The Coming Red
Revolution - I
Around the end of the 19th century the US Senate
was seriously contemplating closure of US Patent Office, as the wise men then
in charge of affairs felt that all the inventions that could be made, have
already been made and that keeping the Patent Office going was a waste of tax-payers’
money. A lot has happened since then and one can only guess what these wise men
would experience if they were to somehow materialize today from whichever world
they have proceeded to after their tenure on Earth was over.
Notwithstanding all these developments over the last
century, it will be clear to anyone, who is even peripherally aware of
scientific developments taking place, that we are just at the beginning of an
explosion that is about to occur on almost all the fronts. For quite a few
years now, science and technology have been operating on a resonating
frequency, each feeding on the advances made by the other, to push the
frontiers of knowledge even further. If anything, one can safely say that the
pace of development currently being experienced, will only accelerate further.
Where that will lead the mankind to, is something that even the best brains
find difficult to state with any degree of confidence.
Compared to the other fields, biological sciences have been
relatively a slow moving segment till now but that is not true anymore. A lot
of important advances in this century and beyond will come from the field of
biology. By most important, I mean the ones which affect the common man the
maximum. Aided by advances in other fields like the nanotechnology and
computational science, the biological sciences have made astounding leaps in
recent years. We have already seen the completion of mapping of human genome
project. The possible spin-offs from this are still being enumerated. Gene
therapy is one area which rightfully attracts the maximum attention due to the
possible benefits in treating Cancer and other diseases. Gene therapy alone
will require a separate discussion.
An important area which stands to gain enormously from the
genetic engineering discipline is food production. I am not referring to Genetically Modified
(GM) food which is no doubt an important part of technological advance and one
expects that once the initial hiccups regarding acceptability of GM technology
are sorted out, it will provide a lot of benefits which will encompass better
yields, better resistance to various plant diseases and even varieties which
can incorporate drugs and nutrients for the benefit of the consumer.
Let’s take a look at another segment of genetic engineering
which can radically alter man’s lifestyle. A few weeks ago, The Times of India
carried an article titled “Bistro in Vitro” - about a futuristic gourmet
restaurant, a “bistro” which serves food grown “in vitro” in laboratories.
Scientists have already reported success in growing meat in laboratory. Of
course, today a burger or a steak “made in lab” will set you back by a few
hundred or even a few thousand dollars, but if one traces the trajectory of
developments in various industries over the past few decades, one can expect
that it will only be a matter of a few years before you will have the option of
ordering “inorganic” meat rather than a farm-grown “organic” variety.
We are familiar with “green revolution” which pushed up the
agricultural yields substantially and the “white revolution”, which made a
country deficient in milk (India) into a milk surplus one. Now this “red
revolution”, though still in future, promises to alter the global food
consumption, agricultural and industrial patterns in a radical way.
In order to comprehend the changes that such an advance
could bring about, we will try to take a look at the demand and supply of meat
and meat products and various inputs that go into maintaining the entire chain
of these products and also the “side-effects” of livestock farming. This will give us an idea of the changes that
will be brought about by this disruptive technology. The figures may be a bit dated and also a bit
fuzzy given the difficulty in getting the correct figures globally but will
still serve to provide us a sense of future.
Consumption of Meat:
First of all, let us take a look at the meat consumption
habits. Broadly dividing the world into vegetarians and non-vegetarians, FAO
statistics state that approx 10% of the world population is vegetarians with
about 31% of Indians at one end and about 3% of Chinese and 5% of Brazilians at
the other end of the spectrum. All the rest of the countries are clustered in
7% to 13% range. The choice of whether to be a vegetarian or a non-vegetarian
seems to be dictated mainly by abhorrence to kill animals for food as preached
by various religions and religious sects. It may not be out of place to
speculate that, if general populace were to have an option of having
“inorganic” meat, the number of non-vegetarians is most likely to go up.
Already in India one can see the trend towards more persons eating non-veg as
even youngsters from traditional vegetarian families get “converted” into
non-vegetarians.
The 2007 FAO figures places the average World per capita
consumption of meat and meat products (excluding fishery products) at 38.7 kgs
with Luxembourg topping the charts (presumably due to a large contribution from
“floating population” of visitors to that small principality). US of A at 125.4
kgs was the highest consumer, if we
disregard the outlier Luxembourg, and was substantially above the figures of
any other developed country.
The meat consumption is showing an up trend of 3% pa. Looking
at the projections of population the world population is likely to touch 9.5
billion by the year 2050. If the same trends continue., both of increase in
rate of consumption and population, it
is not inconceivable that with general increase in living standards in the
developing countries, the world meat consumption could almost triple till 2050.
Inputs Requred For
Meat Production :
That brings us to the question of various inputs that are
required for production of meat and to assess how the world could cater to such
demand.
1. Fodder : Farm animals like pigs, cattle, sheep etc
convert plants into their body mass and as can be expected, the efficiency of
this process of conversion is fairly low. A pig or a head of cattle requires a
feed of around 15kgs in terms of corn and other cereals per kg of their “optimum”
weight. This is the ratio of feed consumed over its life time to the body mass
accumulated till the point of slaughter.
There would be a further processing loss till the meat products are
delivered to the table. Probably it would mean around 20-25 kgs of feed per kg
of finished product.
Globally about 60% of
the livestock feed required is obtained in the form of grain (mainly maize) and
40% as foraging. It is estimated that about 40% of the cereals produced by the
world are required to feed the livestock in one form or other, about 750
million MTs (MMTs)of 2,250 MMTs of
cereals produced are directly used for animal feed and some additional quantity
as processed animal feed. The end result, worldwide animal feed industry
produced 873 MMTs of feed in 2011.
2. Water : It is estimated that pigs which make up
the maximum share in meat products require about 15 litres of water per day on
an average (and the global population of pigs is billion plus). Animal agriculture is a leading consumer of
water resources in the United States. Grain-fed beef production takes 100,000
liters of water for every kilogram of food. As a comparison, raising broiler
chickens takes 3,500 liters of water to make a kilogram of meat. In comparison,
soybean production uses 2,000 liters for kilogram of food produced, rice- 1,912
litres, wheat – 900 litres and potatoes - 500 liters.
Agriculture is one of the main end-use of water and if present trends continue (in all forms of consumption), 1.8
billion people will be living with absolute water scarcity by 2025,
and two-thirds of the world could be subject to water stress. Although
there is a vast amount of water on the planet, sustainably managed
water is becoming scarce. We would soon reach a state defined as “peak water”
which will be the point when we reach physical, economic, and environmental
limits on meeting human demands for water and the subsequent decline of water
availability and use sets in. .
Apart from land and water, fertilizers, pesticides, labour
and energy are major inputs to livestock farming.
There are a number of negative factors which are associated
with livestock farming and meat processing.
A. Land : Livestock requirements account for the
single most important utilization of land which adds to the pressure on
land. As per FAO estimates, as far as
cereals are concerned, the cereal consumption for livestock production is about
75% of the cereal consumption of humans. Considering that the total land used
for cultivation is about 1.5 billion hectares and the land under cereal
production is estimated to be around 693 million hectares as per FAO (2013), it
would be possible to feed billions more if the cereal production was not
diverted to animal feed.
B. Deforestation and Soil Erosion: Increased livestock production has come at
the cost of deforestation and overgrazing of pastures. Loss of forest cover is
estimated to take place at the rate of 9 million hectares per year. That means
between now and 2050, forest cover equivalent to almost the whole of India,
will have been lost. Moreover, this deforestation is happening in the rain
forests and tropics which will probably affect the environment more
drastically. Probably equally serious
but not noticeable has been the erosion of top soil due to overgrazing. It is
estimated to be about 12 million hectares per year. On lands which are used for grazing, the loss
of top-soil is estimated to be on an average 2 MTs per hectare per year.
C. Contamination
of Ground Water : Excess of fertilizers and pesticides which cannot be
absorbed by plants drains of into soil and this ultimately leaches into
subterranean water, affecting the quality of ground water. Excess consumption
of nitrogenous fertilizers is the main cause of the nitrates in groundwater.
The pesticides and herbicides, most of which tend to accumulate in the soil and
groundwater add to the contamination of the groundwater.
D : Greenhouse Gases : Livestock generate a large
quantity of nitrogen oxides and methane as a part of their digestive processes.
There are varying figures of how much is the livestock farming adds to the
greenhouses, a conservative estimate would be 10% - 12%, thus contributing
substantially to the global warming.
E : Energy Consumption : Animal protein production requires
more than eight times as much fossil-fuel energy than production of plant
protein while yielding animal protein that is only 1.4 times more nutritious
for humans than the comparable amount of plant protein, according to a report.
Tracking food animal production from the feed trough to the
dinner table, it was found that broiler chickens to be the most efficient use
of fossil energy, and beef, the least. Chicken meat production consumes energy
in a 4:1 ratio to protein output; beef cattle production requires an energy
input to protein output ratio of 54:1. (Lamb meat production is nearly as
inefficient at 50:1, according to the ecologist's analysis of U.S. Department
of Agriculture statistics. Other ratios range from 13:1 for turkey meat and
14:1 for milk protein to 17:1 for pork and 26:1 for eggs.)
F : Depletion of Mineral Stock : Out of the
fertilizers, nitrogen based fertilizers are by and large derived from nitrogen
captured from atmosphere but potassium and phosphorus based fertilizers are
derived from minerals which have a limited stock. At the current rate of usage, although potash
stocks could last much longer, it is estimated that the (economically) mineable
reserves of phosphates would last only between 50 to 100 years.
G : Introduction of Harmful Chemicals in Food Chain: Animals
reared for slaughter are often fed growth hormones, antibiotics and other chemicals in order to accelerate mass
accumulation. Many of these are not metabolised and their residues are found in
the meat of such animals. The harmful effects of such ingredients are probably
not fully understood as yet but are quite likely to substantial.
Sea has often been touted as an infinite source of food
which can supplement the food available from land, but the reality does not
support this contention. The total production from all aquatic sources, sea as
well as inland fisheries, covering both fish and crustaceans together amounts
to 148 MMTs. Out of this 128 MMTs is consumed and the balance being used as
fishmeal / animal feed etc. The aquaculture accounts for 47% of the catch.
There is not much scope for increase of production in this area as most of the
sea catchment areas are reporting depletion of stocks of fish and the inland
operations are adding to both pressure on land usage as well as contamination
of ground water.
The conclusions are inescapable. We are rapidly moving to a
situation where food shortages, water shortages and poor water quality will be
the harsh reality which the world will have to contend with. No country is
likely to remain free from the repercussions of issues of this nature and
magnitude. Replacing animal proteins in our diet by plant proteins is just one
way to partially rectify the situation.
One does not see a sudden change of heart occurring in 70%
of world’s population to opt for vegetarianism. Nor is it possible to
completely abolish livestock farming, deeply intertwined as it is with a number
of other activities like dairy, farming, wool
production and even as a part of agricultural waste recycling, organic
fertilizer production and many more.
So reduction effected in livestock farming by switching over
to vegetarianism is not going to be substantial and we will only be able to postpone
the day of reckoning. The solution lies elsewhere. It is to the hard-working
twins, Science and Technology, working in tandem with each other, that we must
look for salvation. Meat grown "in vitro" is one solution which promises to help us do
that. This is one Red Revolution that we must all welcome and embrace.
We will take a detailed look at the status of this Red
Revolution in Part II of this paper. As they say, “watch this space”.
LazyBee aka Shirish
Potnis
Note : I have
drawn heavily on the publications of FAO, USDA and other official organizations and of course
Wikipedia.
