section_path: Consumption/Historical
section_name: Historical
paragraph_text: Historical
  
  A bioarchaeological (specifically, isotopic analysis) study of early medieval England found, based on the funerary record, that high-meat protein diets were extremely rare, and that (contrary to previously held assumptions) elites did not consume more meat than non-elites, and men did not consume more meat than women.
  
  In the nineteenth century, meat consumption in Britain was the highest in Europe, exceeded only by that in British colonies. In the 1830s consumption per head in Britain was about 34 kilograms (75 lb) a year, rising to 59 kilograms (130 lb) in 1912. In 1904, laborers consumed 39 kilograms (87 lb) a year while aristocrats ate 140 kilograms (300 lb). There were some 43,000 butcher's shops in Britain in 1910, with "possibly more money invested in the meat industry than in any other British business" except finance. The US was a meat importing country by 1926.
  
  Truncated lifespan as a result of intensive breeding allows more meat to be produced from fewer animals. The world cattle population was about 600 million in 1929, with 700 million sheep and goats and 300 million pigs.