"It seems disingenuous for the intellectual elite of the first world to
dwell on the subject of too many babies being born in the second- and third-world nations while virtually ignoring the over-population of cattle and the realities of a food chain that
robs the poor of sustenance to feed the rich a steady diet of
grain-fed meat."
--Jeremy Rifkin, author of Beyond Beef, The Rise and Fall of the Cattle Culture, and President of the Greenhouse Crisis Foundation, Washington, D.C.
"A meat-fed world now appears a chimera. World grain production has grown more slowly than population since 1984, and farmers lack new methods for repeating the gains of the `green revolution.' Supporting the world's current population of
5.4 billion people on an American-style diet would require two-and-ahalf times as much grain as the world's farmers produce for all purposes. A future world of 8 billion to 14 billion
people eating the American ration of 220 grams of grain-fed meat a day can be nothing but a flight of fancy."
--Alan B. Durning and Holly Brough, Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C.
"There can be no question that more hunger can be alleviated with a given quantity of grain by completely eliminating animals
[from the food production process]. About 2,000 pounds of concentrates [grains] must be supplied to livestock in order to
produce enough meat and other livestock products to support a
person for a year, whereas 400 pounds of grain (corn, wheat, rice, soybeans, etc.) eaten directly will support a person for a
year. Thus, a given quantity of grain eaten directly will feed 5
times as many people as it will if it is first fed to livestock and
then is eaten indirectly by humans in the form of livestock products...."
--M. E. Ensminger, Ph.D., internationally recognized animal agriculture specialist, former Department of Animal Science Chairman at Washington State
University, currently President of Consultants-Agriservices, Clovis, California
Return to the main page