Want to find out more about the amount of land used for meat, eggs and dairy products? Then you've come to the right place! Whether steaks, cheese, potatoes or tomatoes - food does not grow in the supermarket, but has to be produced at great expense. While plant-based foods are simply grown, harvested and consumed on arable land, the amount of land required for animal products is much higher, for example for animal feed, pastureland or stables. In times of Climate change, the Deforestation of the rainforests and of the Species extinction this is a massive problem.
In this article, I would like to explain why meat, eggs and milk are so land-intensive - and why the world's population could be fed on around a quarter of the land currently used to produce food. Let's go!
You can find a brief overview of the article here in advance:
Facts & figures on the land consumption of meat and animal-based foods
First of all, it is important to use meaningful statistics to get a clear picture of land use for meat production - and all the facts related to it. Here are some figures that give a sense of the current scale and its development:
How large is the global agricultural area?
Agriculture is practiced on more than a third of the world's habitable land.₁
What is the land footprint per person?
In Germany, the average food-related per capita land footprint is 2,022 square meters per year. 180 square meters of this is accounted for by grassland and 1,842 square meters by arable land.₂
Which food categories make up the land footprint?
54.4 percent of the average land requirement per capita is used for meat and sausage, 20 percent for milk, cheese, eggs and other dairy products. 0.2 percent of the land requirement is used for the production of fish feed for fish farming - and 24.4 percent is needed for plant-based foods.₂
How much arable land is used for animal feed production?
Even today, 30 percent of the world's arable land is used solely for the production of animal feed, such as soy, wheat or corn.₂
How large is the global soybean cultivation area?
Soy is grown on 2.84 million hectares of arable land worldwide. Of this, 2.73 million hectares (approx. 96.13 percent) are cultivated for the production of animal foodstuffs - and only 0.11 million hectares (approx. 3.87 percent) for the production of plant foodstuffs.₂
What proportion of the farmed arable land is used for the production of animal-based foodstuffs?
83 percent of the total area required for our food is used for the production of meat, sausage, milk or eggs and other animal-based foods.₇
To what extent is the area available for agriculture becoming smaller?
Erosion, salinization, pollution and sealing are reducing the amount of land available for agriculture. Today, 52 percent of our global arable land is already destroyed or endangered.₂
How much land is each inhabitant of the earth entitled to for food?
Today, each inhabitant of the earth has approximately 2,000 square meters (= 0.2 hectares) available for growing food. In 2050, however, it will probably only be 1,700 square meters.₄
How does today's agricultural economy affect biodiversity and deforestation?
Agriculture is responsible for 70 percent of the loss of biodiversity worldwide and 80 percent of the Deforestation of the forests responsible.₃
How much land does the German diet take up abroad?
Around 18.2 million hectares of land are used abroad for food products imported into Germany. This figure rose by 38 percent between 2000 and 2010 alone.₅
Why is the amount of land used for meat and other animal-based foods so extremely high?
The global hunger for meat can only be satisfied by using the appropriate land for meat production. Animal feed cultivation and pasture opens up. Cattle even require around 28 times more land than poultry or pork, for which livestock farming is of course also land-intensive.₆
A remarkable statistic makes it particularly clear why the Factory farming essential to the biggest environmental problems of our time but also the potential that lies dormant in adapting our diet: 83 percent of the area used for agriculture are necessary for the production of animal products (about 26 percent of the world's land area) - but the cultivation of this arable land only generates 18 percent of caloriesthat we humans absorb as a whole.₇
These numbers are especially tragicconsidering that the available, fertile arable land is declining (e.g. due to Soil erosiondesertification or flooding) and the World population continues to grow. A plant-based diet would simply be much more resource- and calorie-efficient.
Why does veganism reduce the carbon footprint per person?
According to a extensive study of the University of Oxford, 75 percent of the world's arable land could be used for other purposes, when humanity vegan would eat. It is quite simply the "animal detour" that takes up so much land area in our diet. If we were to consume the cultivated plants directly and not feeding them to animals to eat them afterwards would significantly reduce land consumption.
A lot of subjunctive - especially as global meat production is increasing. But the Change in our diet is fortunately running at full speed, as the ecological, health and, above all, ethical aspects of the Motives for veganism are so diverse and plausible. Change is all the more necessary when you consider that countless quantities of animal-based food are produced "for nothing" because they end up in the garbage can.
Tip: How you can change your Reduce personal food waste you can find out in the linked article.
What opportunities and advantages do the reclaimed land areas hold for life on Earth?
Only a small proportion of the nutrients that cows, pigs or chickens consume through animal feed end up in meat. A plant-based world diet would therefore definitely be more efficient - and it also protects the environment. Natural resources. But to what extent are there advantages for life on earth if we humans only a quarter of the land area currently under cultivation would we need for our diet? Here are some of the positive consequences of reducing the amount of land needed for food:
- Biodiversity: Fewer fields and arable land mean more habitat for animals and plants. Due to the exorbitant consumption of meat, the habitat - and therefore also the biodiversity - has declined more and more so far. The decision in favor of the vegan lifestyle therefore helps to Stop species extinction.
- Halting deforestation: Avoiding animal-based foods would also slow down the (illegal) deforestation of rainforests for animal feed and grazing land and at the same time protect indigenous peoples from conflict and displacement. You live vegan for people too - and not exclusively for animals.
- Climate protection: The reforestation of land that has become free binds more CO2 again. As factory farming is on the decline, emissions are also lower. The Climate protection in everyday life also ensures that less agricultural land is lost, for example due to desertification.
- Fighting world hunger: It is estimated that we could feed around 3.5 billion more people if we were to consume the livestock food ourselves.₈ Accordingly, direct consumption and the land gained contribute to reducing the End world hunger at last.
- Stop land grabbing: There is great competition for land for the production of meat and other animal-based foods in countries such as Brazil. Foreign corporations buy up large areas of land in such developing countries in order to grow products for export (e.g. soybean meal as animal feed).₉
Can you think of any other benefits of using less land for meat? Then feel free to write me a comment under this article.
Everyone can reduce the amount of space needed for their own meals!
Every piece of meat on our plates contributes to the destruction of species-rich ecosystems such as the rainforest and prevents the reforestation of new areas of land. We need to ask ourselves: Are the 10 minutes of pleasure really worth endangering the planet, the animals and ultimately ourselves and the future of our children and grandchildren?
Every day, each of us has the opportunity to minimize the amount of land we use for our own diet - and thus make a real difference for more biodiversity, climate and forest protection and social justice.
Do you have any questions or tips about land consumption for meat and other animal-based foods? Then I look forward to your message in the comments column.
Stay sustainable,
PS: You want - apart from the space requirement - your Making nutrition even more sustainable? Then you'll find many more valuable tips in the linked article. Have fun!
References:
₁ WWF (2020): Living Planet Report 2020, available at https://www.wwf.de/living-planet-report. [21.01.2022].
₂ WWF Germany (2021): Climate protection, agricultural land and natural habitats, available at https://www.wwf.de/fileadmin/fm-wwf/Publikationen-PDF/kulinarische-kompass-klima.pdfhttps://www.wwf.de/fileadmin/fm-wwf/Publikationen-PDF/kulinarische-kompass-klima.pdf. [21.01.2022].
₃ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2020): Climate Change and Land: An IPCC Special Report on climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security, and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems, Summary for Policymakers, available at https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/sites/4/2020/02/SPM_Updated-Jan20.pdf. [21.01.2022].
₄ FAO(2012): World Agriculture Towards 2030/2050, The 2012 Revision, In: ESA Working Paper, No. 12-03, available at http://www.fao.org/3/ap106e/ap106e.pdf. [21.01.2022].
₅ Birger Nicolai: Germany is dependent on agricultural fields abroad (as at: 19.08.2013), available at https://www.welt.de/wirtschaft/article119159181/Deutschland-ist-abhaengig-von-Agrarfeldern-im-Ausland.html. [21.01.2022].
₆ Claudia Tam: How Veganism Can Help Ease the World's Land Use Crisis (as of 22.12.2020), available at https://earth.org/veganism-land-use. [21.01.2022].
₇ J. Poore, T. Nemecek (2018): Reducing food's environmental impacts through producers and consumers, available at https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aaq0216. [21.01.2022].
₈ Things explained - In a nutshell: Meat - The tastiest evil in the world, YouTube, 24.01.2019, Web, 21.01.2022 at 10:03, in: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6f3dwxexZM.
₉ SÜDWIND e.V.; Irene Knoke, Friederike Niewerth: Flächenkonkurrenz: das Beispiel Fleisch (Stand: Oktober 2013), abrufbar unter https://www.suedwind-institut.de/files/Suedwind/Publikationen/2013/2013-13%20FS%20Flaechenkonkurrenz%20-%20das%20Beispiel%20Fleisch.pdf. [21.01.2022].
