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Comment by hn_throwaway_99 | Hacker News Reader

I think mushroom leather is a cool invention, but at least at the present time, the vast majority of animal leather is a byproduct of food production, to the point that there is a surplus of leather because people like hamburgers more than leather products: https://qz.com/1308051/the-popularity-of-sneakers-is-leaving...

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I've always had a hard time reasoning about this.

On one-hand, it's a waste-stream, which means that finding a purpose for it means that the resources gone into the animals from which leather is made become more efficient.

On the other, if you believe that meat production at its current scale is bad for the environment, you're making it cheaper and subsidising it.

Then there's the impact of all the chemicals involved in leather tanning, which are not inconsequential.

I don't know what to think about leather in all honesty.

It looks to be 1-5% of the value of the animal at this point but some are just discarded entirely.

It's important to consider the durability of leather products. IME, good quality natural leather products easily last 3-4x longer than alternatives.

The tanning process isn't exactly environmentally friendly, but it doesn't have to be if it can reduce overall consumption by enough.

Indeed. Good leather products can last for years or decades. Leather belts, wallets, shoes, bags, etc all last far longer than their fabric alternatives.

Centuries, if cared for properly.

Bad quality, leather, on the other hand, disintegrates within a few months.

I was at the Apple WWDC, where they passed out those leather jackets with the big blue "X" on the back.

Mine didn't make it to the next WWDC, and I took great care of it.

I think that they may have had a couple of versions of the jacket. I saw it reappear, for quite a while, on the bodies of Apple favorites (I wasn't one), for many years.

What do we know about the durability of mushroom leather and how does its environmental impact compare with animal leather?

One wonders how the total life cycle of cotton or nylon compare to the leather production process. Mushroom leather could be used when the look really matters, but otherwise I would think a lot of leather products could be made with heavy canvas or nylon.

Anyway I am a vegan so using animal skin as an industrial output is something I think we should make a conscious effort to end as much as possible.

Leather is also a byproduct of dairy production! Many may relinquish their hamburgers, but few will relinquish their pizzas.

One must consider the cow a miraculous piece of technology: an efficient reactor for converting cereals and grasses into valuable fats, proteins, as well as useful materials.

One more complicating question -- does the hide value of an animal incentivize better treatment during its life?

Leather itself is a driver of deforestation and not just a secondary byproduct.

https://www.stand.earth/publication/forest-conservation/amaz...

The point being that if you shrink the leather market you don’t really reduce the cattle market at all and what would be made into leather is just discarded.

If you cannot sell the leather, the meat will have to become more expensive (same cost to raise the animal, additional cost for discarding the skin, less income). If meat is more expensive, less will be bought, shrinking the meat market.

Yep. Let's return back to times when only rich and wealthy were able to afford meat.

If the price for alternatives goes down in return, sure. Tax meat more heavily, subsidize vegetables and plant-based alternatives with that tax, or come up with some other clever scheme. It'll drive change a lot faster than just depending on the few who (can) care enough.

We eat, on average, too much meat as it is, and with meat the negative externalities such as deforestation are completely ignored in the price.

reading the post about medieval jobs, I don't think this time ever existed.

It depended on the climate and society. Pastoralists living on the steppes almost exclusively lived off animal meat and dairy products, while folks in areas with heavy grain production were much more likely to get the vast majority of their calories from staple grain crops.

I don't know about medieval times, but a lack of animal products in the diet of the the impoverished and imprisoned was a problem as recently as the early 1900s. The disease Pellagra[1] is caused by a lack of niacin in the diet, which can be commonly found in animal products (and certain plant products like legumes). It was considered a paupers disease and was most commonly found in rural areas and in the poor, imprisoned, or orphaned. The prevailing theory was that it was related to eating corn - either an insect born illness or a contaminant - when in reality it was a lack of diet diversity in the people who could only afford to eat corn. The history on Dr. Goldberger is actually really interesting and I recommend a skim of his Wikipedia page.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pellagra#History

Subsidizing a bad thing so more people can do it doesn't make it a good thing. I also eat meat, but the main argument here is "let's have meat prices more accurately reflect the cost and let the market adjust accordingly", and then as a bonus it should also help the planet and everyone

A great point, and I think an important thing to note about mushroom leather is it is ALSO a byproduct of food demand! It is (or was, at least initially) made from the waste of commercial oyster mushroom farming.

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