There has been a lot of discussion recently about the overall disadvantages, in terms of land-use and greenhouse-gas pressure, of eating a meat-rich diet. For example, last week’s Science magazine carried a letter which proposed that meat eating (also known as “meating”!) was the single biggest threat to global biodiversity.
Beyond meat, much of the developed world (and increasingly segments of the developing world) are suffering from non-communicable diseases associated with over-consumption (at least of the wrong sort of things). More people, by a long way, are overweight in the world than malnourished. A recent study highlighted in China that about 12% of the adults were diabetic, but a whopping 50% were showing signs of developing it.
Thus, increasingly, it seems that changing diets would be good for us and good for the environment. If we all demanded less, it would perhaps free up land-pressures for a more “organic-like” world where agriculture becomes sustainable, in the true sense.
Does anyone have thoughts about the levers to change consumption patterns? As with alcohol and tobacco, “knowledge” is not the answer. And, as with alcohol and tobacco, there is some serious big business who have a strong interest in the status quo.
Tim,
the main problem with banning meat from our plates is that malnourishment in developed countries cannot be directly linked to meat consumption, as e.g. tobacco consumption can be linked to lung cancer. Human nutrition is so complex that pointing at meat as a devilish thing will be difficult. Many cultures have lived long with meat-dominated diets and from the health point of view there seems no reason to abandon meat consumption. Looking at China or Indonesia, the increase intake of fat and sugar and the simultaneous abandonment of traditional vegetable dishes and the reduction of physical exercise seems to be the reason for the increase of adiposity. Biodiversity loss and food production efficiency is of no interest to the consumer and probably too little a reason to make politicians act upon this. The success in pushing back tobacco consumption has a lot to do with smoking in public discommoded a large group of non-smokers who put additional pressure on the smokers side-by-side with the health system being stressed by the consequences of smoking. Reducing alcohol consumption seems to follow the same route as consumption figures for light alcohol continue to decrease at least in western Europe. Eating meat does not directly affect your friends and neighbours and therefore the personal pressure you encounter when eating meat will remain small, too small to change your habits. Maybe, if politicians start to read the signs, taxes on meat and sugar to increase the price may be a way to enforce a better nutrition balance. However, we have recently observed in Denmark that a fat tax did not change the consumer habits at all, so the tax was scraped again.
Tim's question sets me asking myself why people do so much 'meating'. Is meat, a poor man's food? I wonder if we can find answers in the concentration of populations, especially working people, in urban areas. Are there forms of social marketing that promote meat consumption as a matter of status? What about government policy? Are there indications that governments privilege meating (for whatever reason) over vegetarianism? Perhaps they have done so in the past as an industrial era strategy to provide animal protein to large numbers of government employees, whether in factories or in the bureaucratic white collar stations.
It would be interesting to find out why majority of the people in my city, Kampala, who commute to work every day eat boiled meat (chicken, 'goat', beef and fish) for lunch while in town. In the evenings, the well-to-do eat pork and wash it down with a cold beer before they head home. Yet at home most people in this city eat vegetable meals for most of the week! Why? How do such trends develop?
There are nomadic pastoralists in Uganda but meat is not their staple. They have a special relationship with animals and they do not slaughter any of them anyhow. However need for cash for medical treatment, education for children or purchase of extra land has forced them to regularly sell their animals to the ever-present markets in urban areas.
To find answers to Tim's question it seems to me that we need to examine questions of historical development of the factory and the town; and daily energy requirements for the working class and government policy. To take action we then need to respond to the emerging trends related to de-industrialization; environmental protection; the significance of consuming vegetables as sources of medicine; de-urbanization. To the extent that government wields significant political power, policy should be the way forward along these lines.
In Germany the publication of the awful scenes & features in gigantic animal-stables and animal-transports by curagous photographers in the mass-media contributes much to gradual changes. The facts of needing some 4-8 kg crop-produce for 1 kg animal-meat/product is gaining perception in the public awareness and the public starts asking questions. Our major news-Station www.heute.de manages to send every now and then short reports about vegetarian diets....this was not imaginable some 2 years ago. So there are many indicators and indications....and very often in good harmony with agriculturists / farmers.....who basically sense the dignity of plants and animals.
Please check out this pub below from WRI.
On the demand side: avoid competition from bioenergy, reduce food waste, reduce fertility rates, and shift diets (a publication on the latter if forthcoming shortly).
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/280755107_Creating_a_sustainable_food_future_A_menu_of_solutions_to_sustainably_feed_more_than_9_billion_people_by_2050_World_resources_report_2013-14_interim_findings
Book Creating a sustainable food future. A menu of solutions to s...
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