From Climate Change to Bird Flu, Is the End of Meat Near?

It’s hard to put into perspective just how big the meat industry is. An appetite for animal products is deeply ingrained in societies across the world. Pork, chicken, beef, lamb—these are everyday ingredients for billions of people everywhere. In fact, they are so popular that the global meat industry is expected to reach a staggering value of more than $2 trillion by 2030. That’s more than the GDP of Mexico. But this giant industry has a giant problem: it’s speeding towards a future where it is sabotaged by its own actions.

Could meat’s climate impact doom the entire industry?

Producing enough meat to fill the plates of billions of people every year requires a lot of resources. Research suggests that 77 percent of all agricultural land is used for livestock production, for example. The beef industry, in particular, is the world’s leading cause of deforestation and habitat destruction. Plus, raising livestock also takes up around one-third of all freshwater supplies. On top of this, animal agriculture emits monumental amounts of greenhouse gasses. According to the United Nations, livestock contributes 14.5 percent of emissions (for context, aviation emits around 2.5 percent).

All of this adds up to immense pressure on the planet. It is worsening the climate crisis, which contributes to extreme weather events all over the world, from flooding to earthquakes to fires. Take Los Angeles’ recent wildfires, for example. Experts confirmed that the intense drought conditions that led to the outbreak were made far more likely by the climate crisis. The fires had a huge human impact, displacing around 200,000 people in Los Angeles and devastating the homes of thousands.

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RELATED: It’s Not Just Eggs: 7 Other Key Foods That Could Also Disappear Soon

But this intense weather event also disrupted the meat industry. In fact, recent estimates predict the financial amount lost by farmers of all kinds in Los Angeles was around $600 million. And if one recent study is anything to go by, this could be a sign of things to come. 

According to a recent Profundo report commissioned by Friends of the Earth, major meat companies could be facing a total financial risk of up to $5.4 trillion by 2050 due to the climate crisis. As a result, the banks that fund them are also looking at a financial risk of up to $9.3 billion. However, these banks—namely Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, and Citigroup, known as the “Big Three”—could reduce this significantly by withdrawing funding from major meat companies, per the report. 

“The data is clear: climate risk is financial risk,” the report states. “By significantly curtailing or ending financing to a small number of high-emitting companies in the agricultural sector, the Big Three and any other lenders or investors in the sector can limit exposure to climate-related losses and make significant progress on their net zero commitments.” 

The conclusion from Profundo is clear: the meat industry can’t afford to go on as it is. If it does, it risks collapsing beneath the weight of its own climate impact.

Beyond climate, disease is costing the meat industry billions

The climate crisis isn’t the only example where the meat industry appears to be the architect of its own downfall. One glaring example is the ongoing bird flu crisis. 

Intensive farms cram thousands of animals together, creating an ideal breeding ground for mutating viruses, like H5N1 (bird flu). The viruses then spread rapidly between animals, resulting in a need for mass culling. Since 2022, more than 148 million birds have been culled from egg and poultry farms in the US as a result of the outbreak. The virus is also no longer just limited to birds—it has also spread to cows, another vital source of income for farmers. 

The impact of the spread is not just a loss of life, but also a loss of income for farmers everywhere. In 2023, the economic cost of animal losses was already in the $3 billion range. And in 2025, the spread is still not controlled. 

Bird flu is just one example of the types of diseases that can spread in industrialized farms. Swine flu emerged from industrialized pig farms, for example.

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A move to plants makes more sense than ever

The meat industry is unsustainable in many ways, but it is not the only way to produce food. A growing body of research suggests that a move to a plant-forward food system, particularly in the Western countries that rely on meat the most, could benefit the planet and the economy. It is, after all, a more efficient use of resources—nearly 80 percent of land is used for farm animals, and yet they supply less than 20 percent of calories worldwide. 

Plant-based foods have a significantly lower impact on the environment than animal products. Take tofu, for example. According to BBC’s Climate Change Food Calculator, eating the soy-based protein once a day for a year contributes just under 60 kilograms to a person’s annual emissions. Eating the same amount of chicken contributes nearly 500 kilograms, in contrast, while eating the same amount of beef contributes more than 2,820 kilograms. 

In 2022, one study from the University of Bonn in Germany stated that rich countries should cut meat consumption by 75 percent for the sake of the climate.

“If all humans consumed as much meat as Europeans or North Americans, we would certainly miss the international climate targets and many ecosystems would collapse,” lead researcher Matin Qaim said.

In 2024, another study, this time from the University of Oxford, suggested that transforming the food system away from business as usual could “unlock trillions of dollars in benefits.” It also suggested that the global adoption of a plant-forward diet could contribute an additional two percent per year to the global GDP. One of the study’s authors, Professor Michael Obersteiner, said: “This new analysis highlights the urgent need for global food system transformation.”