No outrage on my end, more confusion. Sure, veggies take up water and at scale it adds up. But once it’s understood that 3/4 of all grown crop is for livestock feed, it really puts the drastic impact of meat into perspective though.
I think that’s a great perspective to take. Its also worth considering why our food systems are so carbon/ water intense. A big part of this is about patterns of consumption and that grocery stores want to provide and consumers want to consume an entire pallete of what would only be seasonally available foods year round. What it means is that New York cant provide year round lettuce for New York’s needs, so there is no significant lettuce production in New York. Its an all or nothing approach. It would be completely reasonable to produce lettuce in NY… from June till September.
Lettuce basically has to be refrigerated from the time it gets harvested in say Salinas or Imperial county, or Southern Arizona, until pretty much you put it on a plate and serve it. Its also basically water, takes up a large amount of space for its density, and has relatively few calories and nutrient content beyond some fiber. It also (head lettuce is very bad about this) takes a lot of packaging.
For the American diet, and especially, the American vegetarians diet, to make sense climate sense, its going to have to be seasonally limited in whats available.
Earlier you asked about ‘stance’, which I take as an ask for me to frame this politically, or in regards to my view or outlook. I think whats important to me is to have a clear and practical view of what is, especially if that view is partial, and to know what the approximate boundaries of that view are.
No outrage on my end, more confusion. Sure, veggies take up water and at scale it adds up. But once it’s understood that 3/4 of all grown crop is for livestock feed, it really puts the drastic impact of meat into perspective though.
I think that’s a great perspective to take. Its also worth considering why our food systems are so carbon/ water intense. A big part of this is about patterns of consumption and that grocery stores want to provide and consumers want to consume an entire pallete of what would only be seasonally available foods year round. What it means is that New York cant provide year round lettuce for New York’s needs, so there is no significant lettuce production in New York. Its an all or nothing approach. It would be completely reasonable to produce lettuce in NY… from June till September.
Lettuce basically has to be refrigerated from the time it gets harvested in say Salinas or Imperial county, or Southern Arizona, until pretty much you put it on a plate and serve it. Its also basically water, takes up a large amount of space for its density, and has relatively few calories and nutrient content beyond some fiber. It also (head lettuce is very bad about this) takes a lot of packaging.
For the American diet, and especially, the American vegetarians diet, to make sense climate sense, its going to have to be seasonally limited in whats available.
Earlier you asked about ‘stance’, which I take as an ask for me to frame this politically, or in regards to my view or outlook. I think whats important to me is to have a clear and practical view of what is, especially if that view is partial, and to know what the approximate boundaries of that view are.