Part 1: Introduction - What the science says about the societal role of meat

"Livestock is the millennial-long proven method to create healthy nutrition and secure livelihoods, a wisdom deeply embedded in cultual values everywhere" - The Dublin Declaration of Scientists

In mid-April 2023 several peer-reviewed papers were published in the Oxford University Press’ Animal Frontiers journal. This was put together following the October 2022 International Summit on the Societal Role of Meat. This special edition of Animal Frontiers was published by guest editors and authors, among the nearly 1,000 signatories of the Dublin Declaration warning that livestock systems are too precious to society to become the "victim of simplification and reductionism."

There are eight topics and articles included in this journal that I’ll summarize in the upcoming weeks. A ninth article serves as an introduction to the special edition and is summarized below.

It is exciting to see these compiled together. One of my missions moving forward is to play a small role in helping to balance the flood of anti-meat rhetoric with science-based arguments supporting the continued use of meat (or expansion as Animal Frontiers points out). These summaries seem like an excellent place to start.

The articles are worth reading - if my brief summaries seem to lack information or context, you can find all nine articles here. You may treat my summaries as a sort of executive summary of a summary, to help busy minds get the drift of the arguments with a quick skim.

Those working professionally in the meat space, however, should review these source publications. We are all better promoters of our industry armed with science-based truths about an industry that goes back to the beginning of our human race.

From a commonsense standpoint, most of us in the industry feel it is lunacy to believe humans can do without meat in a generation or two. For the most part, we are completely right. But make no mistake... we have been surrendering the narrative for a few decades and these articles are a timely reminder we have a lot to be proud of as an industry and we have much work to do.

Part 1: Introduction

An article summary for a summary article…

Livestock and Human Health

Questions addressed regarding the nutritional value of meat (Part 2 will cover this in more detail):

1. Is meat a meaningful part of the species-adapted diet of humans;
2. Are nutrients compromised when abstaining from meat;
3. How does meat contribute to the supply of these nutrients globally; and
4. Which risks may be created by a large reduction in meat consumption?

Answer(s):

1. Homo sapiens evolved as persistent and frequent meat eaters so it can be assumed that meat is compatible with human anatomy and metabolism.
2. The nutritional benefits of meats are hard to replace; populations with scant access to meat suffer from the expected problems associated with a low intake of the nutrients found in meat.
3. The regular consumption of meat appears to bestow multiple important nutritional benefits.

Questions about the risks of eating meat (Part 3 will cover more on this topic):

1. While the above speaks in favour of some meat, are there health risks in the consumption of meats, specifically red meats or processed meat? What dosage impacts risks?

Answer(s):

1. Based on the international standard for evidence-based health recommendations, any causality assumptions are of low to very low certainty only.
2. The claims to reduce meat consumption are open to interpretation and insufficient to merit strong public policy action. Depending on several factors the risks would be trivial.
3. Depending on the degree of processing, precautions may be warranted on the intake of processed meats beyond reasonable levels.

Conclusion: Taken together, reducing meat consumption may backfire - reducing nutrient security, especially in populations with elevated needs.

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Livestock and the Environment:

Question(s) on ecological principles and ecosystem management (Part 4):

1. Do livestock systems consume more resources than sustainable circulatory ecosystems can afford?

Answer(s):

1. Somewhat depends on the desired state of the ecosystem. If the goal is a return to Nature untouched by humans, this must be dismissed and is arguably impossible.
2. Such a return to savannah-type landscapes will require large-scale intervention by humans including human-managed ruminate herds.
3. Livestock are required to optimize the utilization of crop agriculture. Only a small portion of crop production is human-edible. Livestock animals are uniquely capable to convert inedible biomass into human-edible meat products. Without livestock, more cropland would be required to fulfill edible production requirements for humans.

Question(s) on balance (Part 5):

1. How much of what type of agriculture needs to be practiced where - to achieve optimal land use and a sustainable food system?

Answer(s):

1. Often we hear simplistic arguments for reducing meat, such as the CO2 equivalent of the methane output of ruminants without looking at the true impact and value of livestock products.
2. Our current understanding of the critical resource cycles remains underdeveloped to measure the carrying capacity of Earth. A simple metric is the wrong way to measure impact.
3. Nutritionally, livestock are generators of valuable co-products, whilst also being re-cyclers of byproducts, up-cyclers of non-productive land, potential soil and biodiversity enhancers, and offer social resilience platforms.

Conclusion: Achieving the holy grail of holistic, transparent, and fair metrics will require a multidisciplinary approach across a broad range of scientific skills and views.

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Livestock and Socioeconomics:

Question(s) on meat affordability and sustainable investment (Part 6):

1. Is it possible to make meat affordable while also rewarding investment in this sector?

Answer(s):

1. The long-term health and productivity harm of human undernourishment is an avoidable human tragedy and a huge loss in economic productivity.
2. To resolve this it is argued we must find ways to efficiently expand meat production for universally available livestock products.
3. We must also build livestock food systems that are environmentally sustainable and nutritionally adequate while rewarding the large investments to achieve this.

Question(s) on the morality of eating meat (Part 7):

1. Is eating meat morally defensible?

Answer(s):

1. As long as there are human mouths to feed with meat and no better alternative in sight, then humans enjoy clear ethical priority.

Question(s) about cellular agriculture (Part 8):

1. Is the promise of cellular agriculture for affordable, nutritional equivalent meat that is also better for the environment - close to reality?

Answer(s):

1. The relevant technologies are not new and span several decades of research.
2. The remaining technological issues suggest it may take considerable time to overcome.
3. Further, it remains unclear whether the costs can be reduced sufficiently to become a viable economic, nutritional, or environmental alternative to farming animals.

Question(s) about moving forward (Part 9 and conclusion):???????????

1. What are the challenges and opportunities facing the livestock sector; how do we address the twin challenges of closing the global nutrient gap and achieving environmental sustainability?

Answer(s):??????????

1. Need to develop future leaders and scientists in the meat industry.
2. Timely access and early commercial application of scientific advances.
3. More funding and collaborative approach to the development and delivery of science. Everybody eats.

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Next week's Part 2 will summarize "The role of meat in the human diet: Evolutionary aspects and nutritional value" (Leroy et al., 2023)

Literature focus of Part 1:

Ederer, P., and Leroy, F. 2023. The societal role of meat – what the science says. Animal Frontiers 13(2):3-8. https://doi.org/10.1093/af/vfac098