Well, wouldn’t you know it, there's an article by Bryan Walsh in Time magazine that talks about one of the main causes of global warming – meat consumption. According to the article, "Meat: Making Global Warming Worse," the chief of the UN Intergovernmental on Climate Change (IPCC), a co-recipient of the Nobel Prize with former US Vice President Al Gore in 2007, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri publicly encouraged people to cut back on their meat consumption to save the planet. Interviewed by Britain’s Observer newspaper, Dr. Pachauri said, “Give up meat for one day [per week] at least initially, and decrease it from there.”
Hallelujah. People of planet Earth, there is something we can do as individuals to help stop global warming in its track – cut down our meat consumption. Better yet, go veg to save the planet. The diligent scientists at IPCC have already done the homework. They did the math and presented the data to us in their report Livestock’s Long Shadow that was released in 2006. According to the report, the entire process involved in the production of meat worldwide generates 18% of the planet’s greenhouse gas emission. A factor to consider is that forests are destroyed to create grazing land for these poor animals that will end up as “dead meat” on our dinner table. According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), approximately 70% of the planet’s former forest has been converted to grazing land.
Good God! Seventy percent of the planet’s forest - gone! Do you know how many decades and possibly hundreds of years it takes for a tree to mature and become efficient in absorbing CO2 and gives us that good clean air that we depend on as a human race? Yes, oxygen, that’s right. Aside from all this CO2 stockpiling in our Earth’s atmosphere, there’s nitrous oxide, a greenhouse gas that is 296 times the warming effect of CO2! Oh, where does nitrous oxide comes into the equation you ask? From all the manure excreted by those cows that are being raised for meat consumption. Oh, this is getting better. A cow’s flatulence, that’s right, its fart, is also damaging to our planet Earth. The methane gas produces by the cows is 23 times the warming impact of CO2!
Ladies and gentlemen, readers of planet Earth, we know one of the culprits that causes climate change and that is the eating of meat. But, thanks heaven that there is a simple solution, and it requires a little bit of sacrifice from each one of us - cut back on our meat consumption. Like Dr. Pachauri said, start with cutting back eating meat one day a week and gradually cut back to 2, 3, or even four days a week. For the sake of saving our planet, the sacrifice is worth it. Otherwise, if things continue the way it is and if each one of us doesn’t take responsibility for saving our planet, then there may not be a planet for us to live on. Think about it.
