How expensive is that? How much variety do you have? How easy is it to not do correctly?
Any time I've looked into vegan diets it seems as though you don't have all that much choice if you want to get your vitamins and amino acids.
You can live on a poor diet for a long time, but it will do damage, so whether this type of vegan diet is easy to screw up is also very important.
Those require processing, and often times the supplement industry isn't exactly that clean. (I'm looking at you cheap fish oil sups)
Also you should consider the efficency of what the equillence of plans would take. (More plants requires more land+water, which requires more infrastructure, more transportation, etc). Also, don't forget about soil quality and erosion. You can't just grow infinitely on the same land. Let's not forget yield loss due to pests and diease.
Cows are huge and they feed a lot of people with very little waste. (Assuming you don't throw out the organs and bones)
---
Overall, I would be interested in a thorough look at both sides per person. Most of the articles I've seen from vegetarians and vegans have been completely ignoring the logistics involved and overall impact.
B12 comes from bacteria, and is very frequently supplemented into cattle as well. Animals do not produce their own B12, it's from bacteria consumed in the soil.
https://www.agric.wa.gov.au/livestock-biosecurity/cobalt-def...
> Also you should consider the efficency of what the equillence of plans would take. (More plants requires more land+water, which requires more infrastructure, more transportation, etc). Also, don't forget about soil quality and erosion. You can't just grow infinitely on the same land. Let's not forget yield loss due to pests and diease.
> Cows are huge and they feed a lot of people with very little waste. (Assuming you don't throw out the organs and bones)
I am not sure what you think feeds animal agriculture. Huge amounts of plants (and therefore fossil fuel energy via fertilizer) are required to produce a much smaller amount of animal protein. With the size of animal agriculture, most are not roaming around grazing grass, they are eating farmed plants [1]. Because it takes many plant calories (I've seen estimates from 10-25 plant calories for one calorie animal) animals are using way more land, fertilizer, transportation, no matter how much of the animal is being used
[1] https://sentientmedia.org/u-s-farmed-animals-live-on-factory....
>According to the latest Sentience Institute analysis, the percent of U.S. farmed animals living on factory farms is…
* Broiler chickens (99.9%) live on factory farms
* Turkeys (99.8%) live on factory farms
* Egg chickens (98.2%) live on factory farms
* Pigs (98.3%) live on factory farms
* Cows (70.4%) live on factory farms
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/is-the-livestock-indus...
> A 212-page online report published by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization says 26 percent of the earth’s terrestrial surface is used for livestock grazing. One-third of the planet’s arable land is occupied by livestock feed crop cultivation.
The fact that we grow more than enough food for the world and most people on it go hungry is a political problem, not one related to food going to livestock instead of starving children in Africa.
Places with water shortages don't grow animal fodder like corn (for beef) or soy. (for pork) The Central Valley spends much more of its limited water budget on almonds, walnuts, and pistachios than it does on cattle. There is some corn grown in the central valley, but it's almost all sweet corn for human consumption. Most animal fodder is grown in the Midwest and great planes where they have plenty of water.
Sure, it takes a lot of animal fodder to get a relatively small amount of beef, but you get significantly more animal fodder from one acre of land than you do human food. Remember cattle eat the entire corn plant, stem and all; they can digest cellulose, we can't. Humans either eat very small plants, (lettuce, celery, asparagus) or they eat a tiny portion of the plant. (Fruit or vegetables) Corn plants grow twelve feet tall and are densely packed together.
There are numerous things we can and should do to improve the ranching industry. Banning antibiotics for growth is step zero, antibiotic resident disease is terrifying, and it trumps any and all concerns about food. Stopping agricultural subsidies for corn is the next. Prices should reflect the true cost, not the cost once you've subsidized the externalities. But these are political problems, not intrinsic problems with meat.
https://www.diagnosisdiet.com/micronutrients-mental-health/
Almost by definition it would be weird if vegan diets were not diets full of deficiencies, since they do not partake in wide amounts of food groups eaten for at least millenia. (And we have no record of any vegan societies, though a few vegetarian -ish ones.)
> 2. There are distinct benefits from eating meat (vitamins), in which it's incredibly inefficient from getting them from plants
Raising meat with today's common production methods (feed lots) is incredibly inefficient. In fact, a plant based diet can meet all nutritional requirements with just B12 vitamins. Many vitamins and minerals in meat and dairy are there because of supplementation, not because they're natural.
> 3. The feedlots and environmental problems, that's an issue of our economy. Theres a particular expectation on output.
Which is why plant based diets, both processed foods like these burgers and un/ lightly processed (beans, nuts, tofu and tempeh, pulses) are a solution. They can be grown much more efficiently than meat and take a huge load off of our environment and emissions.
> 5. The author is completely obsessed on cows. There are MANY more alternatives to cows that you can eat.
Cows are also some of the worst animal agriculture product emissions wise and a good chunk of the standard American diet. It's also definitely the star of these fast food restaurants he discusses that these plant based meats are aiming for.