Cattle ranching is a major cause of rainforest destruction in Central and South America. Ranchers slash and burn rainforests to grow grass pasture for cattle. Once the cattle have grazed sufficiently, they are slaughtered and exported to industrialized countries, including the United States, to be made into fast food hamburgers and frozen meat products.

It has been estimated that for every quarter pound hamburger made from rainforest cattle, fifty-five square feet of rainforest was cleared&emdash;an area equal to the size of a small kitchen. Additionally, clearing fifty-five square feet of rainforest releases five hundred pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, which contributes to climate change.

Since the soil of the rainforest is low in nutrients (most rainforest nutrients are found in the biomass above), after a few years of growing grass or other crops, the soil cannot sustain life further and it becomes a barren wasteland. As a result, additional rainforest is cleared and converted into cattle pasture.

Because the United States is the single largest consumer of Central American beef, one could say that Americans are literally eating the rainforest into extinction. One simple way to help save the rainforests is to eat less beef. If every American reduced their beef consumption by only half, there would be no need to destroy the rainforest for cattle pasture.

While fast food giants often claim they do not use rainforest beef in their hamburgers, in many cases this is not true. Do you know whether fast food chains use New Zealand beef in their hamburgers?