Combat Global Warming – Eat Vegan
Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of the Humane Society of the US blogged about "Your Plate, Your Planet" (in other words, what you eat affects the environment) tonight. It's something I ranted about a few times over the summer. Eating lower on the food chain is a very effective tool to reduce our individual carbon-footprints. Apparently, this is still such an unpopular choice that we're looking for a high-tech solution, rather than go the easy route and reduce our meat consumption.
Meat consumption is expected to double, across the global, between 2000 and 2050. Yikes!
Farm emissions, one of the major contributors to global warming, will be one of the main topics discussed in Poznan, Poland as 187 nations gather for talks on a new treaty to help combat global warming.
In releasing its latest figure on emissions last month, United Nations climate officials cited agriculture and transportation as the two sectors that remained most “problematic.”
“It’s an area that’s been largely overlooked,” said Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, head of the Nobel Prize-winning United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. He says people should eat less meat to control their carbon footprints. “We haven’t come to grips with agricultural emissions.” -- Source NY Times
Hopefully there will be some forward progress towards a reduction in the number of animals being produced for food. Perhaps Mr. Pacelle and the HSUS will take on this challenge after their successful campaign to get Proposition 2 passed in California. Or maybe the skyrocketing cost of food will drive more people to consider the cheaper alternative of vegetarian-based meals. Trust me people, it's not that hard to go vegan. We've been at it for almost 1½ years, and we're not going back!
For more on this topic, see our posts "More Reasons Not To Eat Meat," "Vegan Eating Trumps Eating Locally," "Climate Change and Meat Consumption -- Eat Vegan."
Related Information:
Excellent post! I’ve been telling everyone I know about how a person vegan diet uses 1/6 of the land that a meat eater does and how much better it is for our environment. You would think that there would be more of a movement to encourage less meat consumption and production but the US seems to be so routed in it’s agricultural factory farming mess that no one sees beyond it…
This is an important topic. I wrote a post here:
http://www.not-quiteright.net/tvg/2008/06/an-environmentalist-omnivore.html
and here:
http://www.not-quiteright.net/tvg/2008/06/im-curious-if-you-believe.html
Hi Vegan,
Yes, you would think there’d be a push to reduce meat consumption. But there’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes. I don’t know much about the animal industry lobbies, but I assume they’re very powerful.
It’s also a difficult concept for most people to get their heads around. Just think about when you tell people you’re going vegan… The first question tends to be, “but what do you eat?” We are conditioned to think of meat as the main component to any meal. And unless you’re in an environment that is vegan-friendly, you might never be exposed to vegan foods.
Hey Alex,
Thanks for the links. We too, love Livestock’s Long Shadow (although it is a tad dry). I particularly liked your statement, “Fuel efficient vehicles? Clean energy? Public transportation? Regulate carbon? Clean air? Pollution tax? Re-forestation? Yes! But what about that which stares you in the face every morning, noon, and night: your meal. The question is, do you really care or are you just pretending?”
For a lot of people, I believe it’s about education. There are other things out there that you can eat besides meat, but unless you do a little reading (or have access to vegan-friendly resources), you’d never know it.