Sure this is a fairly recent one. It makes intuitive Sense on the surface that going pure vegetarian would be beneficial and reduce emissions. But that’s because we are comparing it to a system of meat that is based off the current demand where a majority of people are large consumers of it regularly.
Animals can be beneficial environmentally speaking even when raised for food, and the resource cost for growing vegetarian food can end up becoming quite large when you scale it to that same level.
Extremes are rarely the true solution there is usually a middle ground this is no exception
That just says soybeans and palm oil are imported in and that’s bad.
Kinda unrelated, yeah?
Most of the soybean products (like tofu and tempeh) in the U.S. aren’t grown here, the study found. Up until recently, they were largely imported from India, where soybean production contributes to widespread deforestation and habitat loss. Soybean plantations also take up valuable land space that could be used to ease food insecurity in the country instead.
And the pollution and environmental impact from transporting soybeans hundreds of thousands of miles to the U.S. is its own environmental catastrophe.
Similarly, palm oil, which is often used as a vegan substitute for butter or lard, is mostly imported from Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Nigeria. Local ecosystems there have been devastated by deforestation and loss of biodiversity as millions of hectares of forests are razed for palm oil production.
On top of its environmental impact, the palm oil industry has been the subject of numerous allegations of human rights violations. Child labor, rampant sexual abuse and rape, and exposure to hazardous pesticides without proper protective equipment aren’t uncommon.
“People prioritize the lives of livestock and domesticated farm animals over the lives of the people who grow palm oil or soybeans,” Trauger said. “Corporations love to market to people that eating this way will make a difference in the world, but it won’t.”
Soybeans are a fairly large part of most purely vegetarian diets, as they provide a metric ton of the various nutrients one needs, you can get around that with enough other types of vegetables but SB is the quickest and easiest which means it would likely become one of the most heavily consumed parts of an all vegetarian economy if everyone were to suddenly switch.
Soybeans, kale, and winter squashes are generally the most popular because they are very heavily nutrient and vitamin dense. But they don’t exactly scale to extreme levels cleanly.
Again, to be clear, I am advocating for a switch to primarily vegetarian diets. I’m just saying going exclusively vegetarian isn’t necessarily going to be great and will come with its own set of challenges and problems. A middle ground of primarily vegetarian but still some light meat usage is going to be the healthier Middle Ground both for your diet and the environment
https://phys.org/news/2023-02-veganism-planet-limited-meat-consumption.html
Sure this is a fairly recent one. It makes intuitive Sense on the surface that going pure vegetarian would be beneficial and reduce emissions. But that’s because we are comparing it to a system of meat that is based off the current demand where a majority of people are large consumers of it regularly.
Animals can be beneficial environmentally speaking even when raised for food, and the resource cost for growing vegetarian food can end up becoming quite large when you scale it to that same level.
Extremes are rarely the true solution there is usually a middle ground this is no exception
That just says soybeans and palm oil are imported in and that’s bad.
Kinda unrelated, yeah?
Soybeans are a fairly large part of most purely vegetarian diets, as they provide a metric ton of the various nutrients one needs, you can get around that with enough other types of vegetables but SB is the quickest and easiest which means it would likely become one of the most heavily consumed parts of an all vegetarian economy if everyone were to suddenly switch.
Soybeans, kale, and winter squashes are generally the most popular because they are very heavily nutrient and vitamin dense. But they don’t exactly scale to extreme levels cleanly.
Again, to be clear, I am advocating for a switch to primarily vegetarian diets. I’m just saying going exclusively vegetarian isn’t necessarily going to be great and will come with its own set of challenges and problems. A middle ground of primarily vegetarian but still some light meat usage is going to be the healthier Middle Ground both for your diet and the environment