
By Kali Holloway
The cliche about the American diet being mostly meat and potatoes has seemed less true over recent years, with vegetarianism going mainstream and veganism gaining popularity. But old dietary habits die hard—possibly because of their clogged arteries. A new study finds there's been a reversal in meat-eating declines, with the last year seeing Americans piling their plates higher with meat than they have in nearly 40 years. That's not so great news for Americans' health and potentially devastating for the planet.
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Rabobank, a global research firm, found that between 2014 and 2015, there was a 5 percent increase in meat consumption. The agency reports the rise was the "largest increase in U.S. meat consumption since the food scares of the 1970s." According to MarketWatch, that means on average, Americans last year ate more than 3.7 pounds of beef, pork or chicken each week—or about 193 pounds a year. That's up from 184 pounds in 2012. Globally, we are not, as Americans like to proclaim with all things, number one in eating meat. But we are very close.
But we may yet grab the brass ring! Vox points out that the fall-off in meat consumption America has seen for years was less due to healthy eating initiatives than to supermarket pricing. Writer Eliza Barclay notes that in the meat-lean years between 2005 and 2014, "ranchers and farmers trimmed their herds because of the recession, historically high feed costs and drought in the Great Plains. Meanwhile, domestic disease outbreaks like porcine epidemic diarrhea virus or PEDv, meant that tens of thousands of hogs never made it to market." Now that that's all been sorted and meat's relatively cheap again, Rabobank predicts meat production in the U.S. will increase 2.5 percent per year. At least until 2018, when we'll hit the meat-eating heights previously observed in the mid-aughts.
Vegetarianism has come a long way in terms of mainstream acceptance—as has veganism, though to a far lesser degree—but the number of Americans who describe themselves as either hasn't exactly exploded. Though estimates vary somewhat, most surveys peg the number of adults in the U.S. who describe themselves as vegetarian or vegan somewhere between nearly 3 percent to 5 percent. (If you live in a vegetarian-friendly city—a designation based on the number of vegan and veggie restaurants—such as Portland, New York City, Austin, Seattle or San Francisco, the number probably seems higher and in your area, that's because it likely is).
While the percentage of vegans has grown but remains small, the number of vegetarians has pretty much remained unchanged for a decade. There's likely a number of reasons why the diets haven't taken hold with more Americans. Some this just comes down to culture: People grow up eating meat, their families and circle groups are meat eaters, they enjoy eating meat, and they haven't really considered cutting meat out. There are also a significant number of vegans and vegetarians who go back to eating meat—a whopping 84 percent. Lifestyle changes can be hard for some former meat eaters; one survey found ex-veggies and vegans said it was too difficult to maintain a "pure" diet. Environment (say, living with a meat eater), convenience and health concerns all played a role. The point is, vegetariansim simply isn't for everybody. A mass conversion isn't going to happen.
But there's a price to say for our meat adherence. By now it's fairly well-known that meat production has dramatic consequences for the environment. Meat and dairy are major contributors to our global carbon footprint and add to the concentration of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. As Think Progress notes, "a single four-ounce hamburger requir[es] around 450 gallons of water to produce." The site also points to a 2015 study that found "meat-associated land use changes are probably the leading cause of modern species extinctions." There's more bad news where that came from, per Think Progress:
According to a report released earlier this year by Environment America, an environmental advocacy group, five big meat companies—Tyson, JBS, Cargill, Smithfield and Perdue—produce a combined 162 million tons of manure every year. Combine that with the amount of fertilizer needed to grow the feed grain that sustains large-scale animal feeding operations and it's easy to see how the waste from our industrial meat complex can literally seep into our waterways, causing everything from local water pollution to massive dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico. Another Environment America report found that Tyson, one of the biggest meat producers in the world, is responsible for dumping more toxic pollution into waterways than companies like ExxonMobil or Dow Chemical.
So, while Americans are eating more chicken, which is slightly less damaging ecologically and widely regarded as healthier than beef, there are still grave problems with our meat intake overall.
Laura Wellesley is a research associate at Chatham House, who focuses on food security and climate change. In a recent Washington Post editorial, she notes that both Americans and Europeans consume quantities of meat that are "unsustainable, both for our planet and for our health." While Wellesley doesn't suggest that everyone needs to become vegetarian, she does propose cutting back on meat. She also believes governments should take steps to promote those reductions, mostly through dietary guidelines, taxing the most eco-unfriendly foods and educational programs. Wellesley believes proactivity by Western governments would be hugely symbolic in motivating a sea change around meat production and consumption.
"A government that is silent on excessive, unsustainable meat eating is sending a message to carry on as normal," Wellesley writes. "But a government that introduces a forward-looking policy of reduced consumption—promoting a healthier and more sustainable eating pattern—signals that overconsumption is something we should all really care about."
This article was reposted with permission from our media associate AlterNet.
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By Eric Tate and Christopher Emrich
Disasters stemming from hazards like floods, wildfires, and disease often garner attention because of their extreme conditions and heavy societal impacts. Although the nature of the damage may vary, major disasters are alike in that socially vulnerable populations often experience the worst repercussions. For example, we saw this following Hurricanes Katrina and Harvey, each of which generated widespread physical damage and outsized impacts to low-income and minority survivors.
Mapping Social Vulnerability
<p>Figure 1a is a typical map of social vulnerability across the United States at the census tract level based on the Social Vulnerability Index (SoVI) algorithm of <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1540-6237.8402002" target="_blank"><em>Cutter et al.</em></a> [2003]. Spatial representation of the index depicts high social vulnerability regionally in the Southwest, upper Great Plains, eastern Oklahoma, southern Texas, and southern Appalachia, among other places. With such a map, users can focus attention on select places and identify population characteristics associated with elevated vulnerabilities.</p>Fig. 1. (a) Social vulnerability across the United States at the census tract scale is mapped here following the Social Vulnerability Index (SoVI). Red and pink hues indicate high social vulnerability. (b) This bivariate map depicts social vulnerability (blue hues) and annualized per capita hazard losses (pink hues) for U.S. counties from 2010 to 2019.
<p>Many current indexes in the United States and abroad are direct or conceptual offshoots of SoVI, which has been widely replicated [e.g., <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13753-016-0090-9" target="_blank"><em>de Loyola Hummell et al.</em></a>, 2016]. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) <a href="https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/placeandhealth/svi/index.html" target="_blank">has also developed</a> a commonly used social vulnerability index intended to help local officials identify communities that may need support before, during, and after disasters.</p><p>The first modeling and mapping efforts, starting around the mid-2000s, largely focused on describing spatial distributions of social vulnerability at varying geographic scales. Over time, research in this area came to emphasize spatial comparisons between social vulnerability and physical hazards [<a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-009-9376-1" target="_blank"><em>Wood et al.</em></a>, 2010], modeling population dynamics following disasters [<a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs11111-008-0072-y" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>Myers et al.</em></a>, 2008], and quantifying the robustness of social vulnerability measures [<a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-012-0152-2" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>Tate</em></a>, 2012].</p><p>More recent work is beginning to dissolve barriers between social vulnerability and environmental justice scholarship [<a href="https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2018.304846" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>Chakraborty et al.</em></a>, 2019], which has traditionally focused on root causes of exposure to pollution hazards. Another prominent new research direction involves deeper interrogation of social vulnerability drivers in specific hazard contexts and disaster phases (e.g., before, during, after). Such work has revealed that interactions among drivers are important, but existing case studies are ill suited to guiding development of new indicators [<a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2015.09.013" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>Rufat et al.</em></a>, 2015].</p><p>Advances in geostatistical analyses have enabled researchers to characterize interactions more accurately among social vulnerability and hazard outcomes. Figure 1b depicts social vulnerability and annualized per capita hazard losses for U.S. counties from 2010 to 2019, facilitating visualization of the spatial coincidence of pre‑event susceptibilities and hazard impacts. Places ranked high in both dimensions may be priority locations for management interventions. Further, such analysis provides invaluable comparisons between places as well as information summarizing state and regional conditions.</p><p>In Figure 2, we take the analysis of interactions a step further, dividing counties into two categories: those experiencing annual per capita losses above or below the national average from 2010 to 2019. The differences among individual race, ethnicity, and poverty variables between the two county groups are small. But expressing race together with poverty (poverty attenuated by race) produces quite different results: Counties with high hazard losses have higher percentages of both impoverished Black populations and impoverished white populations than counties with low hazard losses. These county differences are most pronounced for impoverished Black populations.</p>Fig. 2. Differences in population percentages between counties experiencing annual per capita losses above or below the national average from 2010 to 2019 for individual and compound social vulnerability indicators (race and poverty).
<p>Our current work focuses on social vulnerability to floods using geostatistical modeling and mapping. The research directions are twofold. The first is to develop hazard-specific indicators of social vulnerability to aid in mitigation planning [<a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-020-04470-2" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>Tate et al.</em></a>, 2021]. Because natural hazards differ in their innate characteristics (e.g., rate of onset, spatial extent), causal processes (e.g., urbanization, meteorology), and programmatic responses by government, manifestations of social vulnerability vary across hazards.</p><p>The second is to assess the degree to which socially vulnerable populations benefit from the leading disaster recovery programs [<a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17477891.2019.1675578" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>Emrich et al.</em></a>, 2020], such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) <a href="https://www.fema.gov/individual-disaster-assistance" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Individual Assistance</a> program and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) <a href="https://www.hudexchange.info/programs/cdbg-dr/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Disaster Recovery</a> program. Both research directions posit social vulnerability indicators as potential measures of social equity.</p>Social Vulnerability as a Measure of Equity
<p>Given their focus on social marginalization and economic barriers, social vulnerability indicators are attracting growing scientific interest as measures of inequity resulting from disasters. Indeed, social vulnerability and inequity are related concepts. Social vulnerability research explores the differential susceptibilities and capacities of disaster-affected populations, whereas social equity analyses tend to focus on population disparities in the allocation of resources for hazard mitigation and disaster recovery. Interventions with an equity focus emphasize full and equal resource access for all people with unmet disaster needs.</p><p>Yet newer studies of inequity in disaster programs have documented troubling disparities in income, race, and home ownership among those who <a href="https://eos.org/articles/equity-concerns-raised-in-federal-flood-property-buyouts" target="_blank">participate in flood buyout programs</a>, are <a href="https://www.eenews.net/stories/1063477407" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">eligible for postdisaster loans</a>, receive short-term recovery assistance [<a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2020.102010" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>Drakes et al.</em></a>, 2021], and have <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2020/08/25/texas-natural-disasters--mental-health/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">access to mental health services</a>. For example, a recent analysis of federal flood buyouts found racial privilege to be infused at multiple program stages and geographic scales, resulting in resources that disproportionately benefit whiter and more urban counties and neighborhoods [<a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/2378023120905439" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>Elliott et al.</em></a>, 2020].</p><p>Investments in disaster risk reduction are largely prioritized on the basis of hazard modeling, historical impacts, and economic risk. Social equity, meanwhile, has been far less integrated into the considerations of public agencies for hazard and disaster management. But this situation may be beginning to shift. Following the adage of "what gets measured gets managed," social equity metrics are increasingly being inserted into disaster management.</p><p>At the national level, FEMA has <a href="https://www.fema.gov/news-release/20200220/fema-releases-affordability-framework-national-flood-insurance-program" target="_blank">developed options</a> to increase the affordability of flood insurance [Federal Emergency Management Agency, 2018]. At the subnational scale, Puerto Rico has integrated social vulnerability into its CDBG Mitigation Action Plan, expanding its considerations of risk beyond only economic factors. At the local level, Harris County, Texas, has begun using social vulnerability indicators alongside traditional measures of flood risk to introduce equity into the prioritization of flood mitigation projects [<a href="https://www.hcfcd.org/Portals/62/Resilience/Bond-Program/Prioritization-Framework/final_prioritization-framework-report_20190827.pdf?ver=2019-09-19-092535-743" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>Harris County Flood Control District</em></a>, 2019].</p><p>Unfortunately, many existing measures of disaster equity fall short. They may be unidimensional, using single indicators such as income in places where underlying vulnerability processes suggest that a multidimensional measure like racialized poverty (Figure 2) would be more valid. And criteria presumed to be objective and neutral for determining resource allocation, such as economic loss and cost-benefit ratios, prioritize asset value over social equity. For example, following the <a href="http://www.cedar-rapids.org/discover_cedar_rapids/flood_of_2008/2008_flood_facts.php" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">2008 flooding</a> in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, cost-benefit criteria supported new flood protections for the city's central business district on the east side of the Cedar River but not for vulnerable populations and workforce housing on the west side.</p><p>Furthermore, many equity measures are aspatial or ahistorical, even though the roots of marginalization may lie in systemic and spatially explicit processes that originated long ago like redlining and urban renewal. More research is thus needed to understand which measures are most suitable for which social equity analyses.</p>Challenges for Disaster Equity Analysis
<p>Across studies that quantify, map, and analyze social vulnerability to natural hazards, modelers have faced recurrent measurement challenges, many of which also apply in measuring disaster equity (Table 1). The first is clearly establishing the purpose of an equity analysis by defining characteristics such as the end user and intended use, the type of hazard, and the disaster stage (i.e., mitigation, response, or recovery). Analyses using generalized indicators like the CDC Social Vulnerability Index may be appropriate for identifying broad areas of concern, whereas more detailed analyses are ideal for high-stakes decisions about budget allocations and project prioritization.</p>Wisconsin will end its controversial wolf hunt early after hunters and trappers killed almost 70 percent of the state's quota in the hunt's first 48 hours.
By Jessica Corbett
Sen. Bernie Sanders on Tuesday was the lone progressive to vote against Tom Vilsack reprising his role as secretary of agriculture, citing concerns that progressive advocacy groups have been raising since even before President Joe Biden officially nominated the former Obama administration appointee.