This week, the link between meat eating and climate change is all over the news. Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has discussed the effects of diet on global warming (see www.ciwf.org.uk for video of highlights talk) and recommended that people have at least one meat free meal per week. His recommendation has been a lead story in the UK all week, and is starting to make it over to the US -- it is now on Time Magazine's website and that of Fox News.
Before I share some of those links, I will express personal pleasure in some serendipitous timing: Though the Thanking the Monkey New York book launch was weeks ago, the Access Hollywood montage from it just went onto their site today and is currently the lead story on the Hollywood Green site. The video includes comments from Hal Sparks on cosmetic testing, Girlfriend's star Persia White on fashion, and from that charming Bo Duke of Hazzard, John Schneider, on the cruelty of factory farm confinement. But the longest segment is from Captain Paul Watson of Sea Shepherd, who describes what our meat laden diets are doing to the earth. Then interestingly, the video ends with Hal Sparks suggesting that if you can't go vegetarian, you should at least give up meat two days per week. It seems he and the UN's Pachauri are almost on the same page!
Please check out the Access Hollywood video at http://video.accesshollywood.com/player/?id=644261
If you give it a positive rating and comment, Access Hollywood will learn that viewers want to see and hear these animal friendly messages, and we'll see more of these kinds of segments. So please take just a moment to leave some positive feedback.
(I send a quick note of warm "positive feedback" to Tim Gorski for producing the event coverage, to Kevin Morrison for his wonderful editing -- you'll see all of Kevin's segments from the book launch at http://www.thankingthemonkey.com/nybooklaunch.php -- and to the extraordinary activist and animal friend Christopher Locke.)
The following link will take you to this week's meat and climate change story in hundreds of news outlets: http://tinyurl.com/5e8xjj You can scan through and see if your local news is among them, and please respond if it is.
The most detailed coverage appeared in the UK's Observer (the Sunday sister paper to The Guardian) on September 7. The front page story, by Juliette Jowit, is headed, "UN says eat less meat to curb global warming: Climate expert urges radical diet shift: Industry unfairly targeted - farmers." It opens:
"People should have one meat-free day a week if they want to make a personal and effective sacrifice that would help tackle climate change, the world's leading authority on global warming has told The Observer.
"Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which last year earned a joint share of the Nobel Peace Prize, said that people should then go on to reduce their meat consumption even further."
The article tells us:
"The UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation has estimated that meat production accounts for nearly a fifth of global greenhouse gas emissions. These are generated during the production of animal feeds, for example, while ruminants, particularly cows, emit methane, which is 23 times more dangerous as a global warming agent than carbon dioxide. The agency has also warned that meat consumption is set to double by the middle of the century."
Jowit ends by citing a report from the Food Climate Research Network at Surrey University which, "said vegetarian diets that included lots of milk, butter and cheese would probably not noticeably reduce emissions because dairy cows are a major source of methane, a potent greenhouse gas released through flatulence."
You'll find the full article on line at http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/sep/07/food.foodanddrink
In the same paper, a "special report" on page 18, by Robin McKie and Caroline Davies was headed, "Is our taste for Sunday roast killing the planet?: A UN expert has blamed meat eaters for visiting environmental mayhem on the world as the demand for beef drives deforestation, water scarcity, air pollution and climate change."
It opens:
"Your Sunday roast stands accused." The story tells us that Pachauri, the chairman of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, is not alone in his complaints:
"A host of campaigners have united to condemn meat-eaters for bringing environmental mayhem to the world. 'The human appetite for animal flesh is a driving force behind virtually every major category of environmental damage now threatening the human future: deforestation, erosion, fresh water scarcity, air and water pollution, climate change, biodiversity loss, social injustice, the destabilisation of communities and the spread of disease,' the Worldwatch Institute has warned."
The article details the use of fossil fuels to produce the grain that ruminant animals eat, and the damage from the fertilizer "needed to ensure cattle and other animals have sufficient food." And it tells us, "It requires four calories of plant protein to make one of chicken protein, while the ratio for pork is 17:1; for lamb, 50:1; and for beef, a staggering 54:1."
We also read, "Apart from turning grain into flesh, livestock also transforms it into methane, as flatulence" and that "the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation has concluded that nearly a fifth of all greenhouse-gas emissions come from livestock, more than from all forms of transport."
The article also discusses rainforest clearance to provide pasture for cows and for fields to grow soya beans which are then used to feed cows. We read, "Rainforests are the lungs of the Earth but we are choking them through our appetite for meat, say environmentalists."
That piece is on line at http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/sep/07/food.meat
You can send letters to The Guardian at letters@guardian.co.uk
In the US, the Los Angeles Times included an editorial, yesterday, Tuesday September 9, headed, "What's not for dinner; Will it actually be the meatless who inherit the Earth? The U.N. says eating habits must change." (Page A16.) It opens with:
"So it turns out that meatless Fridays, which for generations inflicted fish sticks and tuna casseroles on millions of school-age children, Catholic and otherwise, were actually saving the planet. The United Nations is now urging wealthy nations to make a dramatic shift in eating habits, saying the best way to curb climate change is for people to go at least one day a week without meat. "
It offers the same information as other stories, but then closes with:
"Which brings us back to individual abstinence. We're not calling for a vegan revolution, but this page has noted that a sincere personal effort to fight global warming must include a reduction in eating red meat. Were fish sticks on Fridays really that bad?"
For the answer to that, please hear what Captain Paul Watson has to say, in the Access Hollywood video linked above, about the state of our oceans! Then you can read the Los Angeles Times piece at
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-meatless9-2008sep09,0,5217684.story and send a letter to the editor, perhaps calling for that "vegan revolution," at letters@latimes.com
The Time Magazine piece, by Bryan Walsh, opens with:
"Need another reason to feel guilty about feeding your children that Happy Meal - aside from the fat, the calories and that voice in your head asking why you can't be bothered to actually cook a well-balanced meal now and then? Rajendra Pachauri would like to offer you one. The head of the U.N.'s Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Pachauri on Monday urged people around the world to cut back on meat in order to combat climate change."
Walsh comments, "So, that addiction to pork and beef isn't just clogging your arteries; it's flame-broiling the earth, too."
Walsh's Time Magazine article also offers much of the same information as the other articles, but with even more detail, for example:
"In Latin America, the FAO estimates that some 70% of former forest cover has been converted for grazing. Lost forest cover heats the planet, because trees absorb CO2 while they're alive - and when they're burned or cut down, the greenhouse gas is released back into the atmosphere."
Walsh comments, "It's true that giving up that average 176 lb. of meat a year is one of the greenest lifestyle changes you can make as an individual." But Walsh ends by suggesting that "relying on individuals to voluntarily change their behavior is nowhere near as effective as political change aimed at speeding the transition to an economy far less carbon-intensive than our current one.... your choices from the takeout menu will matter less than the choices made by those who inherit the White House next January." His point is solid, but for a reason other than the one he emphasizes. Animal advocates and environmentalists must look to candidates and parties unwilling to give massive breaks and subsidies to the meat and dairy industries, cattle ranchers, and to agribusinesses that destroy the environment.
You'll find the Time Magazine article on line at
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1839995,00.html (thanks to Sean McVity for that link)
Please click on the link -- publications take note of which stories get the most clicks -- forward it widely, and respond with a veg-friendly letter to Time Magazine at letters@Time.com
And check out the Fox News story at http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,418801,00.html
Again, please see the Google link provided above, http://tinyurl.com/5e8xjj , and find out if the story is in your paper. Please respond if it is, and if it's not, why not put it there on the letters page? Smaller papers publish a high proportion of letters they receive, some close to 100%. Why not take this opportunity to spread the word about the environmental advantages of plant based diets? Thousands of people can learn from a note you put together in a few minutes.
If you have any trouble finding the email address for a letter to your editor I am happy to help. Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Remember that shorter letters are more likely to be published. And please be sure not to use any comments or phrases from me or from any other alerts in your letters. Editors are looking for original responses from their readers.
Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn
(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)