Should You Do Veganuary? We Say NO! Here's Why
There’s no argument, if you really indulged over the holidays, eating slightly healthier this January via the Vegan diet will probably make you feel better and help you lose a little weight. But what if you could feel BETTER than better? What if you felt like you were THRIVING and burned fat seamlessly?
The vegan diet has many problems: It’s not eco-friendly or nutrient dense, it will make you eat all the time and feel bloated.
You also don’t have to give up meat to be healthy, ethical or sustainable.
I know these are bold claims, but they are backed by science.
100% grass-fed cows live in harmony on the land and therefore have low environmental impact. No changes are being made to the land and cattle are often raised in areas not sustainable for growing grains or produce. It’s often said that beef requires about 1,910 US gallons per pound (or 15,944 litres per kilogram) of water to get to the plate. That can seem striking, but the majority of the water cows use is rainwater!
Most of the water footprint of beef comes from how they’re fed, and more specifically the water it took to grow their feed. Pastured cattle have a large Green Water Footprint: consumption of rain water. They rely primarily on rain-fed grasses and forage that is grown or cultivated on pasture and rangeland (grasses are mostly water). Their Blue (Irrigated) Water Footprint is small because in general, grass-fed cattle don’t rely on irrigated crops from offsite farms, although many pasture operations supplement with hay during winter months and/or drought conditions, and that feed may sometimes have been irrigated.
Note: this is different for CAFO + strictly grain-fed cows. These crops fed to the cattle require a lot of irrigated water. An analysis estimated that about 87 percent of irrigated US corn is grown in regions deemed to have high or extremely high water stress. 80% of all cattle start off as grass-fed and then most are sent to CAFOs (confined animal feeding operations) the last few months to eat grain to fatten up before butchering. Hence the encouragement to go 100% grass-fed if possible.
In comparison to beef, to grow one almond requires 1.1 gallons of water. Less popular, conservative estimates state .8 gallons per almond. And to grow a pound (at 1.1 gallons of water per almond) it takes 1,900 gal/lb. Beef and almonds require roughly the same amount of water - except plants use mostly Blue Water!
Another fun fact about cattle is that they build soil. The midwest plains are nutrient dense because of the millions of bison that roamed the area. They ate the grass in one area for a few days and then move on so it has time to recover. Called rotational grazing, the practice can build soil carbon over time. As the animals graze, manure and plant material get worked into the ground. Regenerative cattle raising follows these same practices.
Further, vegan products - soy, corn, wheat - require native lands to be converted to fields; IE burning down forests and grassland and then bull-dozing it to build fields. Crop fields also are tilled each year to be naked soils for planting, this process releases even more carbon into the atmosphere. The tilling also disrupts the soil ecosystem. In comparison, pastures protect the soil. I also don’t want to forget to mention corn and soy are mostly GMOs - heavily sprayed with chemicals and the fields contribute to chemical runoff in heavy rains (which are happening more and more).
Continuous monoculture also encourages pest invasions and diseases and its one of its biggest disadvantages. This is because diseases can spread quickly through a crop if all the plants are (equally) susceptible. And because monoculture farming doesn’t allow cows to graze the fields and regenerate the topsoils, fields are increasingly becoming barren (it’s literally a crisis).
And then there are nutrients. What about nutrient density? Beef has more nutrients than plants (and I’m not even talking about organ meat)! It’s no secret that long-term plant-based diets are notorious for causing zinc, iron, calcium, DHA, B12 and vitamin D deficiencies.
Beef + animal meat also have more calories, absorbable protein and fat that provide satiation. Almost everyone I have talked to that has been vegetarian or vegan has said they are constantly eating; low calorie foods with fiber can only fill to you to an extent so you eat all day. In undergrad I went vegetarian for a semester and I was always hungry, it’s not a good feeling. All that fiber also does interesting things to your digestion….
Humans have been relying on animals for their nutrients for millions of years. Anthropologists say that when we were hunters + gatherers, we weren’t hunting for protein per se, we were hunting fat. That’s why we tend to love fattier cuts of meat like ribeye and prime rib, which is why the beef industry has added grain to fatten livestock up.
It was the fat that sustained us, that gave us pleasure and kept us alive. It was the nutrient-dense organ meat that grew our brains and made us into modern, brilliant humans. It’s not kale drawn on cave walls, it’s hunting mammoths! That kind of an animal would have been a Paleolithic jackpot - it would have provided nourishment to a clan for months! You see this in modern hunter + gatherer tribes like the Hadza and Maasai, they primarily eat meat, dairy, drink blood, fruit and honey. If they survive into adulthood, they live just as old as us, but disease-free lives.
When our clients make sure they are getting in enough animal based protein in their diet (about 1 gram per pound ideal body weight), wonderful things start to happen to their health.
Regenerative farms doing the right thing for the earth include: White Oak Pastures, Nose to Tail, and Firebrand Meats.
To learn more, watch Sacred Cow on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/Sacred-Cow-Nick-Offerman/dp/B08PDSRSBL
Sacred Cow is taking a critical look at the assumptions and misinformation about meat, Sacred Cow points out the flaws in our current food system and in the proposed "solutions." Inside, Rodgers and Wolf reveal contrarian but science-based findings, such as:
• Meat and animal fat are essential for our bodies.
• A sustainable food system cannot exist without animals.
• A vegan diet may destroy more life than sustainable cattle farming.
• Regenerative cattle ranching is one of our best tools at mitigating climate change.
Sources
https://www.watercalculator.org/footprint/water-footprint-beef-industrial-pasture/
https://www.beefresearch.ca/blog/cattle-feed-water-use/
https://www.businessinsider.com/amount-of-water-needed-to-grow-one-almond-orange-tomato-2015-4
https://farmtogether.com/learn/blog/dispelling-miconceptions-about-almonds-water-use