Submitted by Vucea t3_zvt87h in Futurology
HermitAndHound t1_j1txv5q wrote
Reply to comment by Doctor_Box in Soaring fertilizer prices could see millions more undernourished by Vucea
Mass production of meat in feedlots is a terrible idea. But animals are part of healthy ecosystems. Manure is a fine fertilizer. It's perfectly possible to design productive local farming systems that regenerate soil, improve biodiversity, bring good plant crops AND produce animal protein.
Put the animals back where they belong. Switch back to cows that can live on grass and don't need soy or other protein-rich feed to keep up their insane milk production. Chicken kept on a small scale, to eat scraps and weed food gardens are a benefit to the system, not a problem.
Meat wouldn't be dirt cheap (and shouldn't be), and there'd be less of it. But not keeping animals would be wasting an opportunity. They can turn stuff that we can't eat into something we can while producing fertilizer and doing chores around the farm.
snowmannn t1_j1ual9j wrote
I agree, but like you said, meat would get very expensive (maybe that is a good thing). I just don't see how it can happen on a large scale though. The current industrial AG system is a very entrenched and (currently) very profitable. I fear that we would never see society willingly transition to $20 steaks for the good of the planet.
I've worked on several industrial chicken farms, catching chickens, sorting fertilized eggs off the belt, etc... I think long-term the only sustainable way to feed the masses animal protein is through lab-grown meat. But I agree wholeheartedly that animals are (and should be) a vital part of a healthy ecosystem. But on an industrial scale, it is terribly inefficient to have to feed, heat and care for a living creature, in order to harvest a small portion of animal protein. My 2 cents is that once lab-grown meat is at cost and taste parity with conventional meat, it will begin to really usurp industrial livestock production. I think and hope there will always be a market for locally raised sustainable livestock. Not sure how it will all play out... For context I personally have a small flock of 15 pastured chickens and their manure is how I feed my garden :)
Doctor_Box t1_j1uim5x wrote
>I think and hope there will always be a market for locally raised sustainable livestock.
Why, once there is a lab grown perfect alternative, would you still hope there are locally raised animals getting their throats cut?
snowmannn t1_j1uk1rn wrote
Being from a rural agrarian community... Livestock is integral to farming in many different ways. There is a deep, long history of the symbiotic relationship of livestock in agriculture. Yes, I hope there is still sustainable, pastured raised livestock in the future, even after lab grown meat.
Doctor_Box t1_j1wpmx9 wrote
Unless you're Amish and using Oxen to plough the fields today this argument does not hold water. Farming can and has modernized and changed over time. Having this romantic nostalgia for culture, tradition, or the way things were is not a good reason to continue harming and exploiting animals.
If cutting throats of animals at a fraction of their lifespans is integral to your way of life then it's time to change.
HermitAndHound t1_j1yepa9 wrote
Modern agriculture is problematic, though. There's "peak oil" when oil production starts dwindling because it's getting harder and harder to extract more of it, but there's also "peak phosphorus". Me extract the stuff to make artificial fertilizers and it's not an indefinite resource.
Soil is being washed and blown away. Extreme weather events are becoming more and more common making it all the more vital to have healthy, spongy soil that can handle massive downpours and store water. We can't go on with open-soil farming, putting the same four crops everywhere conditions be damned and trying to make up for the problems with artificial means.
It's not being romantic, or glorifying the "good old times" (which they weren't). Nature has a little bit of practice in how to handle fluctuations. Using the same concepts to make food production resilient and regenerative isn't tree-hugger woo, it's efficient.
Ruminants and grass land go together. We killed most of the wild ones, leaves using livestock to fill that ecological function. Whether that's cattle, sheep or goats, or on much smaller plots, maybe just some rabbits depends on the area and what the land and people need.
People want to preserve old breeds of livestock (it's a resilience thing too, variety is good), but you can't keep every individual until it drops dead on its own. A healthy population needs natural predation, or selection by humans. How do we keep old, not-currently-economically-interesting sheep breeds alive? We eat them. Draft horse breeds mostly survived the switch to combustion engines by also being damn tasty.
Doctor_Box t1_j20sx2j wrote
It's really unfortunate how animal agriculture takes over terms like "protein" and now "regenerative farming". We have more choices than the two you have laid out. It's not only a choice between farm animals or destructive intensive monocropping (which we already do to feed animals now btw).
First look at the macro. The majority (more than 50%) of cropland is used for feeding animals so by taking them out of the equation we have freed up a ton of land and possibilities. Once we no longer have such a high requirement on crops grown we can look at changing how we grow them.
Now ignore what cows are to you for a second and just think about what they do for the soil. They are eating whatever is growing there processing it, using a huge amount of those nutrients to grow, and depositing the rest on the ground as fertilizer. It's an open loop system where the majority of nutrients go to the cow then the cow is carried off the farm to be killed and eaten and those nutrients never return to the land that grew the cow.
Instead we can look at composting, crop rotation, letting land go fallow and other farming practices to keep the nutrients on site. These include no till farming where we minimize the soil disturbance and keep it healthier and intercropping where multiple crops are grown at once in a way that support each other and balance the nutrient requirement in the soil.
Finally in a alternate universe, that I want to stress does not actually exist, where we have to have cows and sheep in the field to maximize the productivity of that field during fallow years then we could treat those animals like service dogs now. We let them live out their lives doing what they do for the soil, but we do not have to kill them every year and breed new cows and sheep to take their place. Cows live for 20-25 years. We would need a tiny number of animals to accomplish that task. If we kept to the bare minimum number of animals for keeping the soil healthy we would effectively have a vegan population because there would be so few of them.
Doctor_Box t1_j1tycv9 wrote
>But not keeping animals would be wasting an opportunity. They can turn stuff that we can't eat into something we can while producing fertilizer and doing chores around the farm.
That's why I only eat dogs and cats. No need to support factory farming when I can eat locally from my back yard. I live in the city and can't have chickens so I raise dogs for meat and while they're growing they work for me and do things like get me a beer from the fridge. A mutually beneficial relationship for the 8-12 months I let them live.
There's also a great option for those stuck in apartments. You can order online from a great family owned business! https://www.elwooddogmeat.com/
I'm also looking to get the laws changed so we can eat humans who naturally pass away. I would hate to waste an opportunity!
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