Nov. 1st is Vegan Day

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Nov. 1st is Vegan Day

 

Thursday, 30 October 2008 GreenMuze Staff

 

 

Jun Yan Loke/iStockphoto

 

Right on the heels of Halloween comes International Vegan Day (November 1st). A day when we need to ask ourselves is there anything scarier than a factory farm? Perhaps the pus in your milk? Hormones in your meat? Or is it the growing deforestation to produce the burger you are eating?

Too often overlooked in environmental discourse is the impact of meat consumption on the planet. Whether you believe in animal rights or not, it is important to reduce your meat intake as part of reducing your ecological footprint. Numerous environmental rights’ organizations advocate for consuming at least one meat free meal a week in an effort to reduce carbon emissions. The simple fact is that a diet heavily centered on meat produces much more greenhouse gases than a vegetarian or vegan diet.

‘Meat is the most resource costly form of food because livestock waste most of the energy and protein value of their feed in digestion and bodily maintenance. More food can be obtained by using land to grow crops for direct human consumption,’ reports Compassion in World Farming (CIWF). National Institute of Livestock and Grassland Science reports that producing a kilogram of beef results in greenhouse gases with a warming potential equivalent to an estimated 36.4 kilograms of carbon dioxide.

According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), livestock production is responsible for 18% of all human induced green house gas emissions. The Union of Concerned Scientists found that animal livestock, and especially cattle, produce large quantities of methane through belching, flatulence, and dried animal waste. Methane’s contribution to climate change is significant in that it is 20 times more effective in trapping heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide over a 100-year period, reports the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

 

Peter vv