Does eating beef in the U.S. lead to deforestation in places such as the Amazon? That’s an increasingly common question, to which the short answer is no.

But let’s dive into the long answer.

While the world should be concerned with the tens of thousands of wildfires that have hit the Amazon wonder, the amount of misguided rhetoric that has sprung forth is disappointing. Of the most confounding beliefs is that U.S. beef consumption is to blame for the blazes.