I recently attended the 2018 Long Island Food Conference where I was the only meat eater among the speakers advocating a “plant-based” diet. The keynote speaker was Francis Moore Lappé. He will be recognized as the author of the hugely influential “Diet for a Small Planet,” a 1971 book that persuaded many people to embrace a grain-and-bean diet.
In the book, Lappé argues that meat production has a negative impact on the environment and is a major cause of global food shortages. She argued that by practicing vegetarianism, we can save the planet and feed the hungry. Many people answered the call. Several conference participants reported that she became a vegetarian after reading her book.
(The recipes in the 1991 20th Anniversary edition, updated later in the book and with Lappé's lengthy foreword, are appalling in their inclusion of margarine, skim milk, low-fat cheese, vegetable oil, eggless mayonnaise, and large amounts of soy foods.) He is credited with introducing it to the American public, but at the time no one knew how toxic soy foods were.)
From Abundance to Scarcity: Rappe's Contradictory Keynote Address on Food Production and Malnutrition
Lappé began his keynote address at the conference by declaring that food is abundant and that the world produces 2,900 calories per person per day. But she says people are going hungry because half of all grains produced are used for animal feed and three-quarters of all agricultural land is used for livestock production.
She told the audience that despite increases in food production, many people in the world suffer from malnutrition and one in five children suffer from stunted growth. Two billion souls are deficient in at least one essential nutrient. She pointed out that, as many people know, the food and agriculture industries are home to a concentration of wealth and power and the influence of lobbyists.
Corn and soybeans used in vegetarian and vegan foods are subsidized. This fact has been linked to her increasing her diabetes rate from 1% in 1970 to 10% today. GMOs came in for particular criticism, which she described as a “huge missed opportunity.” She quoted a GMO scientist who said, “We brainwashed ourselves.”
Lappé condemned what he called the scarcity mind and the assumption of scarcity. Instead, she proposes an ‘eco-mind’ that recognizes that in biology everything is interconnected and that there are no parts, only participants. While the scarcity mentality leads to a concentration of power in agriculture, the ecological mentality is consistent with the laws of nature.
Interestingly, Lappé didn't actually say that people should become vegetarians. One participant told me that at most meetings she asks for weapons. But I don't think I've ever heard a presentation more contradictory and full of mixed messages.
Managed Grazing: Sustainable Solutions for Livestock and Soil Health
Let's start with her Scarcity Mind message that you shouldn't eat beef (or bacon). Everyone in the audience will agree that the current feedlot system, which treats cattle as receptacles for cheap, subsidized corn, is abhorrent. However, it is truly a misunderstanding to claim that using three-quarters of agricultural land for livestock production is a bad thing.
According to some estimates, only 11% of the Earth's surface is arable. That is, it is sufficiently fertile for crop production. However, a significant portion of the remainder supports animal production very well. In fact, grazing cattle and other animals on this type of land improves the soil and increases productivity. In other words, with managed grazing, beef cattle don't need grain, and cows don't need grain. Dairy cows require only small amounts of grain.
And it is said that managed grazing can increase the number of cattle supported by land by up to 10 times. In a recent article, Joel Salatin described converting his 200-acre farm from continuous grazing (where cows roam aimlessly across large tracts of land) to managed grazing (where cows are confined to small pastures). However, they moved daily, mimicking natural grazing patterns.)
Land that once supported just 30 cattle through continuous grazing will now support 300 cattle through managed grazing and environmental improvement rather than degradation. If the world farmed like this, everyone would be able to eat beef!
And that will certainly help address the major problems Lappé mentioned: malnutrition and stunting. Stunting is common in children raised on plant-based diets, primarily due to zinc deficiency. And what is the best source of zinc? Why beef, of course! Only animal products can provide the nutrients most lacking in Third World diets (vitamins A, D, K2, B12, B6, iron, iodine, calcium and zinc).
Nature's Blueprint: The Essential Role of Animals in Sustainable Agriculture
Lappé blames the rise in diabetes on subsidies to corn and soybeans and the proliferation of GMO crops. But grain-based diets, whether subsidized by GMOs or not, can cause diabetes, which, of course, is exactly what Lappé has been urging. Over the past 50 years.
Eco Mind is consistent with the laws of nature, says Lappé. What is the first law of nature? It is this: nature would never farm without animals. Wherever plants grow in the world, there are animals. Even in places where plants don't grow, like Antarctica, animals (i.e. penguins) not only grow but thrive. Around the world, animals and plants have a symbiotic relationship. Plants support animals, and animals help plants primarily by recycling them into rich manure.
If we farm according to the laws of nature, we will be able to raise animals on 100% farmland. On lands suitable for crops and agricultural products, crop production and grazing alternated to enrich the soil. We will raise ducks and geese in the orchard to eliminate pests, and we will raise pigs in the forest pastures to eliminate pests.
Beyond Corn and Soybeans: The Faulty Logic of Restricted Diets on Global Hunger
But Lappé's biggest contradiction is that he presupposes that we live on a small planet with limited resources while simultaneously claiming that we are producing abundant food. And because our planet is small and stressed, we are forced to eat unsatisfactory and restricted diets so that others can eat.
It is not explained how consuming only corn and beans could help people in India and Africa eat enough. Of course, we could send subsidized GMO corn to these areas that we would otherwise feed to our cattle, but this would only weaken local small farms and Lappé does not condone this.
The fact is that we live on a huge planet that is fertile, abundant, abundant, generous and gracious. This is especially true if we farm intelligently in a way that nourishes the soil instead of polluting it.
It's not overpopulation (a claim constantly made throughout the conference), we can feed many times more people than we do now, and we can feed them well if it doesn't hinder businesses.
Even in the age of monocultures and industrial farms, small farms still produce about 70% of the world's food. And all but the poorest farms raise animals such as chickens, ducks, pigs, goats, sheep, and dairy cows.
A Question of Consensus: Differing Views on Global Warming and Dietary Choices
At our booth, I spoke with a lovely young woman who asked me about the Weston A. Price Foundation's position on global warming. Because global warming requires us to become vegetarian.
I know the Foundation doesn't take a position on the subject, but from what I've read, the Earth stopped warming in the late 1990s and is now on a cooling trend. I talked about the medieval warm period, hundreds of years warmer than today, when vineyards flourished in Denmark and dairy farms dotted the Greenland coast.
Then the climate became cold, and Europe experienced the Little Ice Age, when the Thames River froze over every winter and many people starved due to food shortages.
I pointed out that human activity cannot be blamed for these changes because they occurred before industrialization. In most cases, climate change will be associated with changes in solar activity.
That means you don't have to feel guilty about driving an SUV or eating bacon, but she disagreed. She said 97% of scientists support global warming, so “everyone knows” that eating meat instead of a vegetarian diet will cause glaciers to melt and sea levels to rise.
Integrating animals reduces waste and nourishes communities
One of the tracks at the conference focused on food waste. This is another reason to eat a plant-based diet. Clearly, our current industrial food system is incredibly wasteful. Tristram Stuart, a former British pig farmer turned crusader, spoke about new technologies that could turn food waste into animal feed.
He is the founder of Toast Ale, a beer made from fresh surplus bread. It's fair to ask what kind of bread goes into this beer. Does it contain dozens of additives, GMO grains, and soy flour like most breads?
What creates the most waste in our food system is the segregation of animals into single-species CAFOs. With a concentration of hogs in South Carolina and dairy cows in Wisconsin, what do you do with the whey left over from cheese making and the skim milk left over from butter and cream making?
These are waste products that provide no nutrition to humans, but are very nutritious to pigs. And if your pigs live on a farm rather than a factory farm, they can eat kitchen scraps as well as tasty and nutritious farm-sourced whey and skim milk, like cheese, butter and cream.
And if you have a brewery nearby, your pigs can get additional nutrition from spent grain. Waste, whey, skim milk, waste grains, etc. All these foods are provided to the farmer for free, so there is no need to purchase large quantities of grains. Using this system, we can all feel better about eating the ultimate product of recycled waste: bacon!
The Weston A. Price Foundation advocates supporting small, pasture-based farms by spending half of their food dollars selling directly to farmers. With the other half, you can celebrate how much smaller the world has become.
About the author
Sally Fallon Morell is the author of the best-selling cookbook “Nourishing Traditions” and several other books on diet and health. She is the founding president of the Weston A. Price Foundation (westonaprice.org) and founder of A Campaign for Real Milk (realmilk.com). Visit her blog, Nutritioningtraditions.com.
