Pjflg 30—Corn Talk, Lancaster Farming, Saturday, October 14, 1995
Uses Of Grains, Other Resources For Beef Production
UNIVERSITY PARK
(Centre Co.) —Livestock, beef
cattle paiticulaily, are often
accused of using grains and
other resources that should be
directly consumed by the
human population.
Following are some points to
consider in determining the
efficiency of using these
resources through the U. S. beef
cattle industry.
• Raising beef is an efficient
use of our natural resources.
Only through ruminant (four
stomach), grazing animals can
Facts From NCGA’s
‘The World Of Corn 1995’
State Com Production 1994
Million Bushels
1,000 Bushels
lowa*’
Illinois*’
Nebraska*’..
Minnesota*’.
Indiana’
Ohio*’
Wisconsin*’
South Dakota*’,
Kansas*’
Missouri*’
Michigan*’
Texas*’
Kentucky**
Colorado*’
Source USDA/National Agricultural
Statistics Service
• denotes states with com checkoff
‘ denotes NCCA member state
we harvest food from most ot
the more than 800 million acres
of range and pasture land in the
U. S. At least 85 percent of
these lands are too high, too
rough, too dry, or too wet to
grow cultivated crops. The
availability of grazing cattle
more than doubles the U. S.
land area that can be used to
produce plants for food
puiposes.
• Approximately 85 percent
of the nutrients consumed by
cattle come from non-grain
sources—feedstuffs not edible
, 1,930,400 Pennsylvania’
,1,786,200 North Carolina*’
,1,153,700 New York’
~..915,900 Tennessee’
....858,240 Georgia’
....486,500 North Dakota*’..
....437,100 Maryland*’
....367,200 Louisiana*
....304,590 Virginia*’
....273,700 Mississippi’
....260,910 South Carolina’...
....238,680 California
....156,160 Alabama*
....133,500 Washington
by humans. These feedstuffs
include grass, roughage, food
processing by-products and
crop residue. The grain that
cattle do eat is produced speci
fically to meet this need and
would not be grown if the
demand did not exist.
• Less than half of the dry
matter produced by grain crops
is edible by humans. Millions
of tons of nutrients would be
wasted to say nothing of
waste disposal problems—if it
were not for the fact that lives
.123,600 Delaware.
.81,900 Oklahoma
.68,440 New Mexico
.66,120 Arkansas
.57,240 New Jersey
.54,000 Florida
.46,020 Wyoming
.35,190 Idaho
.34,300 West Virginia
.30,500 Oregon,
.29,325 Utah
.28,050 Montana
.24,960 Arizona
.19,425 TOTAL..
tock can make use of food pro
cessing by-products and crop
residues like com stalks.
• If grain were not fed to
livestock, more grain would not
necessarily be available to feed
the hungry. The U. S. continues
to produce more grain than can
readily be sold. For most of the
last three decades, U.S. grain
surpluses have increased, even
with an expanding animal agri
culture. That is why acreage
reduction has been part of of the
government grain programs.
The increase in grain supplies
has not helped alleviate world
hunger. Relief programs and/or
economic and infrastructure
development in poor countries,
providing the ability to produce
or purchase and distribute more
food, are needed to help solve
hunger problems.
• Energy use is not an issue
when it comes to cattle produc
tion. The beef industry con
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sumes less than one half of one
percent of total U.S. fossil fuel
energy use. ,
• More than 80 percent of the
total energy involved in food
production, processing, and
preparation is used after food
leaves the farm. Because many
plant-source foods require
large amounts of energy in the
processing phase, the overall
energy efficiency of beef often
is comparable, or even super
ior, to the energy efficiency of
plant-source foods.
How we manage our resour
ces is vitally important for our
nation’s future. The beef indus
try nationally and in 30 states
(soon to include Pennsylvania)
is increasing efficiency of
resource use through programs
such as Integrated Resource
Management (DRM) which also
considers improved animal
health and well-being and pro
duct wholesomeness.
/ '