I was in the Doctor’s office the other day (which is a very unusual place for me- my husband had too much fun over the weekend and broke his leg- but that is a whole other story)…AND I came across a very interesting article in a National Geographic magazine.
The title of the article was: FOOD FOR THOUGHT-
The number of animals killed for food worldwide.
It caught my attention.
It gave the top 10 animals that are killed worldwide. Before I looked at the numbers and their order I immediately looked away and tried to guess the top 3 animals on the list. I thought I’ve heard this before (on Oprah I believe) but it turned out that I either forgot it or never heard this before…because if I were to give me a grade on this exercise it would probably be a C-.
What do you think are the top 3 animals killed for food in the world today? (Try to guess before you look below for the answers)
Let me give you some interesting info that I noticed.
- The #1 animal (the one that is killed the most) is 20 times higher in number killed than the 2nd animal on the list.
- Six of the animals I have number eaten before.
- The #4 animal on the list I had as a pet growing up- her name was cottontail.
So know that you have thought about the answer…here you go:
The #1 most killed animal in the world today is….CHICKENS. 52 billion chickens are killed every year.
The #2 animal are….DUCKS. 2.6 billion ducks are killed annually.
#3 PIGS – 1.3 billion (I remember in the movie FOOD inc. it stated that in the largest factory in America where they kill pigs- 32,000 pigs are killed every day. That number was hard for me to get a grasp on…but that is only 11 million a year in the one building. That is not even close to how many are killed worldwide).
#4 RABBITS – 1.1 billion (pretty close to the amount of pigs)
#5 TURKEYS – 633 million
#6 SHEEP – 518 million
#7 GOATS – 398 million
#8 COWS – 293 million
#9 WATER BUFFALO – 24 million
#10 CAMELS – 1.7 million
The article also made a very interesting point about ANTS, which are not part of the list, but are edible. They state at ANTS are a good source of protein and are considered a delicacy in many parts of the world. The article read that there are a million ants for every one human being on the planet- THAT’s CRAZY!
What is also crazy is how many animals are killed for human consumption. I know that if these numbers were lowered, even slightly our planet as a whole would be HEALTHIER in ALL aspects.
I hope you have a wonderful DAY!
LIFE IS GOOD!
Source: WFM 1-10