The case for adding plant proteins to ground meat

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DarlBundren
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The case for adding plant proteins to ground meat

Post by DarlBundren »

The following excerpt is taken from Vaclav Smil's Should we eat meat? . I have tried to keep it as concise as I could. Although Smil is neither a vegetarian nor a vegan, (he may be considered a reducetarian) he has always been known for being a meticulous multidisciplinary scholar and as such I consider his work to be valuable. I read the book a long time ago, but I'd like to share with you his argument for the addition of plant proteins to animal products. It should be noted that Smil is both in favor of mock meat and in vitrio meat, but his work suggests that, when it comes to the former option, adding soy to animal products would prove to be a much more effective solution. It goes without saying that the two of them are not mutually exclusive and these new products would be marketed to those people who are not willing to eat a plant-based diet. If what Smil says is true, and I have no reason to believe it isn't, I think that this practice is something that vegans should stand for.
Vaclav Smil wrote:US sales of meat substitutes were up by 10% in 2011 (Chaker 2012), but at about $270 million that was still equal to less than 0.2%. Even after the much publicized meat-safety crises (European bovine spongiform encephalopathy above all) that scared many European meat consumers, the market share of these substitute products as a component of Dutch meals (by volume) remained just 1% (Hoek et al. 2004). That is why I have concluded that the substitutes would have a more important role when used covertly as additives or extenders in ground and processed meats (Smil 2002).

Although there are no global meat consumption data disaggregated by final use categories, I estimated that (based on a variety of national statistics and known dietary preferences) in the year 2000 ground meats added up to at least 15 Mt and that as much as 20 Mt were used in processed meat products. Adjusted for 2010, this means that at least 45 Mt of meat were eaten in the forms where additions of plant proteins would be both practical and would not be objectionable as it would go largely unnoticed, in some cases being just an extension of existing practices. In sausage production, the USDA already allows additions of up to 3.5% of cereal and soy flour or soy concentrate and of up to 2% of soy protein isolates. Adding 5% of plant protein to all processed meat would displace at least 1 Mt of meat, but that is only an equivalent of annual meat production of Austria.

Potential for partial substitution by extending the lean content of ground beef could be even greater: assuming that its annual global consumption is about 20 Mt, replacing just 5% of that total by plant protein would save production of 1 Mt of beef, and with better ways of adjusting for texture and taste, that share could be eventually increased to 10%, displacing 2 Mt of beef every year. If protein substitutes could eventually supply 25% of the nutrient present in 2010 in ground meat and in processed meat products, that substitution would result in net savings (after accounting for the mass of plant protein that would have to be produced or modified as a substitute) of about 75 Mt of concentrated feed, or on the order of 8% of worldwide concentrate feed production of the country’s annual meat sales that reached about $160 billion in 2010 (AMI 2012).
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brimstoneSalad
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Re: The case for adding plant proteins to ground meat

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Absolutely, cutting meat with plant protein is very important. Some of the worst anti-animal campaigns are those designed around criticizing certain fast food establishments for not having 100% real meat.

I believe I've heard some vegans fall into this trap, too, criticizing some fast food for being fake, as if that's supposed to be gross enough to turn people off meat. All it likely does is turn them onto 100% meat instead of the ~50% stuff.
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DarlBundren
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Re: The case for adding plant proteins to ground meat

Post by DarlBundren »

brimstoneSalad wrote:Absolutely, cutting meat with plant protein is very important. Some of the worst anti-animal campaigns are those designed around criticizing certain fast food establishments for not having 100% real meat.
Right.
Did you ever hear the argument in favor of cutting meat with plant protein, though? Smill's book was published some time ago and I have never heard of anyone raising the same point ever since.
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brimstoneSalad
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Re: The case for adding plant proteins to ground meat

Post by brimstoneSalad »

DarlBundren wrote: Sun May 14, 2017 2:24 pm
brimstoneSalad wrote:Absolutely, cutting meat with plant protein is very important. Some of the worst anti-animal campaigns are those designed around criticizing certain fast food establishments for not having 100% real meat.
Right.
Did you ever hear the argument in favor of cutting meat with plant protein, though? Smill's book was published some time ago and I have never heard of anyone raising the same point ever since.
I'm not sure about in that context. It's usually argued on health grounds.
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