Date published: 2008/09/07
The BBC says:
People should consider eating less meat as a way of combating global warming, says the UN's top climate scientist.
Rajendra Pachauri, who chairs the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), will make the call at a speech in London on Monday evening.
UN figures suggest that meat production puts more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than transport.
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"The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has estimated that direct emissions from meat production account for about 18% of the world's total greenhouse gas emissions," he told BBC News."So I want to highlight the fact that among options for mitigating climate change, changing diets is something one should consider."
The FAO figure of 18% includes greenhouse gases released in every part of the meat production cycle - clearing forested land, making and transporting fertiliser, burning fossil fuels in farm vehicles, and the front and rear end emissions of cattle and sheep.
...
Transport, by contrast, accounts for just 13% of humankind's greenhouse gas footprint, according to the IPCC.
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But the biggest source globally of carbon dioxide from meat production is land clearance, particularly of tropical forest, which is set to continue as long as demand for meat rises.
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Dr Pachauri [sees this] as an issue of personal choice."I'm not in favour of mandating things like this, but if there were a (global) price on carbon perhaps the price of meat would go up and people would eat less," he said.
Boy, you would have thought he would know better than to start lecturing people about what they eat. But it is interesting about how so-called environmentalists in England get hysterical about transport (they believe the peasants should not be allowed to drive or fly) but rarely, mention meat, even though Pachauri would like to claim the latter is a bigger problem. (Of course whether the 13% and 18% figures are broadly accurate or not is open to debate. It is odd to include land clearance directly in the meat producing emissions total since it is a one-off set-up cost, not a recurring event, but perhaps they have taken that into account.) The one sane thing Pachauri says is at the end. We should have a global price on carbon and then everyone can decide for themselves on what to spend their own money, without having to listen to endless patronising lectures from anyone.
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