Isn't beef bad because cows release methane, but feeding cows seaweed can mitigate that?
Moreover the weight of a cow carcass is no higher than 60% that of the animal, while for pigs the lower bound is ~78%. Poultry is also very efficient in this regard, especially turkey yielding 80%+.
Where I'm from domestically consumed beef comes mostly from dairy cows so it's not particularly good, but it appears to be the more environmentally sound choice than growing them just for the meat(not that this was the aim - it's just cheaper).
We already did, in the sense that we'd need more earths to let everyone on earth eat the kind of diets prevalent in rich countries today. https://ourworldindata.org/agricultural-land-by-global-diets
Current enourmous land use by meat industries has many negative effects. We should individually switch to plant based (if you haven't already) and in public policy rapidly remove all subsidies from meat and animal industries and fully price in all negative externalities (GHG, antibiotics risks, pandemic risks, air and water pollution). At the same time subsidize plant based alternatives. As a result plant based alternatives would be several times lower in cost than the meat versions, which in turn would drive consumption changes.
No need to get all radical - you won't gain much support for such ideas. Beef consumption already peaked in rich countries anyway.
The idea that negative externalities should be priced in is the standard view in economics. I think most people, if provided the reasoning for it, would accept such pricing in when it comes to such serious global problems as climate change, antibiotics resistance, pandemic risk and air and water pollution.
Now is exactly the time for half measures - radical options proposed in the past largely failed due to their simplistic view of human nature.
We're actually getting there with electricity. Renewables - the very definition of a half-measure - are being deployed at a much higher rate than nuclear, which on the face of it is the ideal solution - but only in a world where megaprojects are delivered on time and within budget. Ironically China and Russia are doing great here - I suppose the secret ingredient is totalitarianism.
> I think most people, if provided the reasoning for it, would accept such pricing in when it comes to such serious global problems as climate change
That's a very charitable assumption.
There are many people who can't even begin to imagine, much less understand the issue at hand.
Going vegan because climate change and animal suffering is going to be a hard sell.
Not sure I understand. What are some examples of "radical options" in policy you think have been attempted and failed? What are examples of "non-radical" options you think there's evidence would yield better outcomes?
With "not the time for half measures" I meant that if only half measures are deployed now then it seems likely millions of humans, many from regions least responsible for climate change, will be harmed, killed or displaced.
The idea of pricing in costs is already very familiar to people in their everyday lives. There are social norms like "you break it, you pay" and various regulations that price in costs.
> Going vegan because climate change and animal suffering is going to be a hard sell.
Keep in mind the distinction between policy level and individual level. The policy suggestion was remove meat industry subsidies, price in externalities, subsidize plant based foods. On the individual level the best outreach approach varies case by case depending on where the recipient is at. Are you already vegan or in the process of switching to vegan? If not then feel free to lift any individual level objections or obstacles you personally have and we can discuss them.
Half measures is what's feasible. The measures you're proposing are not.
> Keep in mind the distinction between policy level and individual level. The policy suggestion was remove meat industry subsidies, price in externalities, subsidize plant based foods.
You're mistaken in the assumption that the majority will be willing to vote for this. Every point of yours is politically unpalatable.
https://www.wired.com/story/carbon-neutral-cows-algae/ "What’s more, feeding cattle algae is really only practical where it’s least needed: on feedlots. This is where most cattle are crowded in the final months of their 1.5- to 2-year lives to rapidly put on weight before slaughter. There, algae feed additives can be churned into the cows’ grain and soy feed. But on feedlots, cattle already belch less methane—only 11 percent of their lifetime output. ... This means that even if algae diets on feedlots worked perfectly, it wouldn’t help with the 89 percent of cows’ belches that occur earlier in their lives."
So even if we stopped producing CO2 from fossil fuels today, we would still be increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere though breeding cows and other livestock, moving through a CH4 phase that does even more harm. Livestock are releasing the C trapped in plant bodies.
There is only one place that actual surplus carbon comes from, and that is fossil fuels. Everything else is part of the closed-loop carbon cycle.
Atmospheric CH4 does not "do harm" as such, it's indeed a greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming in proportion to its prevalence. Said prevalence, as I'm trying to point out, is proportional to the number of heads of cattle. As such, if we don't increase the number of heads significantly, the impact will be constant.
Contrast with fossil fuels for, say, transportation: their impact on greenhouse effect is constantly increasing at a rate proportional to the number of cars/planes/trips.
Or put another way: we have to stop using ICE cars and planes altogether to stop increasing greenhouse effect; we only have to keep eating the same amount of beef and cheese to stop their impact.
There was this eye opening old XKCD that showed that by aggregate weight cattle dwarf every other land mammal: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1338:_Land_Mammal...
(Not a subject expert, do your own research, check the sources, etc.)