Bobby Brainworm Sez "Eat More Meat And Dairy!!"; His Guidelines Would Require An Additional 100 Million Acres Of Land

[hatrack]

The Trump administration’s new dietary guidelines urging Americans to eat far more meat and dairy products will, if followed, come at a major cost to the planet via huge swathes of habitat razed for farmland and millions of tons of extra planet-heating emissions. A new inverted food pyramid recently released by Donald Trump’s health department emphasizes pictures of steak, poultry, ground beef and whole milk, alongside fruits and vegetables, as the most important foods to eat.

The new guidelines are designed to nearly double the amount of protein currently consumed by Americans. “Protein and healthy fats are essential and were wrongly discouraged in prior dietary guidelines,” said Robert F Kennedy Jr, the US health secretary. “We are ending the war on saturated fats.” But a surge in meat-eating by Americans would involve flattening vast tracts of ecosystems such as forests to make way for the hefty environmental hoofprint of raised livestock, emitting large quantities of greenhouse gases in the process, experts have warned.

EDIT

While many Americans will simply ignore the guidelines, the new framework will probably influence institutions such as schools and federal workplaces. The average American already eats about 144kg (317lb) of meat and seafood a year, second globally only to Portugal, and ingests more protein than previous federal government guidelines recommended. Any further increase will be felt in places such as the Amazon rainforest, which is already being felled at a rapid rate for cattle ranches and to grow livestock feed.

Red meat, in particular, has an outsized impact upon the planet – beef requires 20 times more land and emits 20 times more greenhouse gas emissions per gram of protein than common plant proteins, such as beans. The raising of cows, pigs, lamb and other animals for slaughter is also associated with significant localized air and water pollution.

EDIT

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/jan/20/rfk-jr-trump-meat-diet-guidelines-land

[Diamond_Dog]

1. Many Americans are finding meat, especially beef, unaffordable.

[hatrack]

2. I've pretty much gotten out of the habit of eating beef . . . .

Getting older, it's harder to digest, so if I have a steak and half a dozen burgers in a year, that's about my limit. More to the point of the article, where the hell did this "Protein!! Protein!! Protein!! Protein!!" obsession come from?

[rampartd]

3. i might have a forkful of meat or 1/2 burger

but i usually regret it. old age? i just seem to have lost the carnivorous spirit.

[JBTaurus83]

4. What happened

To him being an environmentalist?