Eco online

By Dr Valerie Lewis, President of the Sunshine Coast Environment Council

Our focus on meat consumption has been at the expense of the environment. Image greghardwick.com.au

In 2006, an important paper by the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization entitled “Livestock’s Long Shadow” was released and then almost completely ignored by the world’s media.

In it, the contribution of the world’s livestock agribusiness, including dairy and eggs was shown to be 18 per cent of total greenhouse gases. It stated that animal industries are one of “the most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global.”

I first heard about this stunning information in a speech given by Prof Ian Lowe at the Greenhouse at the Woodford Folk Festival. Prof Lowe wondered how anyone could call themselves an environmentalist and still eat meat. He told us that we could help the planet more by reducing, or better still giving up eating animal products than just about anything else we could do as individuals.

Most people, even committed environmentalists, when they hear this factual assertion develop the mental equivalent of eye-glazing. No-one wants to think about changing their dietary habits to help the planet. We don’t mind to change what light globes we use, or watch our water consumption, turn off lights, use solar hot water, and pay for green electricity. But give up eating meat?

Alright, you might ask, so livestock agribusiness contributes a huge amount to greenhouse gases, but how does that affect population issues?

Starting with Australia, according to the CSIRO, over 90 per cent of land degradation is caused by animal industries. Over farming and over grazing will inevitably result in erosion and loss of habitat, and nearly half of our continent is used for grazing. As a result, our forests are cleared and topsoil is lost.

In addition to this, the amount of water used to produce a kilogram of meat is twenty times the amount used to produce a kilogram of plant food. And most plant food grown here and in the rest of the world is used to feed livestock.

According to the UN report we grow enough plant food (edible grain, soy etc) to feed 50 per cent more than is needed for every person in the world. But most of it is used to grow animals which has driven up the price of grain to where it is affordable only in affluent countries.

The report states  “Livestock now consume more edible protein than they provide. In fact, livestock now consume 77 million tonnes of protein contained in feed stuff that could potentially be used for human nutrition, whereas only 58 million tonnes of protein are contained in food products that animals supply.”

Some simple maths thus tells us that in terms of providing protein nutrition, growing livestock results in a large net loss, sufficient to feed the world.

Another factor that affects the world population is the diseases and the parasites contained in animals and in particular the dense crowding of animal populations jammed into small spaces. The occurrence of various worrying pandemic influenza strains have invariably been traced to such situations. On top of that, the pollution, even in advanced countries, of waterways due to livestock is a major concern.

The UN report stated that even in the United States, livestock is responsible for 32 per cent  of nitrogen, and 33 per cent of phosphorus loads going in to fresh waterways, and 37 per cent of pesticides are used for growing livestock.

The impact of such factors on world health and hence sustaining human life is worsening as this industry continues to grow.

They also point out that the loss of biodiversity and extinction of species that is caused by livestock agribusiness also detracts from the potential for poorer countries to benefit from other livelihoods such as eco-tourism.

The UN report does attempt to supply a few answers to these major problems. It recommends that livestock only be grown in such a way as to be environmentally sustainable.

With respect to the use of the planet’s grasslands for livestock, “It  must adjust itself to deliver landscape maintenance, biodiversity protections, clean water and eventual carbon sequestration rather than only production of conventional livestock commodities…Mastering the political will to implement these steps obviously hinges on the question: what relative value we assign to the environment, compared to other objectives such as the provision of livelihoods or the cheap supply of animal products?”

The report does see some hope for the future in the growing tendency to seek organic produce and the rapidly increasing trend of vegetarianism and healthier diets in developed countries. And there is a quiet, but steady movement in such initiatives as co-operative permaculture gardening, “meatless Mondays” and in the admonishments by the medical establishment that we all need to increase our plant consumption and reduce animal protein.

Professor Lowe’s speech led me to read the UN report and other facts about the negative influence that meat eating is having not only on our environmental health, but on that of the world’s population in general. I would encourage you to do the same.

You can find it at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations website, and it is a startling but edifying read.

So go green and go veg!

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