Effects of the meat industry on water Encompassing the agricultural processes involved in the raising and slaughtering of livestock, the meat industry naturally involves some economical, environmental, biological, geographical, and ethical consequences. As one of the largest components of the global agricultural sector, the meat industry is able to impact the world’s water resources on an alarming level. It does this in primarily two very significant ways: through its consumption of water and its contributions to water pollution. These effects on the world’s water are an increasing cause for concern as water scarcity escalates. The economic scope and impact of the meat industry is a significant factor in its ability to affect water supplies …show more content…
The EPA recognizes animal feeding operations as a significant source of water pollution in the United States and as partly responsible for the impairment of 170,750 miles of river, 2.41 million acres of lakes, and 1,827 square miles of estuaries (EPA). This source of pollution has affected rivers in 22 states and groundwater in 17 states (PETA).
Most of the source of this pollution is runoff from the manure of the livestock (EPA). Without any federal regulations on the storage and treatment of animal waste from livestock production, massive amounts of animal waste are stored in a variety of ways including waste lagoons, use as fertilizer, and manure stockpiles. (PETA) Runoff from these storage methods is the meat industry’s principal source of water pollution. Pollution can also occur if a waste lagoon overfills, leaks, or breaks (Water Quality). There were over 1,000 manure spills in Midwest in the 1990s (Water
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As global population, and demand for water, increases, a strain is put on existing sources of drinking water. Pollution is also threatening water supplies and waterborne illnesses kill millions every year. In addition to this, climate change is already depleting the freshwater stored in glaciers and contributing to changing weather patterns that can produce droughts (Gertz). Continuing with current climate change would place nearly half the world’s population in areas of water stress (Scarcity). The severity of these threats to the earth’s water supply and the increasing demand for water makes the meat industry’s consumption and contamination of water much more alarming. The meat industry’s largely inefficient use of the world’s water resources will not be sustainable in the long run as water resources continue to be threatened. Its contributions as major pollutants are also more alarming in this context. With water scarce and becoming much more so, large scale pollution of water resources is not only deplorable but
Millions of animals are consumed everyday; humans are creating a mass animal holocaust, but is this animal holocaust changing the climate? In the essay “ The Carnivores Dilemma,” written by Nicolette Hahn Niman, a lawyer and livestock rancher, asserts that food production, most importantly beef production, is a global contributor to climate change. Nicolette Niman has reports by United Nations and the University of Chicago and the reports “condemn meat-eating,” and the reports also say that beef production is closely related to global warming. Niman highlights, carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxides are the leading greenhouses gases involved in increasing global warming. A vast majority of people across the world consumes meat and very little people are vegetarian, or the people that don’t eat meat, but are there connections between people and meat production industry when it comes to eating food and the effect it has on the climate? The greenhouse gases, methane, carbon dioxide, and nitrous oxides are not only to blame, but we should be looking at people and industrialized farming for the leading cause of greenhouse gases in agriculture and the arm-twisting dilemma we have been lured into, which is meat production itself.
...urkholder, J., Libra, B., Weyer, P., Heathcote, S., Kolpin, D., Thorne, P., et al. (2007). Impacts of waste from concentrated animal feeding operations on water quality. Environmental Health Perspectives, 11(2), 308–312. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1817674/pdf/ehp0115-000308.pdf
Over the past few decades, small and medium sized farms have been taken over by large-scale factory farms. These farms house billions of animals used for consumption each year. The conditions on factory farms are filthy, overcrowded and disease ridden. Animals forced to live out their lives on these farms are subject to extremely harsh conditions, such as mutilation, confinement and living spaces piled high with feces. Not only do conditions on factory farms make life for livestock absolutely miserable, but factory farms are also negatively impacting human health and the environment. The production and sale of meat has become a billion-dollar industry based upon the bloodshed of other sentient beings. With this being the case, at the very least, factory farms need to be properly regulated and companies involved need to be held accountable for their abuse.
A United Nations report states that land used for animal agriculture, both for grazing and production of crops fed to livestock, takes up an astounding 30% of land on Earth. ("Meat Production Wastes Natural Resources") To meet the industry’s demands, over 260 million acres of forest in the U.S. have been cleared to grow grain fed to farm animals. ("Meat Production Wastes Natural Resources") With that in mind, the meat industry also dumps disease-causing pathogens through animal waste that pollutes water and forces the need for waste lagoons to be constructed, which are susceptible to leaking and flooding. ("Facts about Pollution from Livestock Farms”) Scientists say that about 14% of the world’s greenhouse gases are released by said agriculture industries, which is a growing concern for climate change and global warming. (Silverman) The meat industry uses one-third of all the fossil fuels consumed in the United States. (Moore) There is no question that farming animals has a negative effect on the environment and steps should be taken to mitigate air and water pollution risks and future deforestation. If animal agriculture was phased out, land used for animal grazing could be returned to forest land and some of it converted into fields for cultivating crops for humans. A global shift toward veganism, resulting in the elimination of the meat and animal agriculture industries, would protect the environment from various detrimental effects.
Meat cultivation uses more land, water and resources to house, transport, and slaughter animals and their grain and food than it would cost to fund in vitro meat studies. In April 2008 the In Vitro Consortium first met at the Norwegian Food Research Institute. The consortium is “an international alliance of environmentally concerned scientists striving to facilitate the establishment of a large scale process industry for the production of muscle tissue for human consumption through concerted R&D efforts and attraction of funding fuels to these efforts. ”Meat in both its production and its consumption has a number of destructive effects on not only the environment and humans but also live stock. Some of these effects are antibiotic resistant bacteria due to the overuse of antibiotics in livestock, meat-borne pathogens (e. coli), and diseases associated with diets rich in animal fats (diabetes).
From all the best foods out there, a simple thought of spicy roasted meat can make our mouth watery. Most of our favorite cultural foods usually contain meat as a main recipe. This is why we have a huge supply of meat at affordable prices. However, its affordability and our cultural tie with meat, mean nothing compared to the harm. Consuming meat has negative impacts on the environment as well as on our health. Starting from raising animals, to producing the meat, the industry contributions to global warming. It is also the reason behind most chronic diseases. So, we should stop consuming meat to control climate change and lead a healthy life.
This is a much bigger deal than people think. In fact, according to an article by Peta, How Does Eating Meat Harm the Environment, it has such an effect on the environment that the Union of Concerned Scientist list meat eaters as the second biggest environmental hazard facing the earth. The number one affect being fossil fuels produced by cars. It was also found in a report published by the Worldwatch Institute that nearly 51 percent of all greenhouse gasses are produced from animal agriculture. This is a very staggering number when a lot of research is being done to make vehicles more environmentally friendly when we could make a huge impact just by changing the way we eat. It is even more astounding that it takes the same number of fossil fuels to produce one hamburger as it takes to dive one car 20 miles (Peta How Does Eating Meat Harm the Environment). The production of this meat is also a big cost. It takes more than 80 percent of the corn we grow and more than 95 percent of oat are feed to livestock. The world’s cattle alone are feed the equal amount that would be needed to feed 8.7 billion people. That’s more than the entire world population. If we cut back on our consumption of meat we could take corn and oats that we produce and feed the world. When producing meat many of our natural resources are used. We use water, fossil fuels and top soil, and we are
As the turn of the twentieth century approached, the livestock industry became increasingly more powerful than ever before, and meat became much more affordable for working class families (Best). That was, until Francis Moore Lappé’s book, Diet for a Small Planet was published in 1971, and exposed the grave danger that the meat industry set upon the environment and specifically the earth’s land (Best). With a population that grows as rapidly as the human civilization does, it is imperative that changes are made to ensure habitat conservation for years to come, and it seems that a vegetarian diet is the way to help. Livestock farms and land to grow feed for those animals has taken the space of some of earth’s most wonderful resources, using up recreational land, wildlife habitat, and wilderness. The average American diet consists of 270 pounds of meat each year, and that rounds up to approximately 20 acres of land (Vidal). Livestock is said to take up 30% of dry land on earth, and 80% of the agrarian land within the United States. Becoming a vege...
When these agricultural resources are given to the animals involved in meat production, these resources are lost. Besides the loss of land, the process of animal production is contributing to pollution and other greenhouse gases that are doing irreplaceable damage to the environment and contribute to untold negative health
Bibliography Fiala, Nathan. "How Meat Contributes to Global Warming." The American Scientific Magazine. Journal Article, 4 Feb. 2009.
“Crop yield is roughly proportional to transpiration; more yield requires more transportation. It takes between five hundred and four thousand liters of evapotranspiration (ET, the combined process of evaporation and transpiration) to produce just one kilogram of grain. When that grain is fed to animals, producing a kilogram of of meat takes much more water--between five thousand and fifteen thousand liters. Thus vegetarian diets require less water (2,000 liters of ET daily) than do high-calorie diets that include grain-fed meat (5,000 liters of ET daily)” (Molden, De Fraiture, Rijsberman) We humans only need to drink two to five liters of water a day. Water is something we use a lot and not thinking of how much could be too much water. Water is also used when we cook or bake something. There is a lot of things water are need for and we don’t think about it when we might overuse water for
Freshwater in the world makes up only a small portion of water on the planet. While the percentage of water in the world is nearly 70%, only 2.5% is consumable. Even further, only <1% is easily accessible to basic human needs. According to National Geographic, “by 2025, an estimated 1.8 billion people will live in areas plagued by water scarcity, with two-thirds of the world's population living in water-stressed regions as a result of use, growth, and climate change.” With this current trend, water will become more immersed in environmental, economic, political, and social changes. Many of these in later years shall need to be addressed as tension rises:
...or lakes (Weber 2). When people just dump waste products instead of recycling, it is a misuse of the soil and can contribute to serious health conditions in animals, plants and humans.
The problem of water scarcity has increasingly spread throughout the world as of yet, The UN reports that within the next half- century up to 7 billion people in 60 countries which is more than the whole present population will face water scarcity (Sawin “Water Scarcity could Overwhelm the Next Generation”). As well the demand for freshwater has tripled over the past 50 years, and is continuing to rise as a result of population growth and economic development. 70% of this demand derives from agriculture which shows the influence of water on food supply globally as well not just drinking water (Sawin “Water Scarcity could overwhelm the Next Generation”). But increasing water use is not just a matter of the greater number of people needing it to drink and eat; it also comes from pollution and misuse of water supplies, by either dumping or runoff of bacteria or chemicals into water. This also “causes other pollutions as well such as soil and air pollution, accelerating wetland damage and human caused global warming” (Smith and Thomassey 25). According to UN report, recent estimates suggest that climate change will account for about 20 percent of the increase in global water scarcity in coming decades.
Meat also consumes food resources in a shockingly inefficient way: it takes 8kg of grain to produce 1kg of beef, and 4kg for pork. But each kilo of grain may need a ton of water. And fuel oil is needed throughout the process, to fertilize the grain, pump water and to transport it.