It’s not really suprising, is it?
Just take two people and give them the same basics, but swap everything non vegan with the stuff those animals got to eat for one of them. Not only did he save the middle man to save on emissions, he also ended up with way more food. So you could save a lot more emissions by cutting down the vegan pile to the same amount of calories.
Replacement products bring down the comparison, but making stuff out of soy will always be more efficient than feeding soy to animals and then eating those. So with otherwise equal lifestyles a vegan will always produce less emissions.
As you’ve presented it, the vegan has poorer nutrition than the other person. We also need to consider the vitamin supplements to get amino acids we only get otherwise from meat.
Soy is a complete protein, meaning it has all essential amino acids.
Seitan has 8 out of 9 essential amino acids, is made from wheat and has about the protein density of beef or chicken (~25% according to a quick search).
You get a ton of soy and wheat which would otherwise be feed to animals. Just make tofu and seitan.
However, you’re right, you need to supplement some things - at the very least B12. Which a non vegan diet mostly gets from fortified products, meaning its supplemented anyways.
Very poorly which is why ruminant animals like sheep and cows have three or four stomachs - they need the extra digestive cavities filled with very interesting bacteria cultures to process all that tough cellulosic material.
However, people do eat grass, at least a seed, in the form of various cereal grains like wheat and barley and rice. Those are all grasses!
It’s not really suprising, is it? Just take two people and give them the same basics, but swap everything non vegan with the stuff those animals got to eat for one of them. Not only did he save the middle man to save on emissions, he also ended up with way more food. So you could save a lot more emissions by cutting down the vegan pile to the same amount of calories.
Replacement products bring down the comparison, but making stuff out of soy will always be more efficient than feeding soy to animals and then eating those. So with otherwise equal lifestyles a vegan will always produce less emissions.
As you’ve presented it, the vegan has poorer nutrition than the other person. We also need to consider the vitamin supplements to get amino acids we only get otherwise from meat.
Soy is a complete protein, meaning it has all essential amino acids. Seitan has 8 out of 9 essential amino acids, is made from wheat and has about the protein density of beef or chicken (~25% according to a quick search).
You get a ton of soy and wheat which would otherwise be feed to animals. Just make tofu and seitan.
However, you’re right, you need to supplement some things - at the very least B12. Which a non vegan diet mostly gets from fortified products, meaning its supplemented anyways.
How well do you digest grass?
The figure may be wrong, but a quick search told me about 4% of cows in the US are gras-fed. They mostly eat grains, which you could eat too.
Sounds like an fairly unhealthy diet to have so much grain.
Very poorly which is why ruminant animals like sheep and cows have three or four stomachs - they need the extra digestive cavities filled with very interesting bacteria cultures to process all that tough cellulosic material.
However, people do eat grass, at least a seed, in the form of various cereal grains like wheat and barley and rice. Those are all grasses!
Fun fact of the day…