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Sat, 03 Mar 2007

Vegetarian Diet and Global Warming - Kathy Freston of The Huffington Post Reveals The Other Inconvenient Truth That Environmentalists Don't Talk About

This week, while checking Savvy Vegetarian's google ranking for the word 'vegetarian' out of 50,000,000 sites - top of page 6, wahoo! - I came across three eloquent articles by Kathy Freston, who I assume is vegetarian, on the Huffington Post, about the impact of animal agriculture on global warming.

According to Ms. Freston, in her article Vegetarian Is The New Prius,"Last month, the United Nations published a report on livestock and the environment with a stunning conclusion: "The livestock sector emerges as one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global. It turns out that raising animals for food is a primary cause of land degradation, air pollution, water shortage, water pollution, loss of biodiversity, and not least of all, global warming."

Here in SE Iowa, where industrial agriculture is trying very hard to cover the landscape with CAFO's - confined animal feeding operations - many people, includiing farmers, have first hand experience of the terrible effects on air and water quality, cancer rates, and soil erosion, not to mention animal suffering, just so people in big cities can eat lots of cheap pork. We're not at all surprised to hear that industrial animal agriculture also causes global warming. Strangely, most of us wouldn't consider giving up meat!

Ms. Freston tells us: "Today, 70% of former Amazon rainforest is used for pastureland, and feed crops cover much of the remainder. These forests serve as "sinks," absorbing carbon dioxide from the air, and burning these forests releases all the stored carbon dioxide, quantities that exceed by far the fossil fuel emission of animal agriculture. ...while animal agriculture accounts for 9% of our carbon dioxide emissions, it emits 37% of our methane, and a whopping 65% of our nitrous oxide" - both very effective greenhouse gases.

Researchers at the University of Chicago found that, "when it's all added up, the average American does more to reduce global warming emissions by going vegetarian than by switching to a Prius." I knew it! Go read Vegetarian Is The New Prius

And check out Kathy Freston's follow-up article: A Few More Inconvenient Truths, thoughtful and clearly written, in which she confronts environmentalists in denial about their meat addictions. "I have to admit that when I speak with environmentalists about the obvious waste and pollution involved in the totally unnecessary activity of meat consumption, I feel a lot like Mr. Gore trying to convince the U.S. Congress to take the issue of global warming seriously during his first term in the Congress." She discusss "a few of the key concerns that were posted to the blog and that my meat-eating friends offer in defense of their continued meat consumption." Read her excellent discussion and the wide range of comments prompted by Ms. Frestons's A Few More Inconvenient Truths.

In the third article of her vegetarian-global warming series, One Bite at a Time: A Beginner's Guide to Conscious Eating, Kathy Freston talks about the practical aspects of transitioning to a vegetarian diet. Realizing that people may want to change their diet, but have a little trouble making such a big leap, she lays out a six step program for giving up meat and easing into a vegetarian diet. Ms Freston concludes, "When you consider your choices--heart disease, colon cancer, plus-size pants, melting ice caps, gale force storms, and animal suffering vs. good health, energy, a trim physique, a livable planet, compassion, and tasty, diverse foods--it's clear that going vegetarian is an excellent choice as we move toward living a more conscious life." Hear! Hear! Thank you Kathy Freston!

Read One Bite at a Time: A Beginner's Guide to Conscious Eating. And then head back to Savvy Veg for vegetarian recipes, articles and advice.