India’s environment minister Jairam Ramesh has urged the West to stop eating beef. According to the Telegraph he said “The solution to cut emissions is to stop eating beef. It leads to emission of methane which is 23 times more potent than carbon dioxide.”

Most people in India are Hindu and believe that cows are sacred. Ramesh said “What India has going for it is the fact that we are not a major beef eating nation.”

This message from India is a reminder that climate change is not just an environmental issue but one of social justice too. The way we live our lives in developed countries directly impacts the lives of others. Eating meat causes climate change; climate change causes extreme weather, rises in sea levels, droughts and food shortages - and those that suffer the most are those least responsible for climate change.

Read the Telegraph article here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/india/6615422/India-tells-West-to-stop-eating-beef.html

It seems the beef sector is having a bad week. The BeefSite.com reported the following news in this week’s e-newsletter.

Editorial: The Truth Behind Shock Stories

‘Farmed Fish May Pose BSE Risk‘ was one of our most dramatic headlines this week, but, according to a neurologist from the University of Louisville, this idea is cause for real concern. Friedland suggests farmed fish could transmit Creutzfeldt Jakob disease if they are fed byproducts rendered from cows. He and his team are now urging governments to prevent this feeding practice until safety in the food-chain can be confirmed.

Another shock story came from Reuters. A report they released earlier this week claims that the Brazilian beef giant, JBS, alongside other meatpackers, is under investigation for allegations of “bribing, racketeering, corruption, fraud and collusion.” According to the news agency, the information was passed from a representative at the federal prosecutor’s office.

Corruption and health risks in the meat industry? Never!

Read: Farmed fish article at Science Daily
Read: Reuters article on JBS

The World Wildlife Fund has announced that they want to identify beef farmers who produce meat in an environmentally responsible way and set up a world wide accreditation system. Apparently the aim is to allow consumers to choose ‘greener’ products.

WWF are already major players in the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and Round Table on Responsible Soy Association (RTSA) and have received much criticism from other international environmental organisations - earlier this month over 80 of them signed an opposition statement to the RTRS standards agreed last week, condemning them for promoting genetically modified soy as “responsible”.

Friends of the Earth International produced a statement earlier this year, titled The Only Responsible Soy is Less Soy, they state “Friends of the Earth International strongly rejects the current process of the Roundtable on Responsible Soy (RTRS). The Roundtable completely fails to address the major social and environmental impacts of industrial-scale soy cultivation and frustrates real solutions. Certification provides a façade of sustainability for multinationals and agribusinesses which control the production, finance, trade, processing and marketing of soy products as well as for major oil and agrofuel companies such as Shell and British Petroleum“. This viewpoint is shared by many other international environmental organisations.

WWF themselves have criticised the RSPO. Earlier this year their own figures showed that only 1% of sustainable palm oil has been bought despite the RSPO pledge to buy it. Over 43 million tonnes of palm is produced worldwide, mostly used for food, cosmetics and detergents, and increasing for biofuels. The industry is causing massive scale rainforest destruction in Indonesia.

These schemes simply don’t work. There is no such thing as sustainable soy, palm oil or meat. We just need to accept that we cannot use them anymore in anything like the quantities that we currently do. Let’s stop giving governments and corporations the excuse to carry on with business as normal.

Everyone’s talking about cows this week. In the US, plans commenced to produce an environmentally friendly cow, which will produce less methane. If they are successful in creating this ‘cow of the future’, I’d be interested to hear what they’re going to do about the other impacts of the dairy industry, such as deforestation to grow soy feeds, water pollution and of course, the male dairy calves – the often forgotten rejects of the trade who end up in veal crates or killed at birth as their flesh in not good enough for human consumption.

Here in the UK, Blade Farming think they may have the solution to the male dairy calf problem. They have launched a breeding scheme with eight of their top Holstein bulls who produce cows suitable for the dairy industry but also bull calves which are suitable to be used for beef. Farmers can buy semen from specially chosen bulls and the offspring will be tagged with an orange tag to identify them. Blade have said they would ‘love to buy the calves’ to raise for beef and their main customers, Tesco and McDonalds, are supporting the scheme. Compassion in World Farming apparently are pleased since the scheme may reduce the number of calves shot at birth.

The whole problem is that we have selectively bred cows for years to create those which produce high quantities of milk and those which produce what we deem to be high quality beef. All our messing with nature has created suffering and waste. Blade Farming’s scheme will only make the unsustainable and environmentally damaging dairy and meat industries more profitable, driving prices down and fuelling higher consumption.

It seems we are always looking for ways we can maintain the status quo and we keep coming up with all these crazy ideas when the answer is staring us in the face; it’s all about consumption. We cannot maintain the status quo, we need to consume less if we are to create sustainable societies. According to a report released by Canadean Ltd, global milk consumption is down 0.5% from last year, so it looks like we’re heading in the right direction at last!

A new study which analysed the economic costs of meat-based diets concluded that a reduction in beef and pork consumption could cut $20 trillion off the cost of fighting climate change.

The Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, who conducted the study, said that reducing beef and pork consumption would result in more land being available for vegetation to grow which would result in a ‘carbon sink’. There would also be millions of tonnes less methane.

If people continue to eat meat at the current level, the study estimate that emissions would have to be cut by two-thirds by 2050 at a cost of $49 trillion. However, if people ate a low meat-diet (70g of beef and 325g of chicken and eggs per week) this would free up 15 million square kilometres of farmland to grow vegetation which would absorb carbon dioxide. Alternatively, the land could be used to grow biofuels. Greenhouse gas emissions would also be reduced by 10%.

With a diet free of all animal produce, we could achieve even more for the environment!

Simon Fairlie, co-editor of the Ecologist, made an analysis of different agricultural systems in his article ‘Can Britain Feed Itself?’, published in his magazine The Land. He calculated that with a vegan permaculture system, 8.8 million hectares of UK land would be spare. For organic vegan, 11.2 million hectares. He said “I have so far failed to find any vegan land-use vision that maps out in detail what might be done with the large areas of UK land that would be liberated or abandoned, depending on your viewpoint, if we all turned vegan”. The answer is simple, let it join the fight against climate change!

New research from the University of Hawaii has revealed America’s fast food chain’s dependence on corn.

The researchers bouht 486 servings of hamburgers, fries and chicken sandwiches from McDonald’s, Burger King and Wendy’s in 6 cities in the USA.

Testing in the lab revealed that 100% of the chicken and 93% of the beef came from animals fed on a corn-only diet. Only 12 burgers in the experiment came from cows who had not eaten a corn-only diet.

Friends of the Earth fear that as more corn is diverted to the production of biofuels, more farmers will turn to soy for animal feed. The emphasis continues to be on the impact of biofuels on food security whilst the unsustainable use of  corn and soy as animal feed continues to be ignored. Some people will find it near impossible to stop using their cars because of living in the countryside with poor public transport links or due to a job which involves travelling.  But we can all cut out animal products from our diet and make a significant difference that way.

Read full article in New Scientist.

The World Bank has lent $90 million to Bertin Ltda, Brazil’s second-largest beef processors.

According to Mario Menezes, of Amigos da Terra, Brazil looses 1.8 million hectares of Amazon forest every year, and around 70 and 80 per cent is because of cattle ranching. Brazil already exports 300,000 tonnes of beef per year (41% of which from the Amazon) which is more than any other country.  This injection of cash in to the cattle industry will create further destruction.

The Amazon is home to 75 million cows and Bertin Ltda slaughters up to 5,400 cows a day. However, with the use of this loan and others, they aim to double their capacity, which includes expanding their facility in the heart of the most deforested area of the Amazon. By expanding this slaughter house, they will, without question, encourage farmers to clear more forest to raise more cattle. Much of the land in that area is illegally cleared.

The Amazon rainforest is home to a fifth of the world’s plant and animal species and more than 200 indigenous cultures. As the forest is destroyed, we lose hundreds of species each year, indigenous people are forced off their land, the impacts of poverty is exacerbated, and carbon is being released in to the atmostphere - a major contributer to climate change. We are loosing the ‘lungs of the earth’ and we will all suffer as a consequence.

Brazil’s biggest importers of beef include the UK.  And remember, one of the other main drivers of Amazon destruction is soy, 90% of which is fed to animals raised for meat in Europe and China.

Be part of the solution. Stop eating meat and dairy, and ask others to do the same. In the grand scheme of things, it’s really not so much to ask.

The world’s largest meat company, Tyson Foods, has reported a massive 92% fall in earnings. They earned $9 million in the 3 months ending June 30 2008, down from $111 million in the same quarter last year. Tyson said it paid $140 million more for grain during the quarter to feed its chickens compared to a year ago. Tyson’s beef unit, its largest unit, earned $3 million versus $36 million a year ago.

I hope they are not expecting anyone to feel sorry for them. Tyson is certainly a company our world would be much better without. Take a look at their website if you want a great example of corporate bullsh*t. ‘Tyson cares about the environment’ they say. Let’s think about that a minute. As the recent dramatic fall in profits show, this company relies upon huge amounts of soy to feed it’s animals, the very same soy that is destroying our rainforests and causing climate change. How dare they claim to care about the environment when they are instrumental in it’s destruction?

Even more laughbable is their claim that ‘the primary philanthropic focus for Tyson Foods is hunger relief. As of February, 2008, Tyson had donated more than 50 million pounds of Tyson products to hunger and disaster relief efforts since the year 2000′. So, they are sending their products to poverty stricken areas; areas such as Latin America perhaps where agribusiness has wiped out local farming and destroyed forests to make way for soy to feed Tyson’s chickens, causing the very same poverty and hunger Tyson would have us believe they aim to alleviate. Well, that’s real big of them.

On the bright side, this massive fall in profits is very positive for our planet, animals and people. Long may it continue.

Here is a chart using the figures from Waterfootprint.org to show you how much water is used for animal products. The chart shows how many litres of water are used for every 1kg of product.

16,600 litres = 1 kg of leather
15,500 litres = 1 kg of beef
5,000 litres = 1 kg of cheese
4,800 litres = 1 kg of pork

Let’s compare this to water usage when we eat foods directly:-

1,300 litres = 1 kg of wheat
1,300 litres = 1kg barley
1,800 litres = 1 kg of soybeans
900 litres = 1kg maize
700 litres = 1kg apples
500 litres = 1kg oranges

The figures speak for themselves; if we are to provide enough fresh water for the world, we need to be sustainable by using it as efficiently as possible, and that means moving towards a plant based diet.

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Following the largest beef recall in the US - over 140 million pounds - the US Department of Agriculture has announced a new rule; retailers supplied with contaminated meat will be now be named.

It is absolutely shocking that this has only just been introduced. Currently, when meat is recalled, only the name of the company recalling the meat is made public, along with a description of the meat and brand names, but that is no use to consumers since noone knows where this meat is being sold. The new rule will ensure that the grocery stores stocking the contaminated meat will be named.

But to all you meat eaters out there, don’t think you’re safe - the new rule doesn’t apply to all meat recalls (only those with the most serious risk to health) and plus, most often recalls do not occur until it is way to late, i.e. the diseased meat is already in your belly.

Surprise, surprise, the meat industry has come out against the new rule saying it could ‘confuse’ consumers. They know as well as anyone how damaging it would be for a meat retailer to be named as a seller of potentially lethal contaminated meat. Best bet; stay away from meat all together.