• Raising animals for food causes more water pollution in the United States than any other industry because animals raised for food produce 130 times the excrement of the entire human population: 87,000 pounds per second! Much of the waste from factory farms and slaughterhouses flows into streams and rivers, contaminating water sources.
• Each vegetarian saves an acre of trees every year! More than 260 million acres of U.S. forest have been cleared to grow crops to feed animals raised for meat, and another acre of trees disappears every eight seconds. The tropical rain forests are also being destroyed to create grazing land for cattle. Fifty-five square feet of rain forest may be razed to produce just one quarter-pound burger.
• Of all raw materials and fossil fuels used in the United States, more than one-third is used to raise animals for food. Producing a single hamburger patty uses enough fossil fuel to drive a small car twenty miles and enough water for seventeen showers.
• Of all agricultural land in the United States, 87 percent is used to raise animals for food. That’s 45 percent of the total land mass of the United States.
• More than half the water consumed in the United States is used to raise animals for food. It takes 2,500 gallons of water to produce a pound of meat, but only 25 gallons to produce a pound of wheat. A totally vegetarian diet requires 300 gallons of water per day, whereas a meat- eating diet requires more than 4,000 gallons of water per day.
• In the United States, animals raised for food are fed more than 80 percent of the corn we grow and more than 95 percent of the oats. The worlds cattle alone consume a quantity of food equal to the caloric needs of 8.7 billion people- more than the earth’s entire human population

- PETA Vegetarian Starter Kit