TY - JOUR T1 - Shifting human diets and agricultural nutrient management JF - Journal of Soil and Water Conservation SP - 63A LP - 66A DO - 10.2489/jswc.65.3.63A VL - 65 IS - 3 AU - Michael J. Castellano Y1 - 2010/05/01 UR - http://www.jswconline.org/content/65/3/63A.abstract N2 - Consumption of meat proteins is on the rise. Growing use of human-edible livestock feeds combined with the inherent inefficiency in protein conversion from plants to animals has raised concern that increased meat consumption could diminish environmental quality by increasing the amount of cultivated land (Steinfeld et al. 2006). However, not all livestock varieties have the same environmental impact. The inefficiency of protein conversion from plants to animals varies among livestock products: beef protein is produced with only 5% efficiency, whereas pork and chicken protein are produced with 13% and 25% efficiency (Smil 2002). This has led scientists to recommend a shift in meat consumption from beef towards chicken (e.g., Pelletier 2009; Woof 2009; Godfray et al. 2010). Regardless of environmental quality and food availability concerns, such a shift is occurring. As a proportion of global meat consumption, chicken surpassed beef in the 1990s (FAOSTAT n.d.). In this paper, I explore the impact of shifting human protein sources on agricultural nutrient management and the environment. Production, processing, and delivery of meat proteins generate large amounts of greenhouse gases and eutrophying nutrients. Virtually all reports suggest that beef production is more harmful to the environment than pork or chicken production (e.g., Flachowsky… © 2010 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society ER -