Red meat has a huge carbon footprint because cattle requires a large amount of land and water.

https://sph.tulane.edu/climate-and-food-environmental-impact-beef-consumption

Demand for steaks and burgers is the primary driver of Deforestation:

https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2022-beef-industry-fueling-amazon-rainforest-destruction-deforestation/

https://e360.yale.edu/features/marcel-gomes-interview

https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2023-06-02/almost-a-billion-trees-felled-to-feed-appetite-for-brazilian-beef

If you don’t have a car and rarely eat red meat, you are doing GREAT 🙌 🙌

Sure, you can drink tap water instead of plastic water. You can switch to Tea. You can travel by train. You can use Linux instead of Windows AI’s crap. Those are great ideas. Also, don’t drive yourself crazy. If you are only an ordinary citizen, remember that perfect is the enemy of good.

  • It’s worth noting that soybean meal is not a byproduct. When we look at the most common extraction method for soybean oil (using hexane solvents), soybean meal is still the driver of demand

    However, soybean meal is the main driving force for soybean oil production due to its significant amount of productivity and revenues

    […]

    soybean meal and hulls contribute to over 60% of total revenues, with meal taking the largest portion of over 59% of total revenue

    https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0926669017305010

    This is even more true of other methods like expelling which is still somewhat commonly used

    Moreover, soybean meal is the driving force for the whole process [expelling oil from soy] because it provides over 70% of the total revenue for soy processing by expelling

    https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/9/5/87

      • If we assume that’s the case, half of revenue is still not a byproduct, it’s a coproduct. The other half is still pretty relevant to its value and usage. If 50% of your revenue disappears from something, you’re going to be making a lot less of it

        • @commie@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          fedilink
          11 day ago

          i think at this point we’ve devolved into arguing semantics. you’re not going to convince me soybean is a viable crop unless you can press it for oil, and i don’t think i can convince you it’s a viable product unless the meal is fed to livestock. but i hope you have a good night!

          • AnimalsDream
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            fedilink
            English
            111 hours ago

            What are you talking about? Soy is great. Soy beans, soy curls, tofu, soy milk, soy sauce, miso. All kinds of great soy products.