> You could feed way more people if you ate the corn
We're already eating too much corn, no thank you. If you check the label on the packaged goods you buy, corn is pretty much in all of them in one form or another.
We should grow less corn, let the cows eat grass, and have people eat people food (which might occasionally include a corn on the cob).
I agree with all those points. All I'm saying is that if you argue that using corn ethanol as fuel is bad because it's "burning food", then you have to confront all the other ways in which the agricultural system is not really about making food.
Additionally, sugarcane-derived ethanol is far more efficient than the corn-based stuff we use in the US. I've seen numbers ranging from 3x to more than 7x more efficient than corn-based ethanol, which would mean that the use of ethanol could actually be a net reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, unlike what we get from using corn.
No reason to demonize sustainable, renewable fuel - instead, we should look at the agriculture subsidies that "protect our farmers" and see how they're hurting everyone (including the farmers, affected arguably more than the rest of us by global warming) in the long run.
Ag subsidies seem to mainly stabilize price regimes. There would arguably be costs associated with increased risk of production if the subsidies were not in place.
They might be obsolete, but the fraction of people's time spent on food (both as producers and consumers ) continues to decline. It's also argued that the availability of abundant food is a legitimate public good.
Our levels of food security in the First World are recent. I doubt anyone from... say, 1850 would put food security in terms of a human right as we now do.
The irony is that petroleum products are an input into ethanol-corn production. How much I don't know; but the present subsidy regime nearly guarantees some measure of overproduction.
There isn't enough grass to 'let the cows eat' while sustaining affordability for lower income people. That's why they switched to corn, much better density of calories.
And, as a result, we've created the nightmare situation where we fill the animals we eat with antibiotics since we feed them foods that they're not adapted to eat. Not only are we helping to create antibiotic-resistant superbugs but the antibiotics in food also reduce the beneficial gut bacteria that we need to be healthy.
There was a time when people didn't eat meat with every meal...many people believe it's actually healthier. If people can't afford to eat grass-fed meat with every meal, the simple answer is to not eat meat with every meal...poor people can eat vegetables too and will probably be healthier for it.
> There was a time when people didn't eat meat with every meal.
Yeah. There was also a time when 8-year-olds did a full day's work in the mines and malnourishment was the norm.
You should think about the complexity involved in eating a healthy vegetarian diet before you start being dismissive of it. Meat is easier in some significant ways.
You're putting words in his mouth. He never said to not eat meat. He said not to eat it at every meal. You don't need to eat sausage and bacon at breakfast, a rack of ribs and half a chicken at lunch, and a 1/2 lb steak at supper to get your daily intake of meat-provided nutrients. The sad truth is that far too many people eat meat at every single meal, and it's just not natural for us. Balance.
Don't confuse availability with what is "natural". Eating (lean) meat at every meal is quite natural and has been common in some societies where it was plentiful.
You should think about the complexity involved in eating a healthy vegetarian diet before you start being dismissive of it.
Lets not blow the difficulty of being a vegetarian out of proportion. Eating a healthy vegan diet is still difficult. Eating a healthy vegetarian diet is not. There are plenty of cook books describing varied and balanced vegetarian meals. There are plenty of restaurants that serve good vegetarian meals and many supermarkets (at least in Western Europe) also provide the necessary ingredients.
(I have been a vegetarian for 16 years now, almost half of my life.)
And there's plenty of people who live in places where it's impossible to get any fresh vegetables, much less enough of a variety to provide all the amino acids necessary for someone who isn't eating meat.
I would imagine that the antibiotics in cattle issue is far more closely related to factory farming in confined quarters than anything to do with what kind of food they are primarily eating.
There's a class of antibiotics (ionophores) that are used in cattle feed specifically to manage issues with grain feeding. They reduce incidence of "bloat", and increase feed efficiency. They are also used with other feeds, but the purpose is still to manage digestion issues.
I think there is more use of other antibiotics to treat sickness in feedlots though.
The two are not mutually exclusive; each carries a significant tax on the animal's health and immune system.
Humans are fairly unique in our dietary flexibility; most other animals are evolutionarily adapted to a narrow range of foods. Corn provides caloric energy, but little more; a cow needs to eat grass, and move around, in order to be healthy.
It is not absolutely essential that lower income people eat beef. More importantly, the state should not be allowed to waste tax payer money on the ridiculous idea that lower income people must have beef to eat.
Why on earth should my tax dollars go to a steak party?
Pardon the pun, but your complaints are incredibly rarified. No one's having a steak party, they're eating burgers and tacos in between their long shifts because of lack of fresh produce and time to cook it.
There is an argument that says the Central Valley of California farmers basically funded Reagan's White House run in 1980. Carter was going after payments for all that water...
The average voter feels a burger/taco/burrito is tastier and 'American'.
The average voter probably has also not had /good/ experiences with salads that are actually tasty for reasons other than bacon. (Can we PLEASE stop adding bacon to /everything/ (at least as a default?); some of us just don't like the smokey taste.)
> There isn't enough grass to 'let the cows eat' while sustaining affordability for lower income people.
I'm pretty sure there's no shortage of grass. If we turn some of those corn fields into grazing fields, there would be even more grass.
The reason they use corn is because it fattens up the cow much faster and to a far greater degree.
So yeah, switching to grass will increase the price of beef on a per pound basis. Label the meat. Let people choose. Stick a "fed with corn" or "fed with grass" sticker on it. I'll happily pay twice as much knowing the animal didn't eat crap.
We already do this with eggs. Lots of labeling. There's no reason we can't extend this to poultry and beef.
Then you should check your confidence level, because you're wrong. Most of the available USA grazing territory is already cow-burnt, and that's before you get things like the extreme droughts of recent years causing mass cattle slaughter and die-offs. And mind you all but a rounding error of these cattle are finished on grain feedlots.
This is already happening; I can now find labeled grass-fed beef at regular groceries as well as Whole Foods. It's expensive enough, though, that it's still relatively niche in terms of volume, especially after factoring in fast food and Sysco restaurants.
If that's the case why can other countries like the UK feed cattle on primarily grass? Admitidely the population is lower, but so is the amount of grazing land as I understand.
You might want to prefer population density over population as a metric: the population density of the UK is _much_ higher than that of the US. IIRC, this is true even east of the Mississippi.
Pasture is probably higher quality in the UK though, owing to the wet climate, which would compensate for there being less pasture.
> If you check the label on the packaged goods you buy, corn is pretty much in all of them in one form or another.
Well yeah: corn grows really well in the American Midwest; it's pretty cool that we're able to make so many products from it (kinda like the work George Washington Carver did with peanuts, which grow very well in the South).
It's also an efficient crop as it uses the C4 pathway, and as you've said can be reprocessed infinite ways, even as gas as you see here. Great for an industrialized market economy.
We're already eating too much corn, no thank you. If you check the label on the packaged goods you buy, corn is pretty much in all of them in one form or another.
We should grow less corn, let the cows eat grass, and have people eat people food (which might occasionally include a corn on the cob).