Home
hamburger menu icon

Meat and Animal Products

In this section we consider several aspects of meat consumption. See also our analysis of seafood.

Meat consumption, as a share of total diet, has been increasing worldwide and varies considerably by country and region.

The image: "meat_share.svg" cannot be found!

Source: FAOSTAT 1.

Historically, increased wealth has been associated with a "nutrition transition", or a move to diets heavier in meat and dairy 2. The evidence is that humans have an innate preference for energy-dense foods, particularly those heavy in fats and sugar 3.

The image: "nutrient_density.svg" cannot be found!

Figures are derived from the Food Balances data from FAOSTAT 1.

The FAO further projects that world meat consumption will increase by 51% from 2013 to 2050 4.

Environmental and Welfare Impacts

Animal products, especially beef, tend to have much greater land use, greenhouse gas, and water impacts than plant-based products. We discuss issues of animal welfare more extensively elsewhere.

The feed conversion efficiency of an animal (or substitute) is the ratio of input feed to edible output product, measured by mass. Feed conversion efficiency is highly correlated with lifecycle land use and greenhouse gases 5.

The image: "fcr.svg" cannot be found!

Data sources: Alexander et al. (2016) 5 for poultry, pork, beef, lamb and mutton, eggs, and milk; Alexander et al. (2017) 6 for mealworm, crickets, tilapia, Chinese carp, cultured meat, and imitation meat; Froehlich et al. 7 for crustaceans. Values vary depending on the choice of feed, method of raising animals, and other factors.

Following is an estimate of the number of animals that are slaughtered, or that are required to produce over their lifetimes, to provide 5% of a human's lifetime nutritional needs.

The image: "animal_count.svg" cannot be found!

Sources: Compassion in World Farming 8, FAO (9, 10, 1).

In the United States, the trend has been toward more efficient beef production, though not at a rate that is sufficient to fundamentally change beef's high impacts relative to other foods.

The image: "beef_improvement.svg" cannot be found!

Source: Capper 11.

On metrics such as yield per animal 1, meat production tends to perform better in wealthier countries than in poorer countries.

Animal Feed

Livestock feed is derived as follows

The image: "feed_sources.svg" cannot be found!

Source: Xu et al. 12.

About 5% of feed by mass, 6% by calories, and 8% by protein is converted into meat that is sold 12.

Following is a comparison of estimated impacts of grass-fed beef, relative to feedlot beef.

The image: "grass_fed.svg" cannot be found!

Sources: Clapper 11, Lupo et al. 13, Tichenor et al. 14.

Grass-fed cattle may play a role in sequestering carbon in the soil, though the magnitude of this effect is of considerable controversy. Even with the sequestration effect, the lifecycle emissions of grass-fed beef is likely to be only marginally lower than those of feedlot beef 13.

As an additive to animal feed, seaweed has the potential to reduce enteric fermentation by 50-95% 1516.

Insects 17 and algae 18 are of interest as a partial replacement for fishmeal in feed for cattle, poultry, and aquaculture.

Potential for Dietary Shift

Price is not necessarily a barrier in shifting to established meat alternatives.

The image: "protein_price.svg" cannot be found!

Sources Bashi et al. 19, Diet & Fitness Today 20, FAO 9, IndexMundi 21.

It is unclear if emerging meat alternatives, such as cultured meat, will be better able to gain consumer acceptance than established alternatives. Such acceptance depends on politics and culture, in addition to cost, taste, and nutrition 22. Furthermore, in wealthier countries, protein and fat intake already exceed healthy levels 22.

It has been found that a 10% reduction in the cost of plant-based meat should reduce U. S. cattle production by 0.15%, suggesting that a market-driven shift toward plant-based meat will not be sufficient to displace meat significantly 23.

Hunting

Hunting is a small but nontrivial share of food intake, even in wealthy countries. In Michigan, for instance, hunted venison comprised about 1% of all animal products consumed 24. There is a misconception that conservation in the United States is funded mostly by hunting activity. Of federal and philanthropic conservation funding, 6.1% (about $1.3 billion of $21 billion) is estimated to come from hunters 25. At the state level, about an additional $800 million is raised through hunting license fees, and this also goes mostly to conservation 26. The dependence of state conservation on hunting--an activity which is in a state of decline--jeopardizes conservation funds 27.

Problem:
Stability of State Conservation Funding
Solution:
Fund State Conservation with General Funds

"Bushmeat" refers to game hunted for wildlife, most frequently for subsistence in low-income countries. At least 5.7 million tons of bushmeat are harvested per year worldwide, about 2% of total animal products 28. In some rural areas of West and Central Africa, bushmeat constitutes 80-90% of animal protein, and it is also a major contributor in the Amazon basin 28.

Reliance on bushmeat places great pressure on ecosystems 28. Additionally, bushmeat is a major vector for zoonotic diseases. It now appears probable that the transition to humans of the HIV virus occurred through infected bushmeat 29. The 2014 West Africa ebola outbreak and other ebola outbreaks may have be linked to bushmeat 30.

Pet Food

Globally, the market for vegan pet food was $9.6 billion in 2020 31, for plant-based pet food was $26.10 billion in 2022 32, and for pet food overall was $112.13 billion in 2021 33.

Dogs and cats can be as healthy on vegan diets as they are on meat-based diets, but they--especially cats--require nutritional supplements 34.

References

  1. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. "FAOSTAT". ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  2. Drewnowski, A., Popkin, B. "The nutrition transition: new trends in the global diet". Nutrition Reviews 55(2), pp. 31-43. February 1997. ↩

  3. Drewnowski, A., Rock, C. "The influence of genetic taste markers on food acceptance". The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 62(3), pp. 506-511. September 1995. ↩

  4. Alexandratos, N., Bruinsma, J. "World Agriculture Towards 2030/2050". Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Agricultural Development Economics Division, ESA Working Paper No. 12-03. June 2012. ↩

  5. Alexander, P., Brown, C., Arneth, A., Finnigan, J., Rounsevell, M. "Human appropriation of land for food: The role of diet". Global Environmental Change 41, pp. 88-98. November 2016. ↩ ↩2

  6. Alexander, P., Brown, C., Arneth, A., Dias, C., Finnigan, J., Moran, D., Rounsevell, M. "Could consumption of insects, cultured meat or imitation meat reduce global agricultural land use?". Global Food Security 15, pp. 22-32. December 2017. ↩

  7. Froehlich, H., Runge, C., Gentry, R., Gaines, S., Halpern, B. "Comparative terrestrial feed and land use of an aquaculture-dominant world". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 115(20), pp. 5295-5300. May 2018. ↩

  8. Compassion in World Farming. "The life of: dairy cows". September 2012. ↩

  9. Food and Agriculture Organization. "Nutritive Factors". Accessed January 7, 2020. ↩ ↩2

  10. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Egg Marketing - A Guide for the Production and Sale of Eggs. ISSN 1010-1365, FAO Agricultural Services Bulletin 150, Chapter 1. 2003. ↩

  11. Capper, J. "Is the Grass Always Greener? Comparing the Environmental Impact of Conventional, Natural and Grass-Fed Beef Production Systems". Animals 2, pp. 127-143. ↩ ↩2

  12. Xu, X., Sharma, P., Shu, S., Lin, T., Ciais, P., Tubiello, F. N., Smith, P., Campbell, N., Jain, A. K. "Global greenhouse gas emissions from animal-based foods are twice those of plant-based foods". Nature Food 2, pp. 724-732. September 2021. ↩ ↩2

  13. Lupo, C., Clay, D., Benning, J., Stone, J. "Life-cycle assessment of the beef cattle production system for the northern great plains, USA". Journal of Environmental Quality 42(5), pp. 1386-94. September 2013. ↩ ↩2

  14. Tichenor, N., Peters, C., Norris, G., Thoma, G., Griffin, T. "Life cycle environmental consequences of grass-fed and dairy beef production systems in the Northeastern United States". Journal of Cleaner Production 142(4), pp. 1619-1628. January 2017. ↩

  15. Kinley, R., de Nys, R., Vucko, M., Machado, L., Tomkins, N. "The red macroalgae Asparagopsis taxiformis is a potent natural antimethanogenic that reduces methane production during in vitro fermentation with rumen fluid". Animal Production Science 56(3), pp. 282-289. March 2016. ↩

  16. Roque, B. et al. "Effect of the macroalgae Asparagopsis taxiformis on methane production and rumen microbiome assemblage". Animal Microbiome 1(3). February 2019. ↩

  17. van Huis, A., Oonincx, D. "The environmental sustainability of insects as food and feed. A review". Agronomy for Sustainable Development 37:43. October 2017. ↩

  18. Madeira, M., Cardoso, C., Lopes, P., Coelho, D., Afonso, C., Bandarra, N., Prates, J. "Microalgae as feed ingredients for livestock production and meat quality: A review". Livestock Science 205, pp. 111-121. November 2017. ↩

  19. Bashi, Z., McCullough, R., Ong, L., Ramirez, M. "Alternative proteins: The race for market share is on". McKinsey & Company. August 2019. ↩

  20. Diet & Fitness Today. "Protein in salmon, per 100g". Accessed January 27, 2020. ↩

  21. IndexMundi. "IndexMundi". Accessed January 27, 2020. ↩

  22. van der Weele, C., Feindt, P., van der Goot, A., van Mierlo, B., van Boekel, M. "Meat alternatives: an integrative comparison". Trends in Food Science & Technology 88, pp. 505-512. June 2019. ↩ ↩2

  23. Lusk, J., Blaustein-Rejto, D., Shah, S., Tonsor, G. T. "Impact of Plant-Based Meat Alternatives on Cattle Inventories and Greenhouse Gas Emissions". Available at SSRN. November 2021. ↩

  24. Goguen, A. D., Riley, S. J., Organ, J. F. "Wild-harvested venison yields and sharing by Michigan deer hunters". Human Dimensions of Wildlife 23(3), pp. 197-212. 2018. ↩

  25. Smith, M., Molde, D. A. "Wildlife Conservation and Management Funding in the U.S.". Mountain Lion Foundation. May 2015. ↩

  26. Mahoney, S. "Hunting is by far the largest funding mechanism for wildlife, and the economic benefits go far beyond conservation.". Conservation Force. Accessed November 15, 2022. ↩

  27. Moore, A. "Decline in Hunting Threatens Conservation Funding". NC State University, College of Natural Resources News. January 2021. ↩

  28. Cawthorn, D., Hoffman, L. C. "The bushmeat and food security nexus: A global account of the contributions, conundrums and ethical collisions". Food Research International 76, pp. 906-925. ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  29. Tebit, D. M., Arts, E. J. "Tracking a century of global expansion and evolution of HIV to drive understanding and to combat disease". The Lancet Infectios Diseases 11(1), pp. 45-56. January 2011. ↩

  30. Saéz, A. M. et al. "Investigating the zoonotic origin of the West African Ebola epidemic". EMBO Molecular Medicine 7(1), pp. 17-23. January 2015. ↩

  31. Samriddhi, C., Roshan, D. "Vegan Pet Food Market By Form (Organic and Conventional), Pet Type (Dog Food, Cat Food, and Others), Pet Food Type (Dry Pet Food, Wet Pet Food, Treats & Snacks, and Others), and Distribution Channel (Hypermarket/Supermarket, Specialty Stores, Online Sales Channels, and Others): Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast 2021-2030". Allied Market Research. March 2022. ↩

  32. Future Market Insights. "Plant-based pet food Market Outlook (2022-2032)". September 2022. ↩

  33. Global Newswire. "Pet Food Market Size is projected to reach USD 170.11 Billion by 2030, growing at a CAGR of 4.50%: Spherical Insights". Spherical Insights. October 2022. ↩

  34. Knight, A., Satchell, L. "Vegan versus meat-based pet foods: Owner-reported palatability behaviours and implications for canine and feline welfare". PLoS ONE 16(6): e0253292. June 2021. ↩