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Definition of Eating Lower on the Food Chain

Humans are at the top of the food chain, meaning we eat just about all manners of things including animals, vegetables and other foods both natural and processed. Because of growing environmental and health concerns regarding the demands of the standard human diet, which require large, industrial farms and the over-consumption of unhealthy products, there is an idea that eating lower on the food chain can promote health both for the self and for the planet.

  1. The Food Chain

    • The food chain is a sequence that begins with a species on which no other species feed. The chain traces the links to what that species feeds on and what that next species feeds on and so on, and ends with a species that feeds on no other species. For example, in certain lake environments birds eat the large fish, the large fish eat the smaller fish, the smaller fish eat crustaceans and the crustaceans eat algae and plankton. In almost all situations, humans are considered at the top of the food chain as we feed on practically every species while no species feeds on us.

    Lowering the Food Chain

    • Humans have diets heavily based on other animals, most of which could be considered higher in the food chain since they, too, must feed on something else. The concept of eating lower on the food chain is to skip the species in the upper or middle portions of the food chain and feed on those toward the bottom or those which do not feed on other species.

    Effect

    • Basically, because animals, such as cows, pigs, chickens and predatory animals are considered higher on the food chain, eating lower on the food chain may involve consuming fruits, nuts, vegetables and other non-meat products on which these other species also feed on. In a nut shell, eating lower on the food chain means consuming fewer animal products, bypassing the higher species and instead eating what those species eat. Instead of eating a cow, for example, eat what a cow eats.

    Benefits

    • Proponents of eating lower on the food chain claim the practice leads to consuming a greater variety of foods, a less-expensive diet as vegetables are often less expensive than meat), consumption of less saturated fats and reduced risk to eating contaminated food. Similarly, because raising livestock requires land and produces waste, eating lower on the food chain is said to be better for the environment in terms of land use and pollution.

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