How do you solve a problem like Maria eating meat? Alternatives!

VS

 

The end is nigh!

Well I am not talking about 21st of December... regardless of what those great survivors the Mayans thought (even if THE Britney Spears 'sings' a song about it) the world won't end; but one absolute certainty is that the cows will come home to fart....

The end of my blogging days may be over... screams of please no I hear?!? (or are they all 'Thank God!')... nevertheless I will try and look at the alternatives to a life in an atmosphere of animal farts.

From what the much of the literature points to as the driver in increased livestock production, demand seems to generate the largest fundamental factor in the quantity of emissions. So, to reduce emissions and other detrimental effects of livestock farming we have to reduce demand and consumption.

This is not easy... I personally do not want to stop eating meat altogether, although, after watching the documentary Mat the Truth, I was seriously contemplating going cold turkey... on turkey...

Proteins are vital to human health and life. So if we don't eat meat, what would we eat instead?

A commonly given example is fish. Fish is often seen as a better food stuff than meat, but fishing has caused a substantial amount of environmental damages as well as the state of fish stocks world wide ebbing closer and closer to depletion. The UN FAO World Fisheries and Aquaculture report (2010) states that 32% of stocks are over exploited/depleted or recovering; 53% are fully exploited and 15% are moderately exploited. Shifting more than a billion people in the developed world onto an already stressed resource will cause its collapse. Greater consumption of smaller fish which is environmentally sustainable and healthier for you is one option. If this resource is ever going to support an increasing number of people then sustainability is required, please read Worm et al. (2009) for an in depth insight into the potential approaches to take, most could be applied to other environmental problems; a multidisciplinary approach.

Corn, Soy and Grains are the food stuffs we generally feed to livestock. They are also very much fit for human consumption; but we tend to feed more of it to the meat we eat then personally consume ourselves. I personally don't eat corn... I know shoot me... but as you will find out in a later post (ooh foreshadowing I know right?!) I have taken certain steps in the right direction already!

This list doesn't look too impressive... but one factor easily neglected is simply reducing the amount of meat we eat. Meatless Fridays, or what Roman Catholics call Fridays... notable celebrities do it, Paul McCartney, Leona Lewis, they are talented because they eat a lot less meat... in fact none! OK... there is no link between talent and meat consumption. 

Reducing meat consumption has many benefits. You are healthier, richer (from not buying any meat, doesn't work if your meat originates in a five finger discount manner), aiding the environment in becoming less polluted and less full of cow farts. Also you can waste all those calories on chocolate, more room for nutella! OK I am not advising you to go on to an all nutella diet as fun as it would be, full of chocolaty goodness..... OMG it has been so long since I have had nutella I would kill love to have some right now..... *drools* mmmmmmm. Nutella pizza - nutella instead of tomato sauce and kinder in place of cheese. HEAVEN... like this, but rather than the nuts (which are a great source of proteins and energy!!!) add bananas... *collapses*.

10 minutes later....*wakes up*

Back to the point!

My New Years resolution is to eat less meat... so far I think I have eaten a little meat every day FAIL, but it hasn't been one whole week yet!

So I'll let you ponder about other foods you can stuff yourself with... but remember put down the fork, don't eat too much beef chicken or pork!

Replying to a comment! Again!

This is another reply to another great comment posted on the 'Free the Turkeys! Put down that fork!!!' post made on Christmas Eve! Yulia K wrote:

"I agree, the last video you posted is very insightful, reminding us of the priorities. I like the idea of using pee for P and hope it materilizes, as this will provide us with a renewable source of P, alleviating one of the numerous global problems. However, your last three posts also made me realize something more gloomy, which is that in reality people choose to lead an unsustainable lifestyle, such as choosing to consume meat, and shift the blame for problems such as the global food shortages onto factors like biofuels, for example, which is what I am writing about in my blog. 

It takes 3-4 times more P to support a meat-based diet and also more land to cultivate meat, as land is needed to produce cattle feed too. This means that meat production uses more natural resources, indirectly resulting in the food shortages. If we evaluated what our priorities are and all took responsibility for our own actions, would it not make more sense to lead a less meat-intensive diet, as this would free up the natural resources, such as land and P? 

I find this issue very relevant to biofuels, as decreasing our meat consumption and food waste would likely result in less food shortages and free up more land for activities such as sustainable biofuel cultivation, which should result in GHG emissions savings and greater energy security. Would this not be more useful than leaving all as it is at present i.e. blaming so much on biofuels, for example, as the Gallagher Report (2008) seems to do, preventing the cultivation of biofuels, carrying on with our meat-intensive diet and high P consumption to then realize in the future that food shortages are still increasing as more and more people consume more, P and fossil fuels are running out and we are not prepared for that, and our GHG emissions have not decreased.

While I am also a hypocrite promoting a vegetarian diet here, my point is that I feel that too much emphasis is placed onto blaming industrial activities for the global problems and very little onto us, the consumers, which is not always useful. Therefore I very much agree with you that we should take greater action as citizens (I think this is what you were trying to say, if I understood correctly), even though technological fixes may help."

My Reply:

Thanks for this EPIC post!

You are right; if we did eat less meat, then it would be significantly justifiable to produce more biofuel. However like every other resource or commodity it falls down to the distribution of the meat that is important. If the cost of meat actually took ecosystem service costs into consideration as well as environmental valuations then the cost would increase and there are potentially two outcomes: decrease in demand, reducing consumption; increase in 'innovative' ways at maximising profits to reduce cost production and increase consumption through economies of scale.

The first way would disproportionately affect those who have the lowest incomes as cheap meat is sometime the only source of protein in a diet as most substitutes cost a lot more. The second would lead to further environmental and ecological degradation as intensive farming would become more intensive at the cost of land quality, animal welfare and pollution.

The second point is relevant due to the EU 'wide' ban onBattery hen egg farming. A reported 80 million hens are being 'freed' (some are going to be slaughtered) due to new legislation preventing the use of the current intensive hen cages to produce eggs; a new 'enriched' cage (37% bigger) has to be used.

This results in a just bigger than a sheet of A4 paper space per chicken in a cage. Not that nice! (some info on ending factory farming here).

If we all became concerned consumers and thought about our individual actions then we would achieve a lot more than holistic legislation which is passing the buck of responsibility to people we pay and elect to act for us. I agree with you. Consumption is the problem; and as consumers, we are the ones who have to change OUR habits.

I hope this reply isn’t too bad! I like posting long posts too! :D

Add a little P, get a load more Poo! Part 4: P reserves and losses!

Cordell et al. (2009)’s paper on the story of phosphorous is a MUST READ! 

It is packed full of information on the subject… but I will try my best to extract the useful information. Being half Moroccan (half Italian), I can’t help but rub my hands with glee… the largest stores of P are locating in the country (regardless of what anyone says, Western Sahara does not exist in Morocco; we call the southern provinces… moving swiftly on…!) as shown in the figure below from Elser and Bennet (2011). 

This is however a big problem in terms of global securities and power balances. With turmoil in north Africa and the apparent ‘revolutions’ reaching their 1^st birthday, it is more important than ever that food and the fertiliser used, does not fall into the same fate as it did 3-4 years back with the large prices rises in grains (Elser and Bennet, 2011). 700% price rise in P coupled with the price rise signalled a warning light to governments worldwide. However, as Cordell et al. (2009) and Elser and Bennet (2011) note, the world still is not reacting to this train wreck; they can’t even pull their act together on gas emissions and the Kyoto agreement (COP Durban 2011 round of talks).

One thing is for sure is that if we use less, costs will go down and we are less dependent on another out-sourced commodity that everyone needs. If we all became vegetarian, then we would require significantly less P than a meat based diet, and most of the crop can easily be returned to the soil as residue, recycling most of the P used as a fertiliser. Even so; the largest wastage of P originates in the poor application of fertilisers to soils (8 million tonnes, MT). Leeching of the synthetically produced nutrients results in massive inefficiencies in P management; contaminating ground, surface and coastal waters with high levels of nutrients had led to vast amounts of eutrophication.

Eutrophication is when nutrients (either via leeching direct from fertilisers or poor waste management) added to water bodies causes the growth of organisms; algal blooms are a common example of added nutrients altering the natural ecology of a body of water (lake, sea, estuary, etc.). (Smithand Schindler, 2009) The blooms photosynthesis at high rates, starving most other organisms of oxygen (increased when the blooms die and decompose); creating a hypoxic environment.

Please read more on eutrophication in these sites:

• http://rtseablog.blogspot.com/2011/03/eutrophication-mapping-first-steps-that.html
• http://feastingonnaturalresources.blogspot.com/ This blog, by Megan Smith is great! She also talks about agriculture and environmental issues surrounding the wider debate. I highly recommend her post on Coastal Eutrophication – The impact of Agriculture in Chesapeake Bay

Back to wastes of P and as the figure above (Cordell et al. 2009) suggests, 14/17.5 MT of P go to agriculture; of that only 3 MT make it to our forks. 8 MT is wasted through poor application, and of the 3 MT we consume as food, 1 MT is wasted as spoiled food. By just eating within our means we save 1 MT. through better fertiliser management techniques with save an extra 8 MT. It is easier said than done, but through accurate monitoring of soil nutrient levels, we can guage whether or not the land needs to be fertilised, saving energy, money and effort as well as P. Using more natural fertiliser we can solve some of the problems, by no means is sh… poo a panacea for eutrophication/power insecurities/commodity prices/waste management/agricultural productivity and the like, but it is a step in the right direction!

Reserves of P aren't well documented globally, in fact many researches, scientists, geologists and mad hatters disagree as to how much P there is under ground. Cordell et al. (2009) explores this using a number of different scenarios showing just how long it would take, depending on how much P we need, to finally hit the last nail on the head of the coffin that would be global inorganic P reserves. 

Next part coming soon!

Meat the truth! Documentary Time!

This documentary, presented by a Dutch MP (Dutch Party for the Animals - might be a little biased) explores the role livestock plays in GHG emissions; pretty much what this blog is designed for!

The whole documentary is a great watch, please do!

Fossilised farts (and other agroGHGs)! Part 2: The expansion of Livestock and the debate around the Anthropocene.

Now, studies by Brook et al. (1996); Schlit et al. (2010); Sowers (2010); Burns (2011); Singrayer et al. (2011) and Wolff (2011) all show ice core records and other proxies (analogues for past environmental records) like speleothem (calcite deposits) to show CH₄ and other GHGs like N₂O over the Holocene (11 ka BP; Sowers, 2010) to 140 ka (Schlit et al. 2010). These records show the link between precessional cycles and CH₄ concentrations; but up until 5 ka, the CH₄ concentration deviated from what is expected due to the precessional cycle. The NH has been at an insolation minima due to the precessional cycle being in a NH negative stage (i.e. the southern hemisphere, SH, has more intense summers and winters).

This discrepancy between expected and observed therefore does not follow the natural process. Now shoot me if you must, but I agree with research put forward by Ruddiman, and I am joining in the argument/debate on the Anthropocene. In an article by Ruddiman et al. in a special issue Holocene published in June 2011 (where some of the other 2011 articles from Holocene are taken) attempts to falsify anthropogenic and natural increases in CO₂ and CH₄. The case states that only one other (stage 11) deglaciation has a similar increase in methane after the initial peak and decreasing tail (which would be due to a natural or at least non-anthropogenic process). All of the records (except stage 11) show a decrease of CH₄ in line with NH summer insolation minima. Stage 1 (our current Holocene/Anthropocene) does not follow this trend. Due to the rise and spread of humans through the globe, the establishment of civilisations and the first age of modernity through agricultural development, Ruddiman et al. (2011) and Fuller et al. (2011) show that it is expansion of agricultural practices of wet-rice farming and livestock intensification which is responsible for the anomalous rise in atmospheric methane contribution. This is significant for this blog as it shows (even among scientists like myself… ok I am only a student) humans have had an effect on the greater environment and the Earth’s ecosystems through a variety of anthropogenic process; relating this to livestock they include deforestation (increasing CO₂) and increased agricultural production (increasing CH₄ and later with the green revolution N₂O). This rise is evident 5 ka; that is why I believe that humans have had a significant impact on the earth before 250 yrs BP, it’s been 5 ka that’s how far the Anthropocene extends. This is shown in the graph taken from Fuller et al. 2011. 

Graph showing CH₄ predicted (NH insolation records) and measured CH₄ in GRIP ice core over time.

The Fuller et al. (2011) article looks at agricultural (pastoral and arable) contributions to prehistoric methane levels, using archaeological evidence to match it to the GHG records. This graph from their article shows the deviation from the predicted methane concentrations from the GRIP ice core. The black square points represent actual methane concentrations. The difference between the two data sets is ‘potentially’ cow farts and other anthropogenic processes (causing the deviation). They go deeper, investigating the spatial distribution of the technologies and knowledge of the more intensive (and greater GHG producing) agricultural techniques over time. Here are some maps showing the expansion of livestock practices:

Southern and Eastern Asia Livestock technique dispersal Fuller et al. 2011

Africa Livestock technique dispersal Fuller et al. 2011 

Southern Asia Livestock technique dispersal Fuller et al. 2011

The increased expansion of these farming practices means that more food was able to be cultivated, for direct food (like rice) or indirect food (like livestock feed).  This archaeological evidence shows the actual distribution of the increasing anthropogenic CH₄ sources. Another integral point (that will be elaborated on in part 3 of Fossilised farts) is the fact that the inter-polar gradient (IPG) between ice core records of CH­₄ concentration in Greenland and Antarctica begin to equate (Chappellaz et al., 1997; Burns, 2011). If for instance the NH boreal arctic polar circumference began to emit greater amounts of CH₄, then Greenland’s ice cores will have a greater concentration of the gas than Antarctica’s cores due to the proximity and difficulty of inter-polar diffusion. The fact that the IPG is levelling out shows that the source is low latitude; agricultural expansion into Africa, Southern Asia and South-Eastern Asia can be an explanation to this. Coupled with greater CH₄ emissions from the amazion basin (due to a stronger SH summer) and other low latitude CH₄ sources; this could explain the 5 ka rise. 

Welcome!

Welcome!

This blog is to inform, amaze, inspire and of course explain the many uses of poo… Now please do not adjust your screens or refresh the page, I did just write poo.

Before we indulge ourselves in the wonders of excretion, understanding of the past is vital to analysing potential solutions of present problems for the future. In this context, methane (CH4) is a significant greenhouse gas (GHG), 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide (CO2) and one way that it is emitted is in the form of cow (and other animal) farts, and the anaerobic decomposition of organic materials, like manure. 

But before all of that! Here is a video that makes light of the fundamental argument that I am making.

Enjoy and I will post again soon!