesterday). It’s not like agriculture is a small part of our greenhouse gas emissions (25-35% globally).

We should solve X first is a common talking point when you recognize something is a problem, but don't want to address it for whatever reason.
Post reply on HN