We have been hearing for years that eating less meat is one of the individual decisions that can contribute to the fight against climate change . As societies get richer, they tend to more carnivorous diets, and this increases the raising of livestock, already converted into a large industry with a high emission of greenhouse gases (GHG).
Feed production triggers the use of chemical fertilizers, and a lot of CO2 is released during the processing and transportation of animal products. In addition, this activity is one of the main responsible for deforestation.
However, new data suggest that vegetarian and other diets that do without livestock could contribute more than the traditional one to climate change. Research from Carnegie Mellon University argues that obtaining a calorie from fruits, vegetables, dairy and seafood requires more GHG emissions than from a meat product. Paul Fischbeck, one of the authors of the work, states that “many common vegetables require more energy resources per calorie than is believed. In this sense, aubergines, celery and cucumbers are especially harmful compared to pork or chicken ”.
Researchers have come to that conclusion unexpectedly. Their work has studied the food chain in the United States to determine how the obesity epidemic in that country affects the environment: they analyzed food production, processing and transportation, sales and services, and from there they measured emissions of GHG and the consumption of water and energy of the whole process. They concluded that controlling weight and eating fewer calories could reduce those parameters by up to 9%.
However, they found that the diets recommended as healthier – a mixture of dairy, fruits, vegetables and seafood – had the greatest environmental impact in all three categories : energy consumption grew by 38% and water consumption by 10%, and Greenhouse gas emissions were up 6%.
