T5 Adapters — Calex Global

What is changing?

Agriculture accounts for an estimated 14% of Greenhouse Gases; land use changes such as deforestation and soil degradation cause an additional 17%, according to the FAO. As a result, there are strong calls to include agriculture within the next round of climate change discussions. Elsewhere, meat production alone is estimated to be responsible for 18% of Greenhouse Gas emissions, with the far more damaging methane being a large component of that.

In 1961 global meat supply was an estimated 71 million tonnes; by 2007 that had risen to 264 million tonnes. Total global consumption is expected to double by 2050 – for a variety of reasons: increased wealth- especially in emerging economies, population growth and changes in per capita consumption. In many western countries per capita meat consumption already far exceeds recommended levels causing additional problems such as heart disease and obesity.

Reducing meat consumption is therefore being recommended as a way of not just reducing global warming, but also the costs of meeting the target of maintaining Green house gases at 450 parts per million.

Why is this important?

Meat production requires up to five times more grain – and attendant land, water and fertiliser use – to produce the same level of calories as from grain direct. Halving meat consumption would, according to one study, reduce emissions more than if we halved car use; according to another moving to a meat free diet by 2030 would free up land the size of Russia and Canada combined for other uses, including carbon sequestration.

If meat’s global warming impacts receive attention, so too may other environmental impacts such as water use, effluent and high levels of antibiotics. Concern about conditions in intensive chicken farms recently changed buying patterns in the UK; if other forms of intensive farming, which have kept prices down for so long, come under greater scrutiny, we may see the beginnings of a shift there too. We may also see a greater questioning of how farming is funded or the nature of country side and landscape. Concerns about food security may drive the debate further up public agenda.

Such debates may also stimulate innovation to find new solutions: new technologies to create new forms of meat; or animals which produce less methane; and better meat substitutes.

As the saying goes, there is no such thing as a free lunch; for too long we may have paid no attention to the wider environmental costs of our food. The time to pay the bill in higher prices, lower consumption and changed production methods may have arrived.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 21st, 2009 at 12:51 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.