Turns out the much quoted Livestock’s Long Shadow vastly underestimated the greenhouse gas emissions produced by the world’s production of meat and dairy. Forget 18%, a new study suggests it is actually over half of the world’s GHG emissions.

The Worldwatch Institute, an indepedent research body based in Washington, have just released the study Livestock and Climate Change in their November/ December edition of World Watch, which finds that animal agriculture accounts for at least 32.6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide per year, or 51 percent of annual worldwide GHG emissions.

So what went wrong with the Food and Agriculture’s report, Livestock’s Long Shadow? The report explains that some GHG emissions were “obvious but underestimated, some are simply overlooked, and some are emissions sources that are already counted but have been assigned to the wrong sectors”.

This new report challenges the FAO’s Livestock’s Long Shadow on several issues. Firstly, FAO completely excludes the carbon dioxide produced by animals breathing.

FAO only counts the emissions from changes in land use but not the vast amounts of potential carbon absorption by trees which has been lost by converting forests etc to grazing and growing animal feeds. If the land was not used for animal agriculture, it would regenerate and “could potentially mitigate as much as half (or even more) of all anthropogenic GHGs”. FAO does not take this in to account; considering 26 percent of land worldwide is used for grazing livestock and 33 percent of arable land for growing feed, clearly there is huge potential for carbon absorption if this land as converted back to forest and other natural habitats.

The FAO used an outdated figure for methane’s Global Warming Potential (which compares it’s potential for global warming to that of carbon dioxide), which means that it is grossly underestimated.

Livestock’s Long Shadow also ignores the fact that meat and dairy is accountable for more emission than plant based foods due to more; fluorocarbons, which are used to cool animal products; production, distribution and packaging (including of products such as leather, feathers, skin); cooking; disposal of liquid waste and disease, such as zoonotic diseases (such as swine flu) and other diseases cause by animal products, such as heart disease and cancer, which require carbon intensive medical treatment.

They conclude “By replacing livestock products with analogs [ie meat and dairy alternatives], consumers can take a single powerful action collectively to mitigate most GHGs worldwide”.

I have to say, I did suspect for a minute that there might be an animal group behind this report, perhaps there’s a hidden agenda? But no, the report was written by Robert Goodland and Jeff Anhang. Goodland worked at the World Bank for 23 years and was a lead environmental adviser (he’s since spoken out about how the World Bank is “damaging the planet and punishing the poor“), he also received an award from IUCN for outstanding contributions to environmental conservation. Anhang is a research officer and environmental specialist at the World Bank Group’s International Finance Corporation.

You can read the report on the World Watch Institute website here.

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!

Following Jamie Oliver’s latest programme ‘Jamie Saves our Bacon‘, which aired 29 January and was watched by 2 million people; supermarkets are already reporting increased sales in pork. The programme revealed the appalling conditions of pigs raised in factory farms in Europe, the meat from which is imported to the UK. Jamie urged people to buy British pork due to higher welfare standards. He also promoted cheaper cuts of pork.

According to The Telegraph, “sales of pork belly joints have risen by 66 per cent and shoulder joints by almost 270 per cent”.

Jamie is perhaps best known for his school dinners project, which aims to get rid of the junk food served in schools and replace them with healthy meals. Through the campaign Jamie raises awareness of the huge issue of obesity in the UK, noting that “one quarter of teenagers are already obese”.

Regarding his new pig campaign he says on his website “The list of pork products stocked by the average supermarket is huge; bacon, sausages, ham, pies, gammon, Scotch eggs and even ice cream!”. This is where it becomes very confusing. How can a chef who claims to be concerned with the nation’s health promote foods which are strongly linked to heart disease, obesity and cancer? In particular, sausages, bacon and other processed meats are extremely damaging to health, so much so that the World Cancer Research Fund have warned that there is no safe level of consumption.

The environmental impact of pig farming can also not be ignored, as reported by DEFRA, the impacts include; soil compaction and erosion, toxic levels of zinc in soils, soil and water contamination with heavy metals and antimicrobial drugs, leaching of manure heaps leading to nitrate pollution and pathogen transfer, methane emissions from manure, adverse affects on biodiversity due to pigs destroying outdoor spaces and ammonia emissions which can acidify the surrounding area, and for those living close to the pigs, issues of noise and odour.

Whilst Jamie’s efforts to lessen suffering and support local farmers is commendable, his claim that pigs are raised under better conditions in the UK than in Europe and his plea to buy British pork has no doubt resulted in people buying pork who would not normally do so. Unfortunately, the reality is that British pig farms are far from being ‘high welfare’, as numerous investigations have shown, but not only that, by promoting pork Jamie is also promoting disease and environmental destruction.

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New research has shown that the methane emissions have been rising at a much faster rate than carbon dioxide -  over the last 250 years, CO2 has increased by 31% but methane has increased by a staggering 149%. As methane lasts longer in the atmosphere it also has a higher global warming potential and has already caused a fifth of the global warming experienced since 1750.

The university of Portsmouth found that a herd of 200 cows produce annual emissions of methane equivalent to driving a family car more than 100,000 miles (180,000km) on more than four gallons (21,400 litres) of petrol.

The main source of methane? Animals.

It’s no wonder the National Farmers’ Union is getting a little nervous, they have already stated that the new targets for 80% cut in greenhouse gas emissions will make it neccessary for massive reductions in meat production. This new research is not going to do them any favours.

Japanese company Idemitsu Kosan Co is currently researching the benefits of oil from cashew nut shells in reducing the amount of methane produced by cows. Apparently, adding the oil to feed can reduce the methane emissions by 90%.

There is an obvious flaw in the plan. There are currently around 1.5 billion cows in the world. If this oil from cashew nuts really works and catches on, can you imagine how much would be needed for so many cows? Cattle ranching, and forest clearing to make way for crops which we predominantly feed to animals, is already the top cause of deforestation. Our current level of consumption of cashew nuts would not provide enough shells to produce the oil to feed 1.5 billion cows, therefore introducing cashew nut oil to feeds will only lead to more destruction as we clear more forest to make way for cashew trees.

Cashew nuts can only be grown in a warm and humid climate: ie the South. Amongst the top 5 cashew producing countries are Indonesia and Brazil - two countries which are already facing devastating levels of deforesation to make way for cattle grazing and crop planatations to feed animals or to produce biofuels. If we increase the demand for cashew nuts, we will see further deforestation.

Besides methane and deforestation, we also have to consider the other impacts of the meat and dairy industry - water use (it takes 990 litres of water to produce one litre of milk, 10,000 to produce 1kg of beef), water pollution, land degradation, ammonia… And these impacts could double by 2050 if we don’t do something about it now (2).

There really is just one ethical, sustainable, realistic answer to the enormous impacts of the livestock sector, and that is to end it. If we carry on consuming meat at the current level, and countries like India and China continue increasing their consumption, we will never be able to stop deforestation, world hunger or climate change.

Scientists at the Rowett Research Institute in Aberdeen are concerned about climate change and acknowledge that “cattle and agriculture can be a very serious contributor towards the problem.”

They have been working to develop animal feed which will inhibit the the production of methane, which is 24 times more harmful than carbon dioxide, from the digestive systems of sheep and cows.

So far, they have found that adding fumaric acid (a natural chemical found in plants) to the feed significantly reduces the amount of methane that sheep produce. The fumaric acid traps hydrogen produced by their digestive systems and stops it being turned into methane. The same effect, however, hasn’t been found with cows.

So why is an institute which conducts research to find out ‘how nutriton can prevent disease’  promoting the consumption of red meat, considering the significant health impacts? Wouldn’t it be more consistent with their mission to encourage people to stop eating meat? It would certainly be a hugely better environmental solution.

It’s no surprise that the Rowett Research Institute was co-founded by the North of Scotland College of Agriculture (now the Scottish Agricultural College), whose current chairman was once on the board of Assured British Meat, the vice chairman is a partner and manager of a family beef and sheep farming business and the CEO has also worked in animal agriculture his entire life.

Fumaric acid and malic acid (which are closely related) are already being used in animal feeds. And guess what? Studies have shown that they increase growth rates in animals. In sheep, up to a 27% increase in weight gain was found in those fed feed with malic acid. Weight gain in broiler chickens has been proven to increase when fed fumaric acid. Even dairy cows produce more milk with a diet supplemented with malic acid.

Farmers have been criticised for using antibiotics for fattening their animals and with many governments now illegalising this practice, such as the EU ban in 2006, I am sure many farmers are delighted to have an excuse to add lots of this growth promoting chemical to their feeds.

Then there’s the animal welfare issue. Studies have shown that fumaric acid causes gastric ulcers in humans, as any cause of increase in acidity would. What research has there been about the health impacts of fumaric acid for animals?

In 2001 a report of a 12 year observational study named Typical Clinical Signs Associated with the Addition of Fumaric Acid to Milk Substitutes revealed that when fumaric acid is used in milk substitutes for calves and piglets this produces cardiac and kidney disfunctions and even death. The Scientific Committee on Animal Nutrition produced a report in 2003 to counter this, named The Safety of Fumaric Acid.  Although they claimed that there was not sufficient evidence to prove that fumaric acid has caused these results, they admitted that higher than standard doses of fumaric acid are ‘probably nephrotoxic [poisons the liver] after long term use’ and that ‘tubular dysfunctions [ie in kidneys] in calves, even transient, can not be excluded’. They went on to say that they could not impose a limit for fumaric acid ‘due to the lack of knowledge in the absorption rate and in the nephrotoxic potential’.

Fumaric acid is used to treat human psoriasis and has also been proved to have a nephrotoxic affect.

Even if we could safely reduce the amounts of methane that cows and sheep produce, that’s one of many environmental impacts. What about the vast amounts of water used, pollution, disposing of manure, soil erosion, forest destruction? And let’s not forget all those food miles, shipping grain in from half way around the world while others starve. Meat is, and always will be environmentally damaging, unethical and totally inefficient.

” A cow is 90% inefficient. Ninety percent of what she eats goes right back out” said Bill Dunlap, who raises about a dozen beef cows a year in the US.

Let’s stop pandering to the meat industry and move to a plant based diet.

The BBC’s Countryfile today discussed the issue of cows and sheep and methane. 90% of the methane produced by animal agriculture comes from the cows and sheep themselves. So what can be done to reduce the amount of methane, which is 23 times more damaging to the planet than carbon dioxide?

Well, of course, the solution is simple. Less cows = less methane. Less meat … less cows! However, the farmers think otherwise.

Aberystwyth University and the Institute of Grasslands and Environmental Research are now researching diet changes for cows that will reduce the amount of methane they produce. Apparently garlic and essential oils can reduce methane as can certain types of grass. They predict a reduction of around 30%.

However, they are somewhat missing the point here. By 2050, scientists predict that our meat consumption will grow by 50%. We are already at a point where climate change is critical, as is deforestation, water scarcity and land degradation (all of which the meat industry impacts significantly). For our survival we cannot let the situation get any worse - we cannot allow this 50% increase in meat consumption to occur. Where do people think we can raise 50% more animals? Giving cows a few essential oils is just a drop in the ocean and a waste of time.

Farmers in New Zealand now have an added incentive to switch from animals to growing crops. Levels of methane and nitrous oxide emitted from farms (from cows and sheep) will soon be capped, forcing farmers to find ways to reduce the levels.

Farmers could offset methane and nitrous oxide through emissions trading or planting trees, but these schemes are frowned upon by many environmental organisations as they are not seen to be a solution to the problem.

Attempts to reduce the amount of methane that cows and sheep produce through diet have so far only resulted in inconsequential reductions, so farmers will need to consider bigger changes - such as switching to growing crops!

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A new study hit the press today, again urging people to cut down their meat consumption to save the planet from climate change.

An international team of experts published their report in the medical journal The Lancet. They pointed out that agriculture contributes nearly 25% of the world’s greenhouse gases, the vast majority specifically from livestock. Rainforests are cleared to provide grazing land and to grow the huge amount of crops needed to feed animals. Sheep and cows also produce large quantities of methane which is more harmful to the environment than carbon dioxide. Then there is the transportation of animals and meat around the world.

Professor McMichael and his colleagues argue that “for the world’s higher-income populations, greenhouse-gas emissions from meat eating warrants the same scrutiny as do those from driving and flying”.

McMichael urges that Westerns cut down to 90 grams of meat per day by 2050, and shockingly points out that many people in the Western world eat roughly their own weight in meat every year, on average about 224 grams a day.

It is no wonder that heart disease and cancers are killing so many people in the Western world. Meat is destroying the planet and our bodies, not to mention the countless animals who are forced to live a life of pain and misery to satisfy our taste buds.

This is an important study, however, I do wish McMichael had the courage to say that we all need to stop eating meat completely, now, if we really want to make a difference.