• UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    My point was that for people who can afford meat, they can already also afford the really REALLY similar plant meat

    If they don’t have a grocery store that carries it, they’re facing a time-cost that exceeds any value add. If they are unaware its on the shelf, that won’t matter. Hence the need for expanded marketing and counter-programming and public grocery stores that carry meatless alternatives front-and-center in the aisles normally reserved for giant hunks of dead animal.

    the demand is very low because few people will actually give up animal meat

    Plenty of people have given up animal meat. That’s obviously not the problem. You point to India like its a small thing. That’s 1/6th of the world’s population.

    The demand for rice and beans isn’t low. The demand for tofu isn’t low. It’s a $500M market that’s slated to hit $800M in the next five years. When the economic incentives are there, people take them. So long as we subsidize meat, they won’t bother.

    It is much easier in theory to simply pick a different product at a store

    Not under the deluge of agricultural propaganda or the pride of place certain foods take relative to others. Hell - and I can’t believe this continues to bare mentioning - not all grocery stores carry the same foods. Not all communities have grocery stores. Addressing this deficit goes a long way towards shifting dietary habits.

    One big reason why India doesn’t have a big consumption habit with meat is that Indian groceries don’t stock meat. Pretending there’s a choice to have beef in a Hindu society or bacon in an orthodox Muslim one is delusional.