Plant-Based ‘Beef’ Reduces CO2 but Threatens Ag Jobs
hubie writes:
Plant-based 'beef' reduces CO2 but threatens ag jobs:
Plant-based alternatives to beef have the potential to help reduce carbon dioxide emissions, but their growth in popularity could disrupt the agricultural workforce, threatening more than 1.5 million industry jobs, new economic models show.
[...] By embracing meat protein alternatives, U.S. food production could reduce its agricultural carbon footprint by between 2.5% and 13.5%, mostly by decreasing the number of cows needed for beef production by two to 12 million, according to the paper.
[...] "Still, plant-based alternatives to beef are not silver bullets," he said, "with their impact on other environmental dimensions of the food system - such as total water use - ambiguous."
The researchers explored the potential disruption of plant-based beef alternatives by comparing the economic consequences under a range of scenarios, where plant-based beef alternatives replaced 10%, 30% or 60% of current U.S. beef demand.
[...] Acting to reduce climate change is important, the researchers said, but technological disruption can have many consequences - both positive and negative - across the economy, such as the issue of livelihoods, working conditions, human rights, fair wages and health equity.
[...] The adoption of plant-based beef alternatives could lead to other unintended consequences. For example, resources freed from contracting beef sectors - such as livestock feed - could allow the pork and poultry sectors to expand.
[...] "Nevertheless, a range of plant-based alternatives to animal products are under development," Mason-D'Croz said. "If these are adopted widely, then increases in animal numbers would be less likely, even as economic disruption and negative impacts on the livelihoods of those employed in animal-sourced food value chains would be much larger."
Journal Reference:
Daniel Mason-D'Croz, Anne Barnhill, Justin Bernstein, et al., Ethical and economic implications of the adoption of novel plant-based beef substitutes in the USA: a general equilibrium modelling study [open], The Lancet, 6, 8, 2022. DOI: 10.1016/S2542-5196(22)00169-3
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