(Source: Good Times - Santa Cruz. Via VegSource.)
Editor's Note: Over 20 years ago John Robbins wrote a groundbreaking book that made the connection between diet and environmental devastation. That book was called Diet for a New America -- a book that grows more relevant with each passing year. Robbins moved millions to change their diets (including the founders of this site), he began a wide-reaching non-profit organization called EarthSave, and has gone on to be one of the most effective and articulate advocates for a healthy world. In this fascinating and wide-reaching interview, Robbins talks about where the environmental movement has come since he wrote his first bestseller -- and how it is that many celebrants of Earth Day this year will, once again, be serving food which is now widely accepted to be the greatest cause of environmental destruction.
Reducing meat consumption may just help solve the world’s environmental problems
“Eighty percent of Americans, in polls, say they are environmentalists … And yet, most of us have remained unaware of the one thing that we could be doing on an individual basis that would be most helpful in slowing the deterioration and shifting us toward a more ecologically sustainable way of life.” – Excerpt from “The Food Revolution” by John Robbins
To mark the 20th anniversary of Earth Day in 1990, bestselling author John Robbins made his rounds on the talk show circuit, appearing on major shows of the day like Donahue and Geraldo. Robbins made waves by urging Americans to change dietary direction in his 1987 book “Diet For a New America,” which remains a big seller today. He would go on to become one of the world’s leading experts on the relationship between diet and the environment.
“It was especially hard back then for people to recognize the link between what was on their forks and their eating habits and the environment,” says Robbins, a Santa Cruz County resident, adding that he has happily watched that bridge be gapped over the years.
But with the 40th anniversary of Earth Day just around the corner on April 22, he says there is one dire environmental problem that remains unaddressed: Eating meat.
“We are going to have a lot of Earth Day celebrations, surely that was the case for the 20th anniversary,” he says. “And at a lot of the celebrations, there will be meat served—and I find that hard to understand.”
Forty years after an estimated 20 million people celebrated the first Earth Day, the budding environmental concern that sprouted the tradition has become full-fledged fervor. Deforestation is rampant, key resources are tapped or limited, and global warming is, it can seem, all we hear about. Also in that time, environmentalism has become synonymous with “being green,” a new millennium whirlwind trend that, we’re told, means changing to energy-saving light bulbs, using reusable grocery bags, and driving hybrid cars. But when it comes to the world’s most pressing ecological problems—climate change, land degradation, air and water pollution, loss of biodiversity—it is now a documented fact that a plant-based diet is the most effective way to help curb all of them.
“It’s phenomenal to me that groups come out with articles and lists like ’20 Things You Can Do To Change the Environment,’ and will list things like drive a fuel-efficient car and change your light bulbs, but they won’t say ‘eat less meat,’” says Robbins. “In not saying ‘eat more plants and fewer animals,’ they are omitting the single most significant, most powerful, most meaningful action you can take.”
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A Food Revolution John Robbins has been making a case for a plant-based diet since before “global warming” was a household phrase. He is now a leading world expert on health, food habits and environmental vegetarianism.
Photo: Charles Mixson
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In 2006, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization released “Livestock’s Long Shadow,” one of the most thorough and referenced reports on the environmental impact of animal agriculture. The study found that animals raised for food are responsible for 18 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. Broken down, they say that livestock account for 9 percent of carbon dioxide emissions, 37 percent of methane emissions (which is more than 20 times more effective than CO2 at trapping heat in the atmosphere, making it that much more harmful), and 65 percent of nitrous oxide emissions (which has 298 times the global warming potential of CO2).
The 18 percent figure was raised to 51 percent in late 2009, when two Worldwatch Institute researchers released “Livestock and Climate Change,” in which they re-examine the figure and consider “uncounted, overlooked, and misallocated livestock-related GHG emissions.” (These included emissions from animal excrement, gas, and breathing—dangerous discrepancies considering livestock in the United States produce more than 130 times the excrement of the human population.) But whether you look to the UN’s more conservative percentage or WWI’s 51 percent, livestock remains the primary contributor of greenhouse gases.
“It’s not just that it’s a contributor, it’s that it’s a huge contributor,” says Robbins, adding that greenhouse gases are just the tip of the environmental iceberg. “Livestock are the most significant contributor to today’s most serious environmental problems.”
The report, and several other studies since, also concluded that animal agriculture contributes more greenhouse gases than the global transportation sector—that’s every single car, bus, plane, train, etc. on this earth. It reads, “[Livestock] currently amounts to 18 percent of the global warming effect—an even larger contribution than the transportation sector worldwide.”
As we aim for a more sustainable future, it’s a no-brainer that we need cleaner fuels, smaller cars, better mass transit, and weaned-reliance on single-occupancy vehicles. But what about this piece of information? A 2006 University of Chicago study found that adopting a vegan diet is more effective at reducing greenhouse gas emissions than driving a hybrid car. In the frenzy to be eco-friendly, can vegetarianism join the ranks of trends like driving a Prius?
Despite the ubiquity of climate change conversation, talk about how to reduce carbon footprints has, until recently, largely left out the fact that reducing or eliminating meat and dairy from your diet will help you achieve the greatest reduction of emissions. Al Gore failed to mention it in An Inconvenient Truth (let us note here that his family has deep ties to the beef industry), and the mainstream media has kept mostly mum. But this Earth Day it is time for all of us who are the slightest bit inclined to be green to ask ourselves: does loving Mother Earth mean eating less meat?
Campus Crusaders
It’s a stormy Santa Cruz day, and six members of Banana Slugs for Animals have braved the slapping wind and broken rain to picket outside of the McDonald’s on Mission Street. Despite a thin showing, the protestors are strong in spirit, wielding signs and passing out literature to passersby and reticent McDonald’s customers.
Eric Deardorff, the group’s founder and a philosophy and ethics major at UC Santa Cruz, waves to passing cars, soliciting honks of support and a few of displeasure. It is his 29th birthday, and, as the event’s planner, he is content to be celebrating by holding a “McCruelty” sign in the wet and cold.
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