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Defending Beef
- The Case for Sustainable Meat Production
- Narrated by: Nicolette Hahn Niman
- Length: 10 hrs and 39 mins
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Defending Beef
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Summary
For decades, it has been nearly universal dogma among environmentalists and health advocates that cattle and beef are public enemy number one. But is the matter really so clear cut? Hardly, argues environmental lawyer turned rancher Nicolette Hahn Niman in her new book, Defending Beef.
The public has long been led to believe that livestock, especially cattle, erode soils, pollute air and water, damage riparian areas, and decimate wildlife populations. In Defending Beef, Hahn Niman argues that cattle are not inherently bad for either the Earth or our own nutritional health. In fact, properly managed livestock play an essential role in maintaining grassland ecosystems by functioning as surrogates for herds of wild ruminants that once covered the globe.
Hahn Niman argues that dispersed, grass-fed, small-scale farms can and should become the basis for American food production, replacing the factory farms that harm animals and the environment. The author - a longtime vegetarian - goes on to dispel popular myths about how eating beef is bad for our bodies. She methodically evaluates health claims made against beef, demonstrating that such claims have proven false. She shows how foods from cattle - milk and meat, particularly when raised entirely on grass - are healthful, extremely nutritious, and an irreplaceable part of the world’s food system.
Grounded in empirical scientific data and with living examples from around the world, Defending Beef builds a comprehensive argument that cattle can help to build carbon-sequestering soils to mitigate climate change, enhance biodiversity, help prevent desertification, and provide invaluable nutrition. Defending Beef is simultaneously a book about big ideas and the author’s own personal tale - she starts out as a skeptical vegetarian and eventually becomes an enthusiastic participant in environmentally sustainable ranching.
While no single book can definitively answer the thorny question of how to feed the Earth’s growing population, Defending Beef makes the case that, whatever the world’s future food system looks like, cattle and beef can and must be part of the solution.
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Critic reviews
“[T]he former environmental lawyer and now rancher Nicolette Hahn Niman … has now collected her thoughts in the elegant, strongly argued Defending Beef.” (Corby Kummer, The Atlantic, Best Food Books of 2014)
"Defending Beef is full of important insights and information, things anyone who cares about food and agriculture, including vegetarians, ought to know.” (Edward Behr, editor and publisher of The Art of Eating)
"I have long wished for a single compilation with all the scientific evidence that counters the charges of the anti-beef propagandists. Well, now we have it. It’s Defending Beef, The Case for Sustainable Meat Production by Nicolette Hahn Niman.” (Allan Nation, The Stockman Grass Farmer)
What listeners say about Defending Beef
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Jacky Pratt
- 26-06-19
Superb, factual, laden with research
This is written by a vegetarian - yes, she is still a vegetarian, but she sees complete justification in humans eating meat, particularly beef. But there is a big BUT: this beef must be from cattle grazed on grass/rangelands. She is justifiably against intensive/confined animal farming and she provides much evidence as to how damaging this is to the planet. She gives a comprehensive history of grazing, before land was taken over for mass agriculture. Much land is only suited to grazing and thus can only be used to generate food for humans by having grazing animals convert the grass to meat. What I found astounding was the evidence that grazing by animals could be a necessary saviour of the planet's soil! Their impact on soil is beneficial and necessary - causing the soil to be rich in nutrients and better at dealing with rain than soil that has become more like desert after years of modern agriculture. She also spends time looking at the health impact of humans eating beef versus grain and sugar - the evidence is strongly for beef and against grain as a healthy diet. She describes the damage to the environment caused by the growth, transport and processes required to feed grain to the intensively farmed animals - they are certainly gobbling resources. I am sure many will criticise her book - this is a emotive subject. But I believed her - she quoted so much extensive research that it seemed utterly crazy that we are now being sternly told we must stop eating anything from animals. The evidence is that this is a complex subject and that if we all stopped eating animal products, this would create more (and bigger) problems than it would solve, leaving a planet totally unable to grow the food it requires.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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- Anonymous User
- 21-09-20
this book change my mind I now get meat
this book was very hard for me to read been a vegan. how ever after read it twice I came to the conclusions that it is the best interest of the natural world that I eat well rise grass feed beef
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Nick Thompson
- 18-09-21
Fabulous Book
Nicolette has done an incredible job gathering so much information and delivering it so clearly to help the world come to terms with the destruction of modern industrial agriculture. She explained that not only is eating beef okay, but that cattle and other remanence are essential parts of a mixed farming future. Small-scale local farming involving plants and animals is the only thingWhich is going to protect the human race from destroying itself through soil erosion.
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
- Kindle Customer
- 30-05-22
Better when she sticks to her areas of expertise
The writer is very convincing when she talks about environmentalism and farming. Where it falls apart are the long passages on diet, evolutionary biology and history. For instance, she buys into the idea that pre industrial tribes eat lots of meat in their "natural" states, where they also don't get cancer, heart disease etc. Neither are true, and the latter is a racist idea that lead to colonial and missionary doctors not treating obvious cancers.
People with historical knowledge know that diets through history have varied enormously, and involved far less meat than the author assumes. She also equates carbs and sugar in a very sneaky way. I did find myself wondering who, exactly, is saying that sugar is *good*. People don't obey the food guidelines!
The shame is that the bad parts suffocate the better parts, and make me doubt the better parts. In many ways, it comes across as one part of the food industry taking shots at a rival part.
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Overall1 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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- japlah
- 04-11-21
To beef or not to beef
Which herd to belong to if you must ? Presumably she couldnt help herself from being suc h a lawyer presenting a case to a judge. The "forensic" style confuses the arguments as there is no true independent rigorous and comparive science behind her conjectures. She might get to "win" the case for the moment but it will readily be overturned as more understand and report the real and measured affects. The proof is in the pudding and not the many words and postures whirling about. As a carnivore who loves beef I wish I could be convinced that munching on munching cows is environmenrally acceptable. But in the light of all the other ravages we continue around this one planet ?
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