The water cost associated with the livestock industry is staggering.

According to a 2002 study by David and Marcia Pimentel of Cornell University, Western agricultural irrigation accounts for 85 percent of the fresh water we consume (the other 15 percent is for drinking, washing, food prep, etc). They also found that it takes 100 times more water to produce an ounce of animal protein than it takes to produce an ounce of plant protein.

Did you know that 64 percent of the world’s population is expected to live in a water-stressed environment by 2025? That’s 5 billion people who won’t have enough water if we don’t manage our resources better. (source: United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization report, “Livestock’s Long Shadow,” 2006) Eating more plant protein makes more fresh water available for drinking.

Eat plants! Go plant protein!

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 25th, 2009 at 2:54 pm and is filed under Articles - Ten Steps and THM Basics, Meat and Animal Protein. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.