BernardBrown’s Recent Comments

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  Whoa there cowboy!

  Pastured organic beef is not necessarily the answer to all our problems. As far as I've been able to figure out, some techniques of pasture management can sequester carbon pretty well, but it's hard to tell from the consumer's position that a specific operation is using those techniques - how the heck do I know that the beef (or cheese, or eggs for that matter) I'm looking at were grown correctly? Even if you planted me in the middle of the field, how could I, the end purchaser tell by looking at it?

  In addition, whatever the carbon sequestration, raising beef to slaughter on pasture alone is slower than a feedlot CAFO, so even in a world of all perfect pasture management, we'd never be able to replace the current levels of production, and certainly not the levels forecasted to be demanded by the the Thirld World in the future.

  In the end we're all going to have to cut back, and while what we do end up buying should probably be pastured in a sustainable way (I know I do my best at the farmer's market), we're still going to have to eat beef, etc. as smaller portions of our diet, similar to how we're all working on getting electricity from a more sustainable mix just as we're working to cut down on our overall usage.  

  Change the world one lunch at a time. Find out how at www.pbjcampaign.org

  On Beef has 13 times more climate impact than chicken, 57 times more than potatoes posted 9 months, 1 week ago 7 Responses

• Click here to view comment in original post

  Whoa there cowboy!

  Pastured organic beef is not necessarily the answer to all our problems. As far as I've been able to figure out, some techniques of pasture management can sequester carbon pretty well, but it's hard to tell from the consumer's position that a specific operation is using those techniques - how the heck do I know that the beef (or cheese, or eggs for that matter) I'm looking at were grown correctly? Even if you planted me in the middle of the field, how could I, the end purchaser tell by looking at it?

  In addition, whatever the carbon sequestration, raising beef to slaughter on pasture alone is slower than a feedlot CAFO, so even in a world of all perfect pasture management, we'd never be able to replace the current levels of production, and certainly not the levels forecasted to be demanded by the the Thirld World in the future.

  In the end we're all going to have to cut back, and while what we do end up buying should probably be pastured in a sustainable way (I know I do my best at the farmer's market), we're still going to have to eat beef, etc. as smaller portions of our diet, similar to how we're all working on getting electricity from a more sustainable mix just as we're working to cut down on our overall usage.  

  Change the world one lunch at a time. Find out how at www.pbjcampaign.org

  On Beef has 13 times more climate impact than chicken, 57 times more than potatoes posted 9 months, 1 week ago 7 Responses

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  Kind of Like Clean Coal

  As far as I've been able to tell, this carbon-storing ranching is possible, but I have no sense of how to know when livestock is raised in this manner, I have no sense of what proportion is produced this way now, and while sustainable ranching could sequester comparable quantities of carbon under ground as a prairie, I still haven't seen how it can sequester as much carbon as a forest (including the above-ground carbon stored in a forest in the form of trees).

  Maybe there could be a shift to all of us buying pastured animal products that are raised sustainably (I certainly try to at the local farmer's market), but as far as I can tell it's more expensive than factory farmed product, so ultimately less would be consumed - something I have no problem with as long as we don't cut down forest and overgraze the West under the fuzzy label of biodynamic ranching.  On Umbra on homegrown meat posted 10 months, 3 weeks ago 33 Responses

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  re: soy concern, low on the food chain still helps

  Erin,

  It's true that soybeans are often grown in unsustainable ways, but since it generally takes less grain (including soy) to produce the tofu, bread, or whatever you're eating instead of the grain-fed meat, you'd ultimately be eating food created from smaller quantities of the offending soy.

  One way to think of this is that animals 'process' grain into other forms of food (meat, eggs, milk), but they do it inefficiently, so that it takes more grain to produce the meat, milk, and eggs than it would take to replace them in your diet.

  Of course organic, locally produced tofu would be best, but you'd be decreasing the amount of industrial soy even if the tofu isn't organic or non-GMO.  On Umbra on homegrown meat posted 10 months, 3 weeks ago 33 Responses

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  cut back

  Although I understand that we have to get involved in the legislative process over this kind of thing, it mainly motivates me to cut back even more on my animal product consumption and eat what I eat local and small producer produced - more cause to drag myself out to the farmer's market Saturday morning for the pastured eggs and cheese.

  Billy

  Change the world one lunch at a time. Find out how at www.pbjcampaign.org

  On Why we shouldn't target farmers for our farm bill frustrations posted 1 year, 11 months ago 9 Responses