why is it a problem that it takes so much water to produce 1kg of beef – something like 15,000 liters – if the cows just pee it all back out anyway?

Question

why is it a problem that it takes so much water to produce 1kg of beef – something like 15,000 liters – if the cows just pee it all back out anyway?

In: 10104

Answer 1

I think this really depends on local farming practices around you. In some countries beef is farmed pretty extensively, with most feed coming from grasses bulked out with human inedible crop waste. Since most feed comes from grass, most water comes from rainwater, so the cows aren’t converting clean drinking water into cow pee.

In other countries though farming can pretty intensive, with less land used and more resources like clean drinking water and grain are used to raise the same cows. That’s when the issues mentioned in the other posts become significant.