Eating beef worse than driving an SUV
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Posted on August 29, 2007
Filed Under Justice, Global warming/Climate change, Greenhouse gas emissions, Consumer culture, Environmental disasters, Earth spirituality
Fostering Ecological Hope
Today from Margaret Swedish:
Okay, that’s what People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is saying — and they have some pretty good science to back them up. I found this story in this moring’s NY Times Business section.
Not least among those with the science to support the claim is the United Nations Food And Agriculture Organization (FAO), which issued a report indicating that:
the livestock business generates more greenhouse gas emissions than all forms of transportation combined.
Wow! That’s a lot.
But we are not surprised if this be the case. The raising and feeding of cattle wreaks absolute havoc on ecosystems, is energy intensive, supports destructive agribusiness mono-cropping, gives off huge amounts of methane — a very dangerous greenhouse gas — and helps spur wholesale bulldozing of forests to make way for cattle-grazing. (For info on how rising beef consumption is helping to destroy the Amazon rainforest, go here.)
As the world’s taste for beef grows, so does environmental devastation, including major contributions to the greenhouse gases that are warming the planet. It’s not just the gas the cows emit out there in the fields, it’s all the energy that goes into producing meat, from the slaughterhouses to the packaging plants, and all the plastic in the wrapping, and then the shipping to your grocery store.
In this article, it says that the Humane Society cites research from the University of Chicago indicating that:
“switching to a plant-based diet does more to curb global warming than switching from an S.U.V. to a Camry.”
Now Carl Pope, director of the Sierra Club, interviewed for the NYT article, doesn’t talk about stuff like this because he says it might put people off and then they would be less willing to do environmentally correct things.
We’ve been hearing stuff like this for a long time. I get very depressed at the caution of many environmental groups for this reason — while they are seeking gentle messages that will gently move people, we are running out of time for the drastic actions that need to be taken.
Maybe it’s that exchanging one gas-guzzling vehicle for a hybrid doesn’t change one’s lifestyle much, but getting off red meat does. And God help us if saving the planet means we really have to change how we live.
If, as many scientists say, we have a decade or less to make the changes that can keep irreversible and potentially fatal climate change from taking hold on this planet, then I think PETA and the Humane Society have just the right tone in this case.
And frankly, I think it a good idea to place SUVs and larger houses with cathedral ceilings on a par with tobacco smoking — more and more socially and morally unacceptable, and even offensive. We are talking about life here, as in its continuation.
But just one caution about the vegetarian thing in this article — this business about tofu. Before we get too into this soy business, can we please remember that the production of soybeans at mass levels also has ecological issues of its own. Much of the soybean production is from genetically modified organisms, 90% of the US crop goes for cattle feed, and even more soy is now being grown as a fuel alternative.
Always we need to be, as Jesus once said, wise as serpents and innocent as doves. We must remember, too, that soy cannot replace protein at the same levels as meat, so some creativity is always in order here.
I am not a strict vegetarian, though I no longer eat red meat. I have been buying cage-free eggs and poultry now-and-then, and there are ways this kind of farming is done now with minimal ecological damage. It is also important to check the tofu you buy to make sure it is organic and does not come from genetically modified seeds.
Again, there is no one panacea, but a range of approaches, just like alternative energy sources, that need to be explored.
But, Sierra Club, please, start castigating people a little — I mean, not people, but their lifestyle choices. I know that may affect some big donors, but we have to face this — the Earth cannot afford the lifestyles of the wealthy any longer, and unless they lower their footprint, you are asking the poor of our world to bear the heart-rending costs of the destruction of the planet’s ecosystems.
Technorati Tags: People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, PETA, Sierra Club, vegetarian, beef and global warming, beef consumption and destruction of forests, Human Society, carbon dioxide, methane
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4 Responses to “Eating beef worse than driving an SUV”
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You say, “I am not a strict vegetarian” when in fact you are not a vegetarian at all.
As for your “cage free” whatever:
http://www.peacefulprairie.org/freerange1.html
Right, not a vegetarian by that definition of no animal protein at all. Very little is not the same as none, and there is nothing that stirs up questions of purity like a discussion of how and what we eat.
This blog isn’t about vegetarian eating, but it is about lowering our ecological footprint on the planet. Eating as low as possible on the food chain is an essential part of that.
But this blog is also about the need to ensure adequate diets for billions of people, the majority or whom do not have access to organic plant-based food to replace protein from things like poultry, eggs or fish, or even the land to cultivate such crops. And then there are the folks I know who cannot digest soy products or wheat, an increasingly common ailment. They need protein, too.
How we will feed 9 billion people and reduce our footprint at the same time is one of the monumental challenges of this and the next generation. Meeting that challenge will be very much about what we eat and how we produce what we eat. I find solutions here no less complex than finding the right combination of alternative fuels that can get us off fossil fuels once and for all without doing any more damage.
Thanks for the link about cage-free poultry.
Margart
No animal protein at all would actually indicate a vegan diet which I am sure is quite consistent with efforts to reduce one’s ecological footprint. You state that “eating as low as possible on the food chain is an essential part of” lowering our ecological footprint on the planet. I would suggest that a vegan diet is pretty much about as low on the food chain as a human can attain.
That however is not why I have maintained a vegan diet for the last 20+ years. I simply realized long ago that nonhuman animals have interests which do not include being tortured and killed to be used as our food. It is unnecessary, unjust and inherently cruel.
I also feel that a flesh-eating environmentalist is an oxymoronic concept at best.
Regards,
Michael
I agree about the interests of nonhuman animals, but we have yet to devise a global food production system that can feed 6.5-9 billion people on a vegan diet. Part of what we need to do is reinvent that whole system, starting with the elimination of industrial agriculture.
There are parts of the world where soil erosion, desertification, and other environmental degradation have already eliminated hopes of purely local food production, much less organic production. We have to address this issue not only at the point were we actually eat — which is easy for us in affluent societies with lots of organic food stores, farmers’ markets, and co-ops — but also at the point where poverty affects the vast majority of the planet’s human population. For many such populations, a few cows, goats, or chickens are the family’s only means of survival.
Moving away from animal protein means a major commitment from rich countries to address the food production, soil conservation and restoration, technical skills, and other needs of poor communities around the world.
Thanks for commenting!