Sustainable Meat
I am an omnivore and therefore both plants and animals die so that I may live. In my journey to live a more sustainable life I have thought a lot about where the meat I eat comes from. I have no interest in being a vegetarian so have to look hard at the meat I eat. I am quite opposed to the CAFO (confined animal feeding operation) way of raising animals for food. What I have seen and read is not humane and treats the animals like a sack of protein and not living beings. So, I've started doing what I can to avoid CAFOs. There are lots of ways to do this and I'll outline a few steps you can take to go completely CAFO free.
1. Vote with your dollars and buy ethically produced meat and animal products. Locally raised livestock, locally produced milk products, farm fresh eggs. You can find all these things at a good grocery store or at a Farmer's Market. Organic is great but if it is being trucked in over a thousand miles it still has an impact and now some are reporting that the big organic producers are also CAFOs. Know your source, read labels, and talk to the farmer.
2. Buy large quantities of meat at once. I've done this a few times now and love it. When we first arrived in Idaho, we rented a farmhouse from a woman whose sons raised a couple dozen cows. We ordered a side of beef from her and were there the day they butchered it. I got to help package the cuts and Russ helped with the cutting. That side of beef almost filled our freezer and we are still eating it 2 and a half years later. It is almost gone though. Since that time we have also bought a couple pigs from local places. The second pig was of much higher quality. We bought this one from the WSU Swine Co-op. These students raise the pigs and then market them. The butcher at the university did a great job with the cuts and we love the bacon and chops! It was only about $350 and will last us a good long while. When you do this you not only get to know the farmer who raised your food, you keep the money local and the farmer will get much more of the profits. No corporate bigwigs!
3. Raise it yourself or hunt it. We currently have a flock of laying hens that provide us with plenty of fresh amazing eggs. We'll be doing meat flocks this summer too. And come springtime we will have two or three hogs of our own to raise, butcher and share with friends. Someday (maybe after I am done with school) we'll get dairy goats and start making our own cheese and such. And every year we hunt and fish to add food to the freezer.
There are many ways to reduce your meat eating impact on the environment and I say do what you can, one step at a time. If you can't go completely local or organic, don't stress out. Do what you can. Someday you may have a great opportunity to get closer to your own food chain and have great impact. Just do what you can because it is all the small steps that add up to a big difference. What do some of you do to reduce your impact or avoid CAFOs?
1. Vote with your dollars and buy ethically produced meat and animal products. Locally raised livestock, locally produced milk products, farm fresh eggs. You can find all these things at a good grocery store or at a Farmer's Market. Organic is great but if it is being trucked in over a thousand miles it still has an impact and now some are reporting that the big organic producers are also CAFOs. Know your source, read labels, and talk to the farmer.
2. Buy large quantities of meat at once. I've done this a few times now and love it. When we first arrived in Idaho, we rented a farmhouse from a woman whose sons raised a couple dozen cows. We ordered a side of beef from her and were there the day they butchered it. I got to help package the cuts and Russ helped with the cutting. That side of beef almost filled our freezer and we are still eating it 2 and a half years later. It is almost gone though. Since that time we have also bought a couple pigs from local places. The second pig was of much higher quality. We bought this one from the WSU Swine Co-op. These students raise the pigs and then market them. The butcher at the university did a great job with the cuts and we love the bacon and chops! It was only about $350 and will last us a good long while. When you do this you not only get to know the farmer who raised your food, you keep the money local and the farmer will get much more of the profits. No corporate bigwigs!
3. Raise it yourself or hunt it. We currently have a flock of laying hens that provide us with plenty of fresh amazing eggs. We'll be doing meat flocks this summer too. And come springtime we will have two or three hogs of our own to raise, butcher and share with friends. Someday (maybe after I am done with school) we'll get dairy goats and start making our own cheese and such. And every year we hunt and fish to add food to the freezer.
There are many ways to reduce your meat eating impact on the environment and I say do what you can, one step at a time. If you can't go completely local or organic, don't stress out. Do what you can. Someday you may have a great opportunity to get closer to your own food chain and have great impact. Just do what you can because it is all the small steps that add up to a big difference. What do some of you do to reduce your impact or avoid CAFOs?
Next up: gardening? I'm getting my seed catalogs in the mail and I can't wait to plan the garden and see the fruition. One of these days, maybe I'll move out of the park so I can have my own chickens, and maybe some goats for cheese as well.
ReplyDeleteLove your blog! BTW, mine is at: nancypatterson.org
Nancy - keep me posted about your gardening prospects. Thanks for the link to your blog - it is great!
ReplyDelete