> Is there any evidence that the thousands of Americans who have gone vegan over the last few years have reduced the carbon footprint of the meat producing industry at all?
Reminds me of the covid prevention paradox.
> the numbers are basically flat since 2000 increasing slightly since 2014.[1]
Looking at beef production numbers of a single country is pretty meaningless.
For one, you'd want to look at consumption. Production can be influenced by changing import or export balances without a change in consumption. You can also look at global production figures.
Two, you'd want to look at per capita numbers, to correct for population changes.
Three, you'd want to look at meat generally. (nitpicky) Beef is just one type of meat, it says a lot but not everything. Could be that dietary / health / business preferences shift to or away from e.g. chicken, that aren't related to veganism.
Four, you'd want a more sophisticated research method that'll indicate that veganism is a causal factor for meat consumption than a simple consumption graph. In countries rapidly developing economically (e.g. China), the meat consumption figures would be rising hard with or without say the percentage of vegans doubling from 20% to 40%, that doesn't disprove the impact of the extra 20% vegans. It only shows that other forces (e.g. economic growth) have outweighed the vegan impact, but it doesn't prove that without these extra 20% vegans meat consumption wouldn't be even far higher. % of population that's vegan would definitely show up as a causal variable across countries, almost obviously.
Reminds me of the covid prevention paradox.
> the numbers are basically flat since 2000 increasing slightly since 2014.[1]
Looking at beef production numbers of a single country is pretty meaningless.
For one, you'd want to look at consumption. Production can be influenced by changing import or export balances without a change in consumption. You can also look at global production figures.
Two, you'd want to look at per capita numbers, to correct for population changes.
Three, you'd want to look at meat generally. (nitpicky) Beef is just one type of meat, it says a lot but not everything. Could be that dietary / health / business preferences shift to or away from e.g. chicken, that aren't related to veganism.
Four, you'd want a more sophisticated research method that'll indicate that veganism is a causal factor for meat consumption than a simple consumption graph. In countries rapidly developing economically (e.g. China), the meat consumption figures would be rising hard with or without say the percentage of vegans doubling from 20% to 40%, that doesn't disprove the impact of the extra 20% vegans. It only shows that other forces (e.g. economic growth) have outweighed the vegan impact, but it doesn't prove that without these extra 20% vegans meat consumption wouldn't be even far higher. % of population that's vegan would definitely show up as a causal variable across countries, almost obviously.