iron.Althoughmilkproductiondoesyieldmorecalciumper
acrethanoats,broccolidoesbetterstill,providingfivetimes
as much calcium as milk.^5
Theimplications ofallthisfortheworldfoodsituationare
staggering. In 1974 Lester Brown of the Overseas
DevelopmentCouncil estimated that if Americans were to
reducetheir meatconsumption byonly 10 percent forone
year,itwouldfreeatleast 12 milliontonsofgrainforhuman
consumption—or enough to feed 60 million people. Don
Paarlberg,aformerU.S.assistantsecretaryofagriculture,has
said thatmerely reducing theU.S. livestock population by
half would make available enough food to make up the
calorie deficit of the nonsocialist underdeveloped nations
nearlyfourtimesover.^6 Indeed,thefoodwastedbyanimal
production in the affluent nations would be sufficient, if
properly distributed, to end both hunger and malnutrition
throughout theworld. The simple answer to our question,
then,isthatraisinganimalsforfoodbythemethodsusedin
theindustrialnationsdoesnotcontributetothesolutionofthe
hunger problem.
Meatproductionalsoputsastrainonotherresources.Alan
Durning, a researcher at the Worldwatch Institute, an
environmental thinktank based in Washington, D.C., has
calculatedthat one pound ofsteak from steers raisedin a
feedlotcostsfivepoundsofgrain,2,500gallonsofwater,the
energyequivalentofa gallonofgasoline,andaboutthirty-
fivepoundsof erodedtopsoil.More thana thirdof North
America is takenup with grazing, morethanhalf ofU.S.
croplands are planted with livestock