AS THE ROMANS SAY, "RARA SUNT CARA". RARE IS VALUABLE. (CHINA)

The changes in diet occurring in China carry rippling effects around the world. What China’s hungry for makes a difference, said Janet Larsen of the Earth Policy Institute, adding that, “when a few people jump it may cause a ripple, but when a billion people jump, it’s a major shockwave.”

This week, we will be momentarily going back in time in China to compare eating habits in the past to today's eating habits.

Sorry, it might not be all that fancy...

Last week we focused on the consumption trends in USA, this week we are focusing on an even bigger area and an even bigger problem. China now eats twice as much meat as the United States. This is evident in the diagram below. Meat consumption in China is increasing for various reasons and we will be inspecting the main reasons for this trend in today's post. 

Meat consumption compared between China and U.S.

China in 1980's:

Meat was seen as a luxury; each Chinese ate just 13kg of meat, the equivalent to one tenth of a pig a year. On the other hand, beef was so rare it was nicknamed "Millionaire's meat". 

As China started to emerge from a state of poverty, meat consumption increased. As the Romans say, "Rara Sunt Cara", Rare is valuable. Since China's incomes were, and still are increasing many traditional Chinese foods are being switched to the 'luxury foods'. Instead of rice, individuals are replacing this with meats. Beginning in the 1980s, officials enacted measures to promote livestock production, including support for development of a feed-milling industry and subsidized imports of more productive animal breeds. Such incentives has led to incorrect information in the economy and incorrect incentives; individuals became more enthusiastic about livestock production and began to see it positively.

Dinner would probably look something like this in 1980's

China today:

Currently, China is a big player not only on the demand side, but the supply side too. “China produces and consumes about half of the pork in the world,” Schuele said." Consumption and demand of meat is increasing as low income families gradually climb the ladder up to become middle income families. The meals an average Chinese middle income family is eating now, would be a feast to their parents. 

Moreover, Meat consumption is doubling every 10 years." In all, the country now eats more than 60m tonnes of meat a year; equivalent to 240 million cows, or 600 million pigs, or 24 billion chickens. These facts suggest a very large scale problem that is arising not only in the respects of greenhouse gases emitted in the process but also feed needed for the livestock. Since meat consumption is increasing, it has led to individuals noticing this trend and moving towards setting up small farms. A shift in those with household and small farm productions to larger scale meat factories. This seems to be showing a cyclical trend, in which higher demands lead to higher supply and this reduces prices, such that demand can increase even more.

A meal in China today

Benefits:

So far we have focused on the trends in meat production and consumption in China. Having read my previous posts, one can assume that the increasing trends are detrimental to the planet. It is true in some respects, but on a micro level, it has actually shown a big improvement to the Chinese people's lives.

In lifting 300 million people out of poverty over the past 30 years, China also saw an improvement in diets that made the country healthier. According to the World Food Programme, a six-year-old boy today in China is 6kg heavier and 6cm taller than his counterpart at the start of economic reforms in 1978.

Although it may be true that the health conditions of the people in China may have improved, this correlation may not be directly as a result of the consumption of meat. It could be argued that due to increasing incomes, families can now afford to buy more varieties of foods. In poorer areas of China, families may be eating the exact same foods at each meal; this means the nutrients absorbed would be very limited. By having higher incomes, more varied vegetables could be introduced into the Chinese diet instead of putting emphasis on the role of meat.

Beef:

Beef has not become as popular in China because cattle in feedlots gobble up about 7 pounds of grain for each pound of weight gain. For pigs, the feeding ratio is 3 to 1, and for chickens it is 2 to 1. With one fifth of the world's population and limited land and water supplies, China has had to rely heavily on the more-efficient forms of animal protein. 

This is good news for the environment since beef is the biggest contributor to global warming as discussed in previous posts. On the other hand, other meats have been a big hit in China instead.

Pork:

Over half of the world's pigs now live in China. By the end of the year, it is projected that there will be almost twice as many pigs in China as people in America. In the last few decades, China has developed the world's largest pork industry to feed a rising middle class. A quickly rising appetite for pork in China has fueled the sudden jump in production. In mid 1970s, an average Chinese citizen ate 8kg of pork a year. Now, each person eats about 39kg of pork a year. 

China has now overtaken American pork consumption

Poultry:

Poultry production never existed prior to 1978. Chicken flocks in China have grown rapidly. Since the raising of chickens are much simpler and easier than raising ruminants, China has been a big producer of Chickens. The demand and consumption of poultry is also growing.

Although some may perceive that consuming poultry is not as bad for the environment since chickens do not emit methane the way ruminants do, the main environmental concerns are derived from the chicken feed. According to earth-policy.org, more than 60% of the world soybean exports, nearly all from the United States, Brazil and Argentina, go to China. These crops are very often grown in highly unsustainable conditions; ways which involve deforestation which leads to a reduction of biodiversity. 

Sorry, you just can't win either way I'm afraid.

Happy Meatless Monday! Tune in next Monday for a new post on UK meat consumption trends!

COUNTRIES COMPARED

Today we will be focusing on the worldwide meat production and consumption.

If you were interested in the previous post (the table with a breakdown of meat and milk consumption per country/region) here is a more comprehensive review of the meat production and consumption for ya! 

For those who prefer a more visual breakdown;

1) Worldwide Meat Production

The production of meats in USA and Europe is increasing, however this is equally matched by increasing prices due to the high costs associated to livestock production. However, pigs and poultry are doing well in the market since both species do not need a lot of feed and can be kept in confined spaces.

2) Top Ten International Meat Industry:

Four out of the ten are based in the US; Cargill, Smithfield Foods, Tyson Foods and Hormel Foods. Three are located in Brazil; JBS, BRF and Marfrig. The rest are in Denmark, Netherlands and Japan.

Looking more carefully at the estimated meat consumption and the forecast, it seems that the increasing meat trend may not be so applicable to all countries.

3) Demand in the rich world

This may actually reflect on the fact that the 'richer' may be positively correlated to being more 'educated' and thus may be seeing a reduction in meat consumption. Despite this, only in less than half of the cases shown in the diagram above, shows a decline in meat consumption. Even so, the decline is very minimal and would be outweighed by the increases in meat demand. For example, by 2020, China's poultry production will increase by 37%, Brazil's will increase 28% and U.S. will increase by 16%. Nevertheless, the fact that there are forecasts for some countries lowering their meat demand is a good sign and goes to show that perhaps we can turn the tables.

Having identified and compared the different meat consumption patterns of different countries, we will proceed to look more carefully into specific regions in future posts!

Happy Meatless Monday! Tune in next Monday for a new FUN MYSTERY POST! Look forward to it!

LAND DEGRADATION

The livestock sector is by far the single largest anthropogenic user of land; it accounts for 30% of the land surface of the planet.

After a refreshing weekend, I'm back for a new post on our Meatless Monday's! I hope you had a great weekend too! In today's post, we will be discussing land degradation as a consequence of the livestock sector, so get ready for some important info!

Land degradation is a direct result of the following:

i) Extensive grazing

Extensive grazing leads to a degradation of vast areas of land. Livestock production is shifting geographically, first from rural areas to urban and peri-urban, to get closer to consumers, then towards the sources of feedstuff. Due to convenience and to cut costs, this has expanded the areas affected by extensive grazing. Finally, grazing reduces the fertility of the land. This is important because it means that the quality of the soil is greatly reduced, such that plants would be supplied with less nutrients when grown on this soil. As a result, humans need to turn to other ways of production for good quality produce such as through organic farming.

ii) Deforestation

Since demand for meat production is increasing for various reasons, the land that we have for livestock also needs to be increasing. Countless acres of forest and rainforest land have had to have been cleared as an opportunity cost of raising livestock in large areas. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the UN has estimated that 70% of previously forested land in South America has been converted for grazing land. As a result, it leads to further problems such as a loss in habitat as well as affecting global warming by reducing the trees available to convert carbon dioxide to oxygen.

Solutions to overgrazing:

If you read the previous post, you would have come across the 'free rider problem'. Again, it pops up here. Grazing is not really priced at... well, anything. Because of this, there is a high chance of exploiting this resource. The best solution to this is to introduce grazing fees. Perhaps removing obstacles to mobility on common property pastures will allow pasture sustainability as pastoralists can rotate the crop areas whilst the degraded land can be regenerated. Finally, soil conservation methods should be put into practise more often, this may be maintained through incentives, and by placing limits to uncontrolled burning by pastoralists.

Solutions to deforestation:

Some possible solutions outlined by Greenpeace include the help from companies who have the power and control to introduce zero deforestation policies. This is where the production of the goods are based on minimalising the negative impacts on forests. Furthermore, more emphasis on the bad environmental impacts created by these companies should be put into light by consumers.

Overall, many of us may dismiss overgrazing and deforestation because we are not directly affected by these impacts; the negative knock on effects are gradual such that humans do not see the issues as urgent. However, these issues are affecting the plants, animals and the quality of our lives and future generations. I hope you took something away from this week's post, we will focus on the negative effects on animals next week, so don't forget to come back next Monday!

Happy Meatless Monday! Tune in next Monday for a new post on Biodiversity