[tmitchel2]

Could you pinpoint what exactly is not sustainable about eating meet though? In the UK (where I live) we eat meet produced mostly within the country, the livestock here are generally mostly fed a grass diet. Yes we should eat meet in moderation like anything, yes chopping down rainforests and building feeding lots is obvs horrific. But otherwise, the cattle eat the grass, they turn that into meet and farts, which fairly quickly come full circle back into the ground. No fossil fuels here. Hard to think of something more sustainable to me.

[Someone]

What feeds the grass? Chances are it partly is imported fertilizer (https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/imports-of-ferti...), and that the nitrogen in the fertilizer is partly washed out into the environment (https://www.wwf.org.uk/press-release/government-watchdog-fai...)

Also, chances are the livestock partly is fed from imported food, for example in winter.

[dflock]

The UK climate is, currently, very good at growing grass. You can continuously graze cattle all year round in most of the country, as long as you rotate them between fields every few days. If you have enough space, by the time they get back round, the grass is back. The cow shit fertilizes the grass, and silage made on the farm does a lot of the winter feed top up. As long as the density isn't too high, it can be pretty low input.

[analog31]

At the present time, the Haber-Bosch process sustains well over half of the world's animal population. This is what's not sustainable on a global basis, even if one country can do it.

I saw corn fields when I visited England recently. Don't know the extent.

[ceejayoz]

The farts (and burps) are a major greenhouse gas component. https://www.reuters.com/breakingviews/war-cow-farts-is-stink...

[tmitchel2]

They emit methane as a by product of eating the grass, it's like chucking the grass up in the air and having to wait approx 20 years for it to fully come back down to be eaten again, it's still circular, it's still fully sustainable. Digging up fossil oils from deep ground and shuving it into the atmosphere and never ever putting it back deep into the ground is the elephant in the room here.

[cyberax]

Except that there isn't enough natural grass to keep all the cows fed.

[bregma]

What is the delta in production between cows eating the grass and the same grass decomposing without the cows?