Cows and Climate Change
Food production is second only to transportation in terms of human greenhouse emissions, and is responsible for roughly 30% of global warming. Among the worst offenders are agricultural land use and production/use of fertilizers. According to the journal "Science," greenhouse gas emission originating from food production and consumption will likely make the world exceed its 1.5 C limit by the 2050s, as outlined in the Paris Agreement. This data even took into consideration cutting out all use of fossil fuels. Unfortunately, emissions from food production aren't completely avoidable, but there is one known solution that could make a considerable difference in reducing emissions. That being, eating less meat. Going full vegetarian is not necessarily the answer, but limiting the amount of red meat we consume on a weekly basis. Replacing it with vegetables or meats like chicken and fish will help reduce greenhouse gas effects caused from the deforestation used to make cow pastures and land to grow crops for livestock, as well as reduce the amount of fertilizer used to grow said crops. More environmentally friendly farming practices would also help out, but the most effective way to reduce food related climate change is to follow the Chick-fil-A slogan and eat more chicken!... or just less cows in general, whatever floats your boat.
As we learned in class, tress play a huge role in the carbon cycle- thus deforestation is a huge contributor of increased carbon/greenhouse gas emissions. To make things worse, not only does the productiona and consumption of food contribute to climate change, a lot of people tend to waste their food, meaning all the work and enivornmental harm that went into growing, raising, and creating that food was all for nothing. Larger and more wealthy nations are especialy guilty of this, and often consume massive amount of meat. In fact, while in the process of writing this blog post, my boyfriend texted me to say he had gone out to eat and gotten a triple hamburger for lunch. He only ate half and took the rest home because it was too much. Of course I laughed at the irony of the situation, but in all seriousness, Americans often eat red meat too much and I don't think it would hurt anyone to eat just one hamburger a week instead of two. Needless to say, I shall be advising my boyfriend to order only a double next time, and I suggest anyone who reads this considers cutting back their intakr of red meat as well.
Link: https://insidescience.org/news/third-global-greenhouse-gas-emissions-tied-food
Interesting, I never knew just how much fertilizers and other farming techniques harmed the environment. However, I think that the problem will not be solved by eating "just on hamburger a week", as this is simply too much to ask for. Many people will not be able to do this, will not care, or will never hear of the objective, and therefore there will be little change.
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