Gases from animals destined for dinner plates account for nearly a quarter of all methane emissions worldwide.
Eating less meat could help slow global warming by reducing the number of livestock and thereby decreasing the amount of methane flatulence from the animals.
Livestock – predominantly cattle – are responsible for an astonishing proportion of global warming gases - 18 per cent of all emissions - which is
more greenhouse gas emissions than all the transport on earth – planes, trains, cars......
Most deforested land is used for pasture and the UN reckons the carbon released in the process takes the carbon cost of livestock up to the equivalent of 2.7 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide.
1.5 billion head of cattle on the planet and 7 billion sheep. They, together with the more modest emissions of other farm animals, produce 37% of global methane emissions which adds up to the equivalent of another 2.2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide a year.
Factor in the effects of another global warming gas - nitrous oxide, which is way more potent than even methane with 296 times the global warming power of carbon dioxide. 65% of human related emissions of nitrous oxide are from the nitrogen in animal manure. That accounts for the equivalent of another 2.2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide a year.
Add the effects of the three gases associated with farming animals and you get total emissions equivalent to 7.1 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. According to the UN report we humans are responsible for a total of the equivalent of 40 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. That’s how we got that incredible figure of 18 per cent of total emissions.
In a special energy and health series of the medical journal The Lancet, experts said people should eat fewer steaks and hamburgers. Reducing global red meat consumption by 10 percent, they said, would cut the gases emitted by cows, sheep and goats that contribute to global warming.
If people knew that they were threatening the environment by eating more meat, they might think twice before ordering a burger.
On average, in developed countries, people typically eat about 224 grams per day. But in Africa, most people only get about 31 grams a day. If the global average were 90 grams per day, that would prevent the levels of gases from speeding up climate change.
Eating less red meat would also improve health in general. Dr. John Powles, a public health expert at Cambridge University, one of the study's authors and his co-authors estimate that reducing meat consumption would reduce the numbers of people with heart disease and cancer. One study has estimated that the risk of colorectal cancer drops by about a third for every 100 grams of red meat that is cut out of your diet.
Eating less meat would also help stop the obesity epidemic in developed countries.
So why is the meat we eat so polluting?Well, first of all we need to get a sense of scale. 70% of all agricultural land is used to raise animals – that’s a third of the land surface of the entire planet. What’s more, over 30% of all cereal production goes to feed those animals.
Ruminant animals like cows and sheep produce a lot of methane as they digest their food. And methane is a powerful greenhouse gas – 23 times as powerful as carbon dioxide in trapping heat to make the earth warmer.
Furthermore, on average, it takes
1,790 litres of water to grow 1kg of wheat compared with
9,680 litres of water for 1kg of beef.
Western diets, which depend largely on meat, are really putting great pressures on the environment. Meat-eaters consume the equivalent of about 5,000 litres [1,100 gallons] of water a day compared to the 1,000-2,000 litres used by people on vegetarian diets in developing countries.
So, the conclusion,
eat less meat, help reduce the greenhouse gases, slowing down the global warming, conserve more water, and more importantly, become healthier!
That's why it's good to have 3 million vegetarians in UK. Just hope more people can cut their meat diet, if not totally... :)
