Beyond Beef: Rise and Fall of the Cattle Culture - Softcover

How many hamburger lovers realize that a single boneless beefsteak requires more than 1,000 gallons of precious water to produce, that livestock now consume nearly one-third of the world's grain, or that cattle play a central role in species extinction? Taking us from ancient Sumer to the automated factory feedlots, Jeremy Rifkin interweaves anthropology, history, sociology, economics, health and ecology in an examination and indictment of the cattle culture that has come to shape the warp of our society. He depicts a world in which the poorer peoples have been starved to support the beef addiction of a handful of wealthy nations - an addiction that has resulted in millions of deaths from heart attacks, cancer and strokes. He also describes the grim ecological effects of the cattle culture: rain forests burned, fertile plains turned into desert, a climate threatened by global warming.