With the "eat locally grown food" movement on the rise and the term "food-miles" joining "locavore" in our vocabulary, this study points out that the majority of environmental effects of our food chain is in its production, not in its transport. So it might behoove us to eat less damaging food...of which red meat is the king.
Substituting chicken, fish or vegetables for red meat can help combat climate change, a new study suggests. In fact, putting these foods on the dinner table does more to reduce carbon emissions than eating locally grown food, researchers report in the May 15 issue of the journal Environmental Science & Technology.
Environmental advocates and retailers urge customers to purchase goods from local sources to. The idea is that food grown locally requires less fuel for shipping to the store. The new study does not argue that point. Yet few studies have compared greenhouse gas emissions from food production to those of transportation.
The production phase is responsible for 83 percent of the average U.S. household's greenhouse-gas burden with regard to food, while transportation accounts for only 11 percent, the new study found. The production of red meat, the researchers conclude, is almost 150 percent more greenhouse-gas-intensive than chicken or fish.
"We suggest that dietary shift can be a more effective means of lowering an average household's food-related climate footprint than 'buying local,'" the researchers write. “Shifting less than one day per week's worth of calories from red meat and dairy products to chicken, fish, eggs, or a vegetable-based diet achieves more greenhouse-gas reduction than buying all locally sourced food.
As much of the developing world gets more disposal income, in addition to the exponential increase in cars, there has been a steady rise in meat consumption. Both are contributing seriously to global warming.
This UN report on the effects of livestock farming concurs; livestock use over 30% of eht earth's entore land surface.
Says Henning Steinfeld, Chief of FAO’s Livestock Information and Policy Branch and senior author of the report: “Livestock are one of the most significant contributors to today’s most serious environmental problems. Urgent action is required to remedy the situation.”