For several decades, Americans have enjoyed paying low prices for meat at the grocery store. Unfortunately, many are unaware of the hidden costs of “cheap meat”—and when you add them up, they are substantial.

The manner in which most commercial livestock is raised is wasteful of precious resources and destructive to the environment, in some ways irreparably. In addition to the broader ecosystem, people and wildlife have been paying dearly with their health.

The documentary “Meat of the Matter” traces the trail of destruction left by the commercial meat industry.

On the brighter side, a new breed of ranchers is leading the meat revolution by returning to traditional styles of animal husbandry, farming in a manner that actually supports and restores the earth as opposed to recklessly using it up.

The US Meat Racket

Most meat in the US (beef, pork, chicken, turkey, etc.) is raised in confined animal feeding operations, or CAFOs. It’s a corporate-controlled system characterized by large-scale, centralized, low profit-margin production, processing and distribution systems.

Food production has been built around efficiency—producing more for less. Worldwide, tens of billions of animals are crammed into feedlots, where they’re tortured by unhealthy, unsanitary, and cruel conditions.

This is the “cheapest” way to raise meat, for the largest profits. Making matters worse, the government subsidizes these operations, shrewdly fleecing American taxpayers in order to keep the meat monopoly going.

Smaller American ranchers wishing to offer traditionally raised grass-fed meats, who care about quality and environmental impact, face higher operational costs and must charge a premium for their product.

Most of the grass-fed beef sold in the US—as much as 85 percent—is actually imported from Australia and New Zealand because those countries still have plentiful grasslands, as well as a climate that permits year-round grazing. As a result, Australian ranchers can sell their meat for less than American ranchers.¹