Nearly one million cattle take heavy toll on Arizona’s land, water

If you’re like me, when you go to the local grocery store, you find it fairly easy to slip into the mindset that imagines all those vacuum-sealed cuts of beef lined up in the climate-controlled meat aisle simply popped out of some magical stainless steel machine, a clean, efficient marvel of our technological age.

But as I know — and you know — nothing could be further from the truth.

The reality is, those packages of beef are the final product of a production chain that in its use of water, grain and other resources is one of the most environmentally damaging processes on our beleaguered planet.

Just here in Arizona, an astounding 970,000 steers and calves roam the open range (or, more likely, huddle together on giant feedlots).

I know, because today I called the Arizona Beef Council, and chatted with Anna Groseta, the Council’s spokeswoman. According to their website, Anna is a former Beef Ambassador (”The Voice of Women in the United States Beef Cattle Industry”), so I trust in her beef expertise.

The Beef Council gets a dollar for every head of cattle that goes to the ol’ slaughterhouse, so you would imagine they’d keep pretty good figures.

(Believe it or not, the dollar-a-head “check-off” fee is a federal law — part of the 1985 Farm Bill — called the Beef Promotion and Research Act, the purpose of which is “to support beef/veal promotion, research and information.” Go figure.)

And much to my surprise, that nearly one million head of cattle is absolutely peanuts in comparison to some of our neighboring states.

“We’re not even in the top ten,” Anna assures me.

Colorado has 2.3 million cattle.

Texas alone has a staggering 14 million.

(Just to go one step further — and vegetarians, brace yourselves — according to the USDA, give or take a few million, in 2008, all told, there were about 100 million cattle in the good old USA, from sea to shining sea. Let’s hope they never get the vote.)

But, getting back to Arizona, and our humble one million bovine residents, I ask: what is the cost — and the benefit — of all these heifers?

For starters, cattle ranching generates about $3.2 billion annually in the state.

That’s not chump change.

And hey now — let’s not forget our federal government’s latest farm bill, a five-year, $305 billion monstrosity. Some of that has got to be filtering down to our ranchers.

Also to be considered are the 11.5 million acres of public land open for grazing in the state, and the abundant water being guzzled by these thirsty creatures — an estimated 2,500 gallons of water for every one-pound steak.

In exchange, we, the people, get plentiful, flavorful beef.

And despite all those stories you hear about people stocking up on Spam because of the horrible economic crisis bearing down on us like a Category 5 hurricane, spokeswoman Anna assures me that folks are still chowing down.

“Calorie for calorie and dollar for dollar, beef is the protein of choice,” she says.

In fact, she tells me that beef scientists (yeah, I never imagined there was such a thing either) have recently discovered new cuts of beef!

One is called the “chuck roll,” and forgive me if I’m not running for my fork and knife.

“There have been new cuts to come out, like the chuck roll,” Anna says. “We call those value cuts – it’s a whole new era and it’s adding value to the carcass.”

Now, for those of you not just decided on a new life of vegetarianism, let me get to my main point (and I do have one!) which is that if it’s not already abundantly clear, our society’s meat fixation is totally out of control!

If you don’t believe me, here’s some facts from a U.N. report, with the appropriately ominous title: Livestock’s Long Shadow.

The total area occupied by grazing is equivalent to 26 percent of the ice-free terrestrial surface of the planet. In addition, the total area dedicated to feedcrop production amounts to 33 percent of total arable land. In all, livestock production accounts for 70 percent of all agricultural land and 30 percent of the land surface of the planet.

Turns out that 20 percent of greenhouse gas emissions come from livestock, too.

Okay, well, maybe some of you have heard all this stuff already. And for you vegetarians out there — keep on keeping on. For the rest of us, I wonder… what does it take to curb this addiction?

It’s a salient question — and one I will go into in depth in an upcoming post, which will include an exclusive interview with Howard Lyman, anti-beef activist, former cattleman and the original “Mad Cowboy”. Stay tuned.

John Collins Rudolf

(Photo of feedlot courtesy Vegetarian Image)