> Animals are a VERY thermodynamically inefficient way of converting plants to ‘high quality proteins’.
That would be pertinent if they were eating the same foods, but they don't eat the same foods. They eat the stuff we won't eat, produced largely either as a byproduct of the production of the foods we do eat or produced on lands that cannot support the foods we eat.
The more efficient we get in producing plants to eat, the more efficient byproducts there are for animals to eat, so you get a continuous relationship of meat becoming cheaper as other foods become cheaper. Economies of scale can only get you so far when the raw material inputs are your main cost centre.
The industry will have to move towards using those 'waste' products in order to be competitive, but at that point you're essentially just replicating animal processes and you're up against a 'machine' doing the same that has had millions of years to develop itself.
That would be pertinent if they were eating the same foods, but they don't eat the same foods. They eat the stuff we won't eat, produced largely either as a byproduct of the production of the foods we do eat or produced on lands that cannot support the foods we eat.
The more efficient we get in producing plants to eat, the more efficient byproducts there are for animals to eat, so you get a continuous relationship of meat becoming cheaper as other foods become cheaper. Economies of scale can only get you so far when the raw material inputs are your main cost centre.
The industry will have to move towards using those 'waste' products in order to be competitive, but at that point you're essentially just replicating animal processes and you're up against a 'machine' doing the same that has had millions of years to develop itself.