US Beef

growstuff, that's why I previously brought up contaminants-

What doesn't remain in the soil leaches into waterways or becomes airborne- No beef is completely free of contaminants and harmful bacteria-

It's important to keep in mind that the 1 in 6 that get sick isn't necessarily from U.S. meat and produce despite the fact it's categorized as domestic illness- They care to determine if the person traveled but not that the food has-

I remain confused.

Join the club, MOnica.

Perhaps if I go out, this gale will clear my head of knitted fog.

Or stay on here and wade through treacle?

Stay- And sing .. I had a dream there were clouds in my coffee, clouds in my coffee ..

And is Lucy still in the sky with diamonds?

Importing US food including beef is all about production methods they are using entirely different environmental and welfare rules and have a much better economy of scale. If U.K. producers were allowed to use their standards there would be no complaint, but that’s not permitted.

Beef imports and exports.
Imports mainly from Ireland with smaller quantities from many others including Brazil, Botswana and Namibia.
Exports mainly to E.U. but relatively small quantities probably speciality products, for some reason The Netherlands has a two way trade.

Lamb is the big meat export with 40% of our lamb exported much of it to the EU

I think there would be quite a few complaints if UK producers used US methods.

David I notice that animal welfare never enters into any of you contributions. Most people who do not want US beef in Britain object to the commodification of animals, the conditions they are reared in and the routine use of antibiotics to prevent infection when animals are raise in over crowded conditions.

Monica I’m not an animal welfare activist, our standards in this country are closely regulated both by government and the main buyers (supermarkets) of animals. I accept those standards, they are reasonable, well supervised and reviewed regularly. If a producer or processor does break the rules they lose the supply contract, last year a chicken processor did that and closed.

Countries we might import from have very different ideas about animal welfare, don’t get fooled by natural free range either, that could mean large scale ranching, animals fending for themselves until gathered for winter.

I'm so glad that I'm vegetarian. There's great cruelty in farming anyway. Our welfare standards reduce it somewhat, that's all.

So many so-called animal lovers eat meat and don't really care how it's produced, choosing by price instead. If they saw how the animal lived and died, maybe they'd change their minds!

David Who said anything about being an animal welfare activist? I didn't - and I would add I am not and never have been. I have no idea what 'natural free-range' means or what it applies to.

However, how ever well regulated, I do not want to buy or eat meat raised in the kind of vast feed lots that are common in the US, I also do not want to eat the meat of animals that have routinely been fed growth hormones/antibiotics for disease problems caused by the conditions they live in.

Antibiotic resistance, which is wide spread, and is beginning to become life threatening (I think both the US and the UK patients have died because there was no antibiotic capable of dealing with their infection) has been caused by the indiscriminate prescription of antibiotics by doctors - and their extensive and systematic use in agriculture.

As I am allergic to pennicillin and other drugs, I want to be sure that any antibiotics I imbibe - and I have had none in the past decade - have been carefully selected and prescribed by my doctor, not consumed as the result of the constant consumption of minute quantities in the food I eat.

Monica somewhere wires are crossed I think in my previous posts I have stated welfare and environmental standards are different to ours. I agree with what you say and don’t want our standards diluted nor I’m sure do the majority of consumers.
Your 15.33 post inferred that I did not care about welfare, I do know the current standards are high and are well supervised I support that. They are much higher than the US or any other country that we are likely to import meat from.

The animals aren't given antibiotics because of disease problems caused by the conditions they live in but because of how how they are fed towards the end of their lives-

All calves start out as grass fed- Towards the end of their lives they're fed high calorie diets to make them gain weight- Feedlots- The process often caused abscess in the liver so antibiotics were given to protect other livers ..

Animals in the UK/EU are exposed to contaminants via air, land and water- Including antibiotics- Chemicals that have been banned long ago continue to leach into the waterways- No amount of animal welfare is going to change that-

The animals are drinking the water and eating the grass- You are eating the animal- Same goes for vegetables ..

Add the contaminated meat to the cocktail of pesticides in your vegetables and you have the perfect recipe for long term problems like:

Allergies, Parkinson’s disease; asthma; depression and anxiety; attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); and cancer, including leukaemia and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

bon appetit!

I think there is a misunderstanding about what is meant by high welfare standards. The main purpose of standards set by the US and to a greater extent in Europe (this includes the UK) are human safety. Ensuring that the meat we eat is safe to eat. To meet those standards it is necessary that the animals are cared for in a way that does not threaten human health and so some of these standards relate to the proper care of the animals, but their main purpose is human safety, animal welfare is merely an adjunct to that.

To begin with cattle in industrial farms being fattened for market are fed corn, soy and derivatives, but cattle are ruminant animals, whose natural diet is grass based and whose digestion is not adapted to eat grain, yet all these safety and welfare standards do not ban the feeding of corn to cattle.

The BSE epidemic was the result, not of poor standards but of the introduction of animal protein, processed on hygenic, production lines that met the highest of standards, being fed to cattle, who were not adapted to eating it, while the processing freed the pathogen, that caused scrapie in sheep, but had not migrated before to other animals, to do so.

On a broader environmental basis. although figures vary, around a third of the world's arable land is growing crops, soya and corn, to feed to animals. around 70% of the world's soya crop is fed to cattle. This is wasteful way to use resources.

There are large areas of land that are only suitable for grazing cattle and poorer lands that can produce crops of hay and silage for winter feed. Cattle raised on this land is sustainable, and it could be argued, of better quality than cattle grass raised for six months then intensively fed cereals for another six months then slaughtered.

The corollary is that there will, overall, be less meat available and that meat will be more expensive. No human harm can come from this and, indeed, it can be suggested that this would be to the benefit of human health.

Two reports have come out this year saying that for the sake of the environment and, human health and survival we should move from a diet heavy in meat to one more based on fruit, vegetables and pulses. One from the UN, published by this week. The other, a French government funded, report from Science Po in Paris, you dismissed out of hand in a previous conversation we had, because the English traslation was funded by the Soil Association and hosted on its site. I am quite happy to give you a reference to the original report, written in French and not on the Soil Association site.

So the conclusion is that shouldn't eat meat as animals are full of hormones, antibiotics, pollutants from land, air and water, ditto dairy products for the same reasons, not fish as it could be full of plastics from the oceans or mites if farmed, nor fruit, vegetables, grains as they are all polluted with pesticides (even organic will pick up pollutants from the air apparently!)

As the song goes "Think I'll go and eat worms"
Although

It can only be "suggested" that less meat of better quality and higher price wouldn't result in human harm if the result were that the practice produced enough meat to feed everyone-

The WHO supports diets richer in vegetables and fruits but backed away from claiming eating strictly fruits and vegetables was best-

Well .. worms are subjected to the same pollutants as the early bird that eats them ..

rosecarmel How much is enough to feed everyone and I thought this discussion was about beef. It is what my contributions have concentrated on.

Callistemon, I know your post was not a response to mine but as far as I am concerned environmental issues and animal welfare are my main concern. Humankind has expanded from a small group in Africa to many billions today and has eaten 'polluted' food from day 1, so while I would want to exclude pollutants, especially man made ones, by choice, my lunch today included onions and rhubarb (in separate dishes) both of which naturally contain oxalic acid and potatoes, that naturally include solanine.

No, it wasn't a response to yours M0nica
It was a tongue-in-cheek response to some of the other posts on here.

Idealism has to be tempered with practicality and common sense.

Hetty58 do you have links to proven research that links those diseases to contaminated meat and pesticides?
That is quite a sweeping statement.

M0nica, you mentioned fruits and vegetables, too-

I have no idea how much beef is enough to feed everyone-
There's about 327 million people in the U.S.- According to studied averages, Americans consume about 222lbs of meat/poultry yearly per person-

rosecarmel, I am not a vegetarian, I am an omnivore and I eat meat and hope to continue to do so.

However the answer to the question: how much beef is enough to feed everyone is no beef at all. All our protein needs can be met from vegetarian sources. The average American eats over 4lbs of meat a week. That could easily be halved.

There will always be land that is only suited to raising animals, whether beef, lamb or pork and other land that is only productive if animals regularly graze it and fertilise it, but there is no pressing nutritional need to raise cattle in unsuitable conditions and feed them on food their digestion can not properly handle, no matter how high the standards for human safety are.