We can save the planet from climate change and forest destruction - and can produce enough food for everyone without factory farming, new research from Friends of the Earth and Compassion in World Farming shows.
A report, Eating the Planet?, published this week, as world leaders prepare for the FAO World Summit on food security, reveals that enough food can be produced to feed the growing world population with fairer and healthier diets whilst avoiding deforestation and animal cruelty.
It states that continuing to eat more meat and dairy globally – the production of which already generates more climate-changing emissions than all of the world’s transport – will push the world’s climate and resources over the edge. Despite pushes from agribusiness to intensify farming to feed a growing global population that is expected to reach over nine billion by 2050, the researchers found that a diet equivalent to eating meat three times a week would allow forests to remain untouched, animals to be farmed in free-range conditions and greener farming methods to be used.
With as many people obese in the west as malnourished in poor countries – roughly a billion of each – distributing protein more fairly is also an opportunity to tackle global health problems, the report points out. But feeding the world in a planet-friendly way means there will be little room to grow biofuel crops for cars – feeding people must come first. Compassion in World Farming and Friends of the Earth are calling on Ministers to switch support from factory farming to planet-friendly and humane methods.
The groups also want the Government to take action to measure and reduce the impact of the UK’s meat and dairy production and consumption – and to switch subsidies from intensive to planet-friendly and humane farming.
Clare Oxborrow, senior food campaigner at Friends of the Earth, said: “It’s amazing news that we can feed a rapidly expanding population without trashing the planet – and still eat meat several times a week.
With as many obese as malnourished people in the world, fairer and healthier lower-meat diets are a win-win for people and the planet.”
She continues, “The Government has already backed a major scientific study that calls for a move away from intensive production – it’s time it stopped spending public money on it and got behind planet-friendly farming instead.”
Lasse Bruun, Head of Campaigns at Compassion in World Farming, said: “It’s great to see that we can actually do without factory farming and still eat meat, just by cutting down the amount we consume. With 60 billion animals being reared for livestock production every year and the figure set to double by 2050, we really need to re-consider our approach to farming.
“Animals are being reared like factory units to provide us with cheap meat. The true cost of eating too much meat is animal suffering, deforestation and obesity. We have the power to save our planet and be kind to animals. All we need to do is change our diets to a healthier and fairer option.”
SUSTAINABLE FOOD GUIDELINES
Currently, one third of the world’s cereal crop goes to feed the 60 billion farm animals reared every year to produce meat, eggs and dairy products – the majority of them on factory farms. With increasing strain on the world’s natural resources and millions of people unable to feed themselves, it’s unsustainable and morally questionable to continue rearing so many farm animals in such intensive systems and feeding them crops which could be used for human needs.
Not only that, factory farming produces large amounts of waste (often polluting local water sources) and increases the risk of spreading animal disease.
Eat higher welfare
Higher welfare animal products cause less animal suffering. Buying them will encourage investment in higher welfare farming which is smaller scale and poses fewer risks to animals, people and the planet.
Eat less
Eating less meat, dairy and eggs reduces the environmental impact of animal farming and improves human health.
Most people in the west eat more protein than they need. The saturated fat in many meat and dairy products can be harmful to good health and may contribute to obesity, type-2 diabetes and heart disease. Global cancer experts say red meat can be a factor in certain cancers and that processed meats should be avoided.
Farm animal production is responsible for 18% of the greenhouse gases which we produce – more than transport at 14%. Another good reason for eating less.
Meat and dairy production also use huge amounts of cereals and soya grown for animal feed and, that most precious and increasingly scarce global resource, water. As Dr Pachauri, Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has said, “Please eat less meat. Meat is a very carbon-intensive commodity.”
Eating less and eating only higher welfare products is a positive step which Compassion encourages you to make.
Going vegetarian or vegan
Cutting out meat or all animal products is obviously a fantastic way to reduce animal suffering and the impact animal production has on the environment. However, if you choose to be a veggie remember to look for higher welfare dairy and egg products.
Melissa Corkhill is the editor of The Green Parent magazine, mother of two and author of the book Green Parenting
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