Source: MEATINGPLACE, 12/5/13

Human consumption of meat has risen over the past century, fueled by changing diets in China and India, but the shift places people only at the same level as omnivores such as anchovies and pigs, French researchers found.

The study, published online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, used national data from 1961 through 2009 on the human food supply from the Food and Agricultural Organization that covered 98.1 percent of the world’s population.

The researchers found a 3 percent rise in the global median human trophic level — a measure of animals’ diets that lets researchers make comparisons among the various species. The scale ranges between 1 for plants to 5.5 for carnivorous apex predators such as polar bears and killer whales.

On this scale, humans have seen a rise in meat consumption to an average of 2.21 since 1961. By country, national levels ranged from 2.04 to 2.57.

North America, North and Eastern Europe, Australia and New Zealand had higher levels until 1990, when they began to decrease. An increasing trend was seen in China and India, plus other countries in Asia, Africa and South America.

A trophic level had never before been calculated for humans.

“In the global food web, we discover that humans are similar to anchovy or pigs and cannot be considered apex predators,” the researchers said.

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