The environmental consequences of animal husbandry

My second criteria for moral meat-eating is that the meat should be raised in an environmentally benign way.

The relationship of all living things with the environment is one of birth, resource consumption, waste production, death, and decay. This cycle, replayed within and across a complex web of relationships that encompasses all living things from microbes and lichens to killer whales and baobab trees, is our ecosystem and it is dynamic. This is to say that any equilibrium can be perturbed, for good or bad, by chance or design. This is the stuff that drives evolution, mass extinctions, etc...

We therefore know that the world that we inhabit is affected by our actions, both in predictable and unpredictable ways - nothing Earth shattering here, this is a banal assertion. What we see perhaps less clearly is that the environment that we consider to be "natural" is man-made to a significant extent, particularly in the US and Western Europe. This is particularly true of what we like to call "the countryside".

For example, in Les Vosges, the mountains would be covered with dense forests if it were not for pastures grazed by farm animals (see pictures). The hedgerows of Bretagne and Normandy are a man-made environment, which would revert to moor or forest if it were not maintained by man and its animals. In this way, we are no different than some other large animals; elephants come to mind. Similar examples exist in the US, I am sure, and HFW gives several examples in the UK. Below are some pictures from Les Vosges.

Would letting pasture revert to forest be so bad? After all, isn't forest "good for the environment"? isn't it better than pasture?

Well, perhaps or perhaps not: some species have conquered the pastures of the Vosges and Bretagne, and would doubtlessly find themselves challenged in dense forests. In some ways, this environment that we've created has created its own biodiversity and ecosystem, which one could argue are worthy of some form of protection.

Why do I go through all of this trouble to argue for the future of pastures, hedgerows, and the animals and flowers that inhabit them? It is because extensive animal husbandry is a prime factor in the maintenance of these rich environments. Should we abandon the consumption of meat altogether, we would remove all incentive for farmers to maintain this environment. What would likely happen is that steep slopes would be surrendered to forest (perhaps not a bad thing), but flat areas would likely be turned over to farming wheat, corn, or carrots, as there would be no financial incentive for the farmer to maintain the fractured environment, and no help from livestock.

Farming plants, unless it is done by hand on small holdings, uses mechanized equipment which is hampered by hedgerows and small parcels. Fractured pasture and fields, fenced off by hedges, low walls, or trees are much more resistant to soil erosion from wind and rain than plowed fields.

A farmer with pastures and fields, who rotates the use of his land over time to raise animals and plants (fodder and/or human food), will preserve both the rich ecosystem of "the countryside" and raise tasty meat in a way that is arguably environmentally and "ecosystematically" equivalent to one raising plants only.

Need I point out the obvious: this ain't no factory farming that I'm describing here.

Next: livestock, water, and the atmosphere.