There's a big difference between being anti-Monsanto and anti-GMO. Monsanto is a business, and some of their business practices are...a little questionable. Being anti-GMO is, in my experience, generally born from ignorance, where people want everything to be "natural" and don't understand science, so they fear it.

Edit: Yes, similar to the anti-vaccine people, in a way. Unlike anti-vaccine though, anti-GMO is definitely trending right now. They were able to get big crowds for protests when I was in San Diego.

I think you completely missed out on what I was trying to show. You were saying that small farms don't work and I agree to a certain extent. I believe that they survive but if a different strategy was in place maybe they could do better.

I showed you one item which does work on the small market. From what I can see online they seem to be doing well in other states too. Farmers use their bees to pollenate crops for other farmers and there is a demand for the product. In fact I'm starting to see the local super markets carry more local honey rather than the cheaper brands.

Beyond Saving wrote:

Well sure, small farms can be successful in a niche, I never said they couldn't. There is a couple around here that makes pretty decent money selling duck eggs. But you have to consider why they are successful. They succeed because they can charge substantially more for their product, because nobody is mass producing it and selling it for a much lower cost. Small local honey farmers can't produce enough to feed honey to all 300 million Americans. If they did, they would no longer be small, they would have to turn to mass production techniques. 

There are two honey farms here in Central Florida which sell more honey than the super markets. One of which has expanded in to multiple states. They employ over a hundred people and their goal is to expand in to every state selling raw, organic honey.

The only place you can get their honey is at the farmer's market or online. Of which, maybe they are more successful because they sell stuff like chocolate honey and soap, etc.

he green revolution started in the late '40s, it was pretty much over by the 60's.

And before that, people didn't eat beef like we do today. They couldn't afford to. Beef was reserved for special occasions and the wealthy.

We produce approximately 6 times more beef today than we did in the '30s. Which means if we go back to '30s production methods like you are advocating, we would need 6 times the land. 

Nor is it well suited for grasses, which is why it isn't planted in grasses. Rocky and swampy land is not desirable for pasture. When it is used as pasture, it is used for animals that are not intended for human consumption like breeder cattle or often sheep. Foothills are often planted if the soil is good. Where they are not planted with crops are areas where the soil quality is poor, which again, makes them poor for high caloric grasses. Those areas are where you see a lot of breeder ranches, sheep ranches and goats. If the soil is high quality, it is great for crops, if it is low quality, then it is only useful for pasture with animals that are consuming natural vegetation. In the old days, it wasn't uncommon for a cow to take 3-4 years to reach market weight. That isn't practical in today's world, if you are going to grass finish your cattle, you need high caloric grasses.

No it isn't. Every grassfed operation that exists pays for their grass. It has to be reseeded every year, otherwise you end up with natural vegetation taking over. Which again, leads to skinny cows that are tough as shoe leather. Just fine for breeders or species that we don't eat like sheep and goats, but no okay for feeders.

Where? You are talking about some 250,000 extra square miles just to match US production. That is an area about the size of Alberta. Where is there that much land that isn't being used for something else?

I could shred this argument,

since I am arguing your main point that grassfed is more efficient than grainfed

Oh please. I'm on the anti-subsidy bandwagon more militantly than most, but farm subsidies are completely insignificant compared to revenue and profits. All cattle subsidies are on a per head basis and pay no attention to what the cattle are eating. Grain subsidies (which I assume you intend to imply lead to lower feed prices and therefore encourage use as feed) are nowhere near large enough to affect what crops get planted. In fact, the largest subsidies by far goes towards rice, a relatively small crop in the US. The largest recipient of corn and soy subsidies over the last 17 years is Harvest States Cooperatives (now CHS), they average about $4 million a year in subsidies- their revenue is $40 BILLION. $4 million is less than they make in interest and nowhere near large enough to affect their decisions of which crop to plant. Plus, you can get subsidies no matter what you farm.

The largest subsidy by far is the property tax discount, and exactly what you farm doesn't matter at all, you get the same discount. It is calculated by the type of soil and higher quality soils get taxed more, so if anything it is biased against grain farmers.

Other government involvement is the ethanol industry, which consumes 30-40% of corn that could otherwise be used as livestock feed. Which has an upward pressure on feed prices. Despite that, corn remains the cheapest method of feeding cattle.

http://farm.ewg.org/index.php

Beyond Saving wrote:

he green revolution started in the late '40s, it was pretty much over by the 60's.

Only in Mexico, Asia and Africa. In the rest of North America it didn't even start until the 50's, and wasn't widespread until almost the 70's.

Others followed into the feedlot business. Between 1940 and 1969, the number of cattle on farms nearly doubled, from 60,818 to over 106,000 head. But the number of farms producing cattle dropped by around three-quarters, from 4.85 million farms with cattle in 1940 to 1.7 million farms in 1969.

According to your own graph that claim is pure bullshit. That graph shows a less than 100% increase in meat consumption per person since the green revolution began, even assuming it was immediately implemented all across the US in the 40's (which didn't happen). Meat consumption didn't even double, which shows that people were eating quite a bit of meat already.

Beyond Saving wrote:

We produce approximately 6 times more beef today than we did in the '30s. Which means if we go back to '30s production methods like you are advocating, we would need 6 times the land. 

Not a problem.

Having lived in both mountains and swamps surrounded by what you call poor land despite the local farmers saying it's just fine, I call bullshit again.

Yes it is. No grass fed operation needs to reseed unless the animals were allowed to overgraze. You don't even need fertilisation because the animals did it for you.

 Where isn't it? I grant your country is a lot more crowded than mine, but that's not all that much. Even less if indoor or underground operations are considered.

 

Efficiency isn't my main argument, it's merely a argument. If I were to make any argument my main argument, it would be the overcrowding and excessive antibacterial/etc. products that are going to create superbugs in our livestock even faster than we create them in humans.

The subsidies aren't there anymore because the desired shift already happened. I learned this in school, and I can't find anything supporting or denying this when I look for it today. Maybe I just don't remember the specific terminology that would get me results. Maybe the US never did it at all, and the focus was specifically on Canada. I doubt it, however, as I specifically recall looking at the impact in a number of countries in the Western hemisphere.

I always prefer higher quality and would prefer to pay more for it. It is part of the reason why I don't eat "junk food" any more.

No, it was pretty much over in the late '60s. Particularly in the area of feedlots. 

Only in Mexico, Asia and Africa. In the rest of North America it didn't even start until the 50's, and wasn't widespread until almost the 70's.

Almost doubling per capita is very significant.

It doesn't take a genius to see that 54 billion pounds requires significantly more land if you are ranching the same way you were when you produced 9 billion pounds. So just because we had enough land to grassfeed most cattle when we produced 9 billion pounds is not evidence that we have enough land to produce 54 billion pounds using the same methods. Which is the point you made that I am refuting.

You saying it isn't a problem doesn't make the problem disappear. Where exactly is all this unused land? The land available for farming has shrunk since the '30s, not increased, and in 1930 there wasn't much land that wasn't being used. We certainly used far more than 1/6th of what was available.

Those local farmers also weren't raising 30,000 head of cattle on that land. If you read my response, you will see that I outlined numerous uses for that land, but grassfed beef is not among them- and certainly not largescale production of grassfed beef. 

Over time, pastures have to be managed. Cows don't conveniently chow down to exactly 2-3 inches. Sometimes the stupid fucks eat a patch bare.

The also start to weigh a lot, and guess what happens when a few thousand cows all walk over the same piece of land? The soil gets compressed, divots get dug up, the ground becomes uneven which hinders regrowth as well as increases risks of things like broken legs.

We have indoor operations right now and they work. Those are the ones you are criticizing...

Certainly. And I never said that feedlots are without problems and difficulties. Grassfed isn't a plausible answer, unless you are willing to say that people have to significantly reduce the amount of beef they eat or stop eating it altogether- which is the stand taken by many environmentalists. Personally, I'm a selfish SOB, and me enjoying a burger is more important than whatever problems people even 100 years from now are faced with.

I don't know anything about Canadian subsidy programs. In the US, subsidies to corn farmers were in the form of limiting production by paying them NOT to plant and by giving them subsidized loans during times when market prices were low. Direct crop subsidies didn't come into existence until the corn shortage of '72, which led to the "Agricultural and Consumer Protection Act of 1973" which was the first time that direct subsidies were given to farmers. It attempted to reduce the price of corn, which it may or may not have short term. The next year corn prices did fall, but the drought ended too and corn prices typically fall after a drought. How much is related to subsidies is a detail that could be argued.

Regardless, by 1973, feedlots with grainfed cattle were already the primary method of beef production. So saying subsidies encouraged the change to feedlots is putting the cart before the horse. Saying that feedlots are responsible for the creation of subsidies is probably accurate, because the beef industry strongly pushed for the corn subsidies to lower their feed costs. Without their money and clout, perhaps the bill never passes.

Re: the honey discussion...

Honey is a lot more complicated than it seems. Did you know that honey which isn't gold coloured will not receive approval to be sold? It isn't all that uncommon either, as the colour is dependant on what the bees consume. I remember a year or two ago a farmer got red honey because of crops a neighbour was growing, and had to throw away the whole inventory. Not because red honey is bad, but because the colour didn't match what the bureaucrats define as honey. It's incredibly stupid.

Re: the honey discussion... Honey is a lot more complicated than it seems. Did you know that honey which isn't gold coloured will not receive approval to be sold? It isn't all that uncommon either, as the colour is dependant on what the bees consume. I remember a year or two ago a farmer got red honey because of crops a neighbour was growing, and had to throw away the whole inventory. Not because red honey is bad, but because the colour didn't match what the bureaucrats define as honey. It's incredibly stupid.

Your saying it is a problem doesn't make it a problem. Where are your statistics showing the US is out of land?

The United States has a total land area of nearly 2.3 billion acres. Major uses in 2002 were forest-use land, 651 million acres (28.8 percent); grassland pasture and range land, 587 million acres (25.9 percent); cropland, 442 million acres (19.5 percent); special uses (primarily parks and wildlife areas), 297 million acres (13.1 percent); miscellaneous other uses, 228 million acres (10.1 percent); and urban land, 60 million acres (2.6 percent).

Beyond Saving wrote:

Those local farmers also weren't raising 30,000 head of cattle on that land. If you read my response, you will see that I outlined numerous uses for that land, but grassfed beef is not among them- and certainly not largescale production of grassfed beef. 

No they weren't. But neither do they need to. Concentrating all production into a few super farms is convenient, but also unsafe for the economy long term, our population, the cows population, and the environment. A thousand small farms for every super farm will make meat cost a bit more, but not so much more that people will stop buying it.

No. We have thousands of animals crowded together indoors, not indoor pastures.

Well since you consider a reduction in meat consumption of less than 50% significant and I don't, we have an unsolvable dispute. I say that such a reduction wouldn't hurt at all. I also love me a burger. And I'll be ahead of you in the line when we start killing people to prevent them from stealing our burgers away. But I won't mind eating burgers half as much as I do now. You aren't rich from what I understand, but neither are you living in poverty. You probably won't have to eat less, you'll pay more. Which is as unpleasant as eating less, but it won't bankrupt you.

Farmers could make more $ by letting their cows free range in locations that are poor for crops but great for grasses. I don't know as much about pigs and chickens and turkeys etc., but beef could be a LOT more efficient than it is.

So where exactly do we even get 3 times our current pasture? Deforestation?

The cost would have to be enough to stop people from buying it, because the supply would be much lower. If the price didn't rise you would have massive shortages. 

Indoor pastures? How the fuck would that work and why would you go through the effort, expense and massive energy consumption such an endeavor would require?

Which farmers would not make more profit (because they couldn't produce nearly as much) and the production system would NOT be more efficient since by your own admission it would produce less at a more expensive price. Farmers produce like they do because it allows them to meet demand and make a profit.  

Personally, I rarely eat beef at all. Mostly, I eat venison, pork, lamb and an assortment of other game that I kill myself.

How does "big honey" destroy your love for good honey or hurt your personal life in any way?  

Brian37 wrote:

Do you know why any product you buy is so expensive? Because the uber rich compete with each other for bigger profits,which drags even mom and pop shops into that stupid mentality.

I was under the impression that competition drove the price down.  That explains why Wal-Marts tend to drive mom-and-pops into the ground, since they can sell at a lower price.

Beyond Saving wrote:

How does "big honey" destroy your love for good honey or hurt your personal life in any way?  

I haven't really researched it yet, but I bet I can complain about it some way.