Is America Beyond Peak Meat?

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the average meat intake for Americans peaked at 184 pounds (84.5 kilograms) a person in 2004. Buy 2011, that amount dropped to 171 pounds, and projections for 2012 indicate even more of a decrease to 166 pounds per person this year. This recent trend mimics what occurred in the United States in the 1970s, when the average American's consumption of beef peaked at 91 pounds in 1976. As concerns over the effects of beef on health spiked, more consumers turned to poultry as a leaner alternative. What was once an average of a pound of poultry per month rose to a pound per month by the 1990s. That same decade, Americans began to eat more poultry by weight than beef, but now even that number is in decline.