If You Only Do One Thing This Year…..

one green thing to do this year
One thing this year

Many of us make well-intentioned resolutions at the start of a new year.

If you’re like me, you don’t achieve all of them.

This year, though, there’s one resolution that will make a big difference to the environment, and greatly improve your green living. It’s a resolution that’s reasonably easy to keep throughout the year, and one that’s really important.

What is this one, special resolution?

If you eat meat – especially beef – please eat less of it.

Did you notice, I’m NOT saying stop eating beef (unless you want to of course). Just reduce the quantity you eat. Be mindful.

Consider vegetarian or chicken meals instead of beef when you’re eating at home and eating out.  It’s now easier than ever to find interesting, tasty vegetarian options in restaurants and in recipe books, and easy to find interesting fresh produce in supermarkets and farmers markets.

Why is it so important to cut back on beef?

Sustainable Meat Pastured Cattle
Factory farms don’t look like this!

Industrial animal agriculture or factory farming has been good for meat prices – more people can afford to buy more meat today than ever before. And it’s also good for large corporations who invest massively in their bid to control the food supply.

But factory farms also cause huge problems:

  • Greenhouse gas emissions:  Animals, especially cows, produce methane as a by-product of digestion. Methane that escapes into the atmosphere is 84 times more potent than CO2. The sheer volume of animals in factory farms creates massive emissions and waste products.
  • Local water quality is affected by large quantities of manure and antibiotics.
  • Environmental degradation: it takes far more grain and land to produce a calorie of food for humans by feeding grains to animals than directly to people. That means more destruction of grasslands and forests for farming, more tractors burning fuel, and more pesticides seeping into the groundwater.
  • Animal cruelty: Animals in factory farms do not lead healthy lives and their “processing” is deliberately highly efficient in order to contain costs, rather than humane.
avoid food from factory farms to avoid waste
Aerial photo of Tascosa Factory Farm in Texas by Mishka Henner. Cattle live in the rectangular lots or yards, waste products feed into a ‘lagoon’. Hopefully this ‘lagoon’ never leaks.

A new report from the National Academy of Sciences suggests that we have been vastly underestimating livestock’s contribution to global greenhouse gas emissions. As the Associated Press notes, that means America’s methane might contribute as much to climate change as its entire transportation sector. Some of that comes from by-products of fossil fuel extraction, such as fracking, but most of it currently comes from animals.

This is a growing problem, as meat consumption has risen steadily in rich countries and now developing nations are catching up. In all, the world’s total meat consumption in 2018 was 346 million tons, compared to 71 million tons in 1961. It is expected to double again by 2050.

 

global meat consumption

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beef has the highest carbon footprint of any meat, so it makes sense to cut back on consumption. If you want to eat beef, try to find local, organic or grass-fed beef. It will cost more – but it tastes better.

Poultry has a lower carbon footprint than beef, and of course vegetables much lower still.

A healthier lifestyle and a less polluted planet.

What price your health, the survival of the planet and a happier animal?

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Editor’s Note – This article has been updated with more recent information.


Tags

beef, factory farms, green living, greenhouse gases, methane


  • I think I am doing my bit here – red meat typically two to three times a week only – not bad for a confirmed carnivore. Oh, and a few veggies which I never used to eat.

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