Patrick O. Brown, a Stanford University biochemist, has changed science twice by giving stuff away. In the early 1990s Brown invented the DNA microarray, a tool that measures how cells make use of their DNA; he then showed researchers how to make their own, transforming genetic research. In 2000 he was one of three scientists who launched a free, online scientific journal called the Public Library of Science (PLOS); it has already broken the stranglehold of $200-a-year scientific publications like Science and Nature.

Now he is tackling an even bigger foe. Over the next 18 months Brown, 55, will take a break from his normal scientific work (finding out how a small number of genes are translated into a much larger number of proteins) in order to change the way the world farms and eats. He wants to put an end to animal farming, or at least put a significant dent in our global hunger for cows, pigs and chickens.

Brown, who has been a vegetarian for more than 30 years and a vegan for 5, notes that while livestock accounts for only 9% of human-caused carbon dioxide emissions, it accounts for 37% of human-caused methane (most of it emanating from the animals’ digestive systems) and 65% of human-caused nitrous oxide, according to the Food & Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Both are far better at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, meaning that cows, chickens and their ilk have a larger greenhouse effect than all the cars, trucks and planes in the world.

The green cognoscenti are choosing animal husbandry as their new enemy. Jonathan Safran Foer, the bestselling novelist, has published articles declaring that he is raising his kids vegetarian because of the environmental consequences of meat farming and that if people are going to eat meat, they should consider eating dogs. Lord Stern, a professor at the London School of Economics, told the Independent that the West would have to become more vegetarian in order to combat global warming; without change in present trends, meat and milk output will double by 2050.

Brown brings scientific clout to the debate–he’s a member of the National Academy of Sciences and an investigator for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute–and a realization that the arguments for change need to be economic, not just ethical. Growing crops to feed animals requires a lot more land, energy and fertilizer than growing them to feed people, he says: 70% of the land that was once Amazon rain forest is dedicated to grazing. Even if scientists figure out how to make milk with stem cells, it’s unlikely they will be able to create milk with the same efficiency as they can corn or wheat.

“There’s absolutely no possibility that 50 years from now this system will be operating as it does now,” says Brown. “One approach is to just wait, and either we’ll deal with it or we’ll be toast. I want to approach this as a solvable problem.” Solution: “Eliminate animal farming on planet Earth.”

Diets are malleable. Thirty years ago nobody drank high fructose corn syrup. Now it’s a dominant part of the American diet. As Western diets move into China, people there are eating more beef. Brown argues that the key to removing meat from diets is to give foodmakers an incentive to make yummy vegetable-based fare. If vendors push the new foods, palates will follow.

Incentive? Brown thinks if he can convince food manufacturers that the costs of selling meat are too high, and rising, they’ll come around. Seemingly tiny changes in economics could make animal farming a lot less affordable. At the moment farmers around the world are arguing they should be immune from taxes and ceilings on greenhouse gases; if they are not exempt, the cost of meat will go up. Raising the price of water would have the same effect. It takes 1,000 liters of water to produce a liter of milk.

Brown plans to spend the first six months of his project hammering out economic models with colleagues, illustrating ways that animal farming is likely to become onerously expensive. Then he’ll take a year off to work with famous chefs and food researchers on tastier vegetarian dishes, and to develop a strategy to tackle the political, economic, legal, behavioral and food-security issues he’s sure to face.

If Brown can work it so that McDonald’s puts less meat in each Big Mac, that could count as a win. Until now little research has gone into making foods friendly to the environment.

“If you’re a big food producer now, this is absolutely inevitable,” he says. “You’d better start thinking ahead. You’d better seriously start investing and trying to find alternatives in order to stay alive.”

Republished from Forbes.com

Kraft Foods, on the other hand, is still neck-deep in the program and insists it will continue to use the “Smart Choices” symbol on its own processed, factory-made food products. The Smart Choices organization itself also continues to defend its position, declaring that labeling processed, sugared-up dead foods as “Smart” is a great idea. “Our nutrition criteria are based on sound, consensus science,” said Smart Choices chair Mike Hughes (in all seriousness).

As NaturalNews previously reported (http://www.naturalnews.com/027077_n…), the fraudulent Smart Choices food labeling program was being led by a Tufts University dean named Dr. Eileen Kennedy, a woman who continues to insist that sugary breakfast cereals made with 40% sugar, artificial coloring chemicals and partially-hydrogenated oils are really, really healthy for kids! (Eat more!) To paraphrase her view, they’re smart choices because they are “better than a donut.”

The whole purpose of the Smart Choice program, of course, was to influence gullible parents into buying highly-processed, dead food products that earn more profits for participating food companies. And in order to accomplish that, this group had to abandon commonsense nutrition and push processed food products onto a nation full of children who are already obese, diabetic and increasingly diagnosed with ADHD.

That’s why Michael Jacobson from the CSPI resigned from the group early on. He said publicy, “It was paid for by industry and when industry put down its foot and said this is what we’re doing, that was it, end of story.”

The American Society for Nutrition pretends to invoke science

This Smart Choices program was also engineered in part by the American Society for Nutrition, a corporate-sponsored group that caters to the financial and political interests of its members like GlaxoSmithKline, Eli Lilly, Monsanto, Procter & Gamble, the Sugar Association, Abbott Laboratories, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, ConAgra Foods, National Dairy Council, PepsiCo and the drug giant Wyeth. (http://www.nutrition.org/media/abou…)

(Are you starting to get the picture here yet?)

The American Society for Nutrition has now removed their former page touting the Smart Choices program (http://www.nutrition.org/news/smart…). Now, the page just says, “The page you requested is forbidden. The page you are looking for is restricted.”

For its role in the Smart Choices scheme, the American Society for (Mal?)Nutrition has received the Integrity Disgrace Award from TheNewIQ.com. (http://www.thenewiq.com/integritywa…).

Page 19 of its 2007-2008 annual report explains that the American Society for Nutrition seeks to “Position [itself] as an authoritative leader in nutrition through science.”

It’s laughable, of course, when you’re pushing refined sugar to children and calling it a “smart” choice. Where’s the science in that? Maybe all the scientists they hired are whacked out on a sugar high from eating too much Froot Loops…

Complete marketing hoax

I find it fascinating that the minute the FDA says it’s going to investigate the Smart Choices labeling program, the big food companies who funded the project flee like cockroaches scurrying under the kitchen counter. If the Smart Choices program was really based on such great nutritional science as its hucksters claim, then why did these food companies distance themselves as quickly as possible the minute a hint of scrutiny was announced?

The reason, of course, is because the entire Smart Choices program was a fraud to begin with. Nutritionally, it was a complete joke, and from a regulatory point of view, it was a disaster… did anybody really think the processed food industry could police itself?

If a genuine Smart Choices labeling program were ever put into place, it should have required large red warning symbols on virtually all the products from the participating companies. “Warning: Don’t eat this unless you, too, want to get cancer, diabetes and heart disease! (50 cents-off coupon on back!)”

I can’t think of a single product made by PepsiCo that’s actually good for you. Kellogg has some products that could qualify as somewhat nutritious, but Kraft Foods manufactures primarily nutrient-depleted, processed dead foods that in my opinion no parent should ever feed a child. It’s difficult to imagine any of these being labeled “smart” anything. Processed, dead foods loaded with sugar and refined carbohydrates actually make children obese and diabetic, and diabetes has been scientifically linked to impaired cognitive function (http://www.naturalnews.com/027281_d…). So if you really do the math on processed foods, they tend to make kids stupid, meaning this “Smart Choice” program would have been more accurately named, “Stupid Foods!”

Why did the FDA tolerate this fraud for so long?

It’s a relief to see this fraudulent Smart Choices program falling apart so quickly. The program was an outright fraud that pushed health-harming disinformation onto parents and families.

Of course, that was the whole point of the program, and it would have succeeded if it wasn’t so blatantly stupid to begin with. With Smart Choices, the food industry tried to hoodwink the entire American population, and they got schooled on it by a few outspoken nutritionists who exposed the program as complete bunk. Dr. Eileen Kennedy also got an earful, most likely, for her role as head honcho of the fraudulent program, if not for her hilarious comment about processed foods being “smart” because they’re better than donuts.

Any person who tries to push 40% sugar cereals onto children while labeling it a “Smart Choice” probably deserves to be caned in a public square in Singapore. Or better yet, they should have their hands tied behind their backs and thrown into a neck-deep marsh pit full of soggy Froot Loops then ordered to try to eat their way back to shore without getting diabetes…

But here’s my real question: You know how the FDA conducts raids on herbal companies that dare to tell the truth about their herbal products, like the fact that astragalus supports immune function? (http://www.naturalnews.com/027303_t…) Well, why isn’t the FDA threatening PepsiCo, Kraft Foods, Unilever and Kellogg with the confiscation of their products that are being sold through these fraudulent labeling claims?

In other words, why does the FDA threaten companies that tell the truth on their labels, but it completely ignores (influential) companies that lie on their labels? If the FDA had any real credibility left, it would have sent nasty warning letters to these big food companies long ago, threatening their CEOs with criminal arrest and prosecution, confiscating their products, shutting down their companies and listing them on the FDA website as violators of federal law.

But that never happened. Care to guess why? The answer, as you well know, is because in the food and drug industries, MONEY TALKS. The companies with the big bucks get a wink and a nod instead of a threatening letter. In fact, it was only after a huge public outcry forcing the FDA’s hand that these food companies decided to flee the Smart Choice labeling program at all. Had nobody raised a stink about it, absolutely zero enforcement action would have taken place.

Food companies will get away with everything the public lets them get away with. They will use dangerous chemical additives in their products, they’ll target children with obesity-promoting sugary cereals, they’ll engage in blatant labeling fraud to promote junk products as “smart,” they’ll use clever packaging illusions to make a small quantity of food look larger, and they’ll even lobby lawmakers in Washington to stop the passage of any new laws that might hamper their ability to keep on selling disease-promoting products to a gullible population of hungry (but nutritionally deficient) consumers.

The only way to stop these crooks is to stand up and shout the truth about what’s they’re trying to shove down our throats. From processed white sugar via genetically modified sugar beets to snack chips laced with monosodium glutamate, these companies are in the business of selling poison to a population that’s already among the sickest in the world.

When will the criminal investigations begin?

What we really need in America goes way beyond any labeling program. What we really need is an army of deputized nutritional investigators to arrest and prosecute these food company executives for poisoning our children with aspartame, MSG, chemical food additives and nutrient-depleted processed ingredients like sugar and white flour. We need food company executives to start serving jail time for the crimes of negligence they’ve committed against our people.

People have a right to nutritious food. When they are forced to eat from a national food supply that makes them diseased and nutrient deficient, that’s a crime. When sodas and junk foods are sold in vending machines in public schools, that’s a crime against children. And when food companies engage in blatant marketing fraud to try to push their dangerous, disease-causing products onto gullible consumers, that’s a violation of federal labeling laws and should be prosecuted as such.

It’s time we took the crooked food companies to task. It’s time we demanded honest, nutritious food that prevents disease and supports both mental and physical health. And as long as we tolerate the shenanigans of both the FDA and the big food companies it is protecting, we’ll never get a national food supply that promotes a healthy population.

Here are some things you might want to check out to learn more:

This report from Yale University researchers details the marketing of sugary cereals to children:
http://www.cerealfacts.org/media/Ce…

Be sure to watch the movie Food, Inc.:
http://www.foodincmovie.com/

You’ll find the trailer on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eKY…

Reposted from NaturalNews.

At first blush, global warming seems to be a great hook for those of us promoting animal-friendly eating, but there are two problems:

1. Offering accurate information. Many people say that meat is the leading cause of global warming. But this is not true; the production of meat is not the leading cause of greenhouse gases — only more than transportation. From:

http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140673607612562
Food, livestock production, energy, climate change, and health

Although the main human source of greenhouse-gas emissions is combustion of fossil fuels for energy generation, non-energy emissions (including from agriculture and land-use changes) contribute more than a third of the total greenhouse-gas emissions worldwide.

And elsewhere:

Greenhouse-gas emissions from the agriculture sector account for about 22% of global total emissions; this contribution is similar to that of industry and greater than that of transport. Livestock production (including transport of livestock and feed) accounts for nearly 80% of the sector’s emissions.

So livestock comes after energy generation and industry. And that is only globally; from the Salon article referenced below:

Here in the U.S., livestock’s impact is not quite so extreme: Six percent of our greenhouse gases come from livestock production, compared with 19 percent from cars, light trucks and airplanes.

See more here (scroll down to the update).

As we’ve said elsewhere, no meat eater is actively seeking to be a vegetarian; rather, people are looking for a reason to dismiss us. When we exaggerate or lie, that is all that is remembered — not the underlying reality. That worldwide meat production contributes more to global warming than all of transportation is accurate and striking; there is no reason to exaggerate.

2. The expected impact in the public mind, and how it thus actually affects animals. When the public hears “livestock” (as in “livestock causes more global warming than transportation”), they think cattle, and the conclusion is that they should eat less beef. Even when people hear “meat … global warming,” they think burping (or flatulent) cows. (Of course, the news is written by, and the media run by, meat eaters. So they will always choose the side that is least challenging to their habits / the status quo.)

For those that look into the science and aren’t already vegan, concern for global warming leads almost inevitably to more chickens being eaten (it takes about 190 chickens to provide the same number of meals as one steer; see “Suffering per Kilogram” and “Farm Animal Welfare, Legislation, and Trade” (pdf).

For example, from:

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/10/22/peta/index.html

“Astonishingly enough,” says study coauthor Gidon Eshel, a Bard College geophysicist, “the poultry diet is actually better than lacto-ovo vegetarian.” In other words, a roast chicken dinner is better for the planet than a cheese pizza.

How about going vegan?

The average American is responsible for about 26 tons annually, so if the entire U.S. population went vegan, we’d reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by only 6 percent.

The vast majority of that 6 percent is from cutting out beef and dairy. (The entire article is worth reading for how “informed” opinion plays this out.)

Similarly:

Food-Miles and the Relative Climate Impacts of Food Choices in the United States
Environ. Sci. Technol. In press

Different food groups exhibit a large range in GHG-intensity; on average, red meat is around 150% more GHG-intensive than chicken or fish. Thus, we suggest that dietary shift can be a more effective means of lowering an average household’s food-related climate footprint than “buying local.” Shifting less than one day per week’s worth of calories from red meat and dairy products to chicken, fish, eggs, or a vegetable-based diet achieves more GHG reduction than buying all locally sourced food.

The LA Times shows “replace beef with chicken” in action:

“No hamburger patties?” asked an incredulous football player, repeating the words of the grill cook. He glowered at the posted sign: ‘Cows or cars? Worldwide, livestock emits 18% of greenhouse gases, more than the transportation sector! Today we’re offering great-tasting vegetarian choices.’ “Just give me three chicken breasts, please,” he said….

Here is another example. A final data point is that if Al Gore — who believes global warming is an existential risk — won’t change, it would appear that global warming/veg isn’t an incredibly compelling argument for veganism (see here, and comments).
My general impression (and I know there are exceptions to this and all arguments) is that global warming is another argument that makes sense to us, and makes us think, “Here is a great, self-interested hook I can use to convince others of veganism’s superiority!” But it isn’t a question of whether veganism is the best diet for addressing global warming (as far as I can tell, it is). The bottom line has to be the actual impact of the message we choose to present. In other words: we shouldn’t seek out and use arguments that seem to support veganism — veganism isn’t the point. If we take suffering seriously, we must seek to present a message that reduces the most suffering.

As Nobel Laureate Herb Simon discovered, human psychology / decision making is often determined by ‘good enough.’ People don’t hear about a concern (especially a relatively abstract issue like global warming) and take it to the fullest extent — e.g., stop driving at all — but rather, those motivated enough will do something (drive a bit less, drive a more fuel-efficient car) and feel good that they are doing something. (The same has held true for “the health argument“)

In this case, though, doing “something” means eating a lot more chickens. We can say, “But being vegan is even better!” till we’re blue in the face, but experience shows that this is effective only in the rarest of cases; the vast majority of people who will be moved at all about global warming are happy to be ‘taking action’ by eating a lot more chickens. (And it is the cattle industry that is worried about the global warming / diet argument, not the poultry industry — the latter loves anything that badmouths beef.)

Although the global warming / food connection seems clear to us and appears to justify our veganism, the bottom line is how it actually plays out in people’s minds via the actual media. When used on its own, I fear that the diet / global warming angle does significantly more harm (more chickens eaten) than good (people actually going veg who otherwise wouldn’t have if exposed to the realities of modern agribusiness).

For this reason, I think that we should be very careful how we use global warming. It is a hot topic, so it gives us an “in” with the media and environmental groups. But if we present it on its own, given human psychology, the case is almost always going to have the bottom line of eating more chickens. In my opinion, the global warming / diet connection does more harm than good when presented on its own, but can work as a hook to capture attention and allow us to draw attention to the horrors of modern agribusiness, with a special focus on cruelty to chickens.

PS On a related topic, there is growing recognition that increased usage of certain biofuels will exacerbate global hunger (e.g., http://tinyurl.com/5wmh3y). Of course, the same argument of resource usage can be made regarding using crops as animals feed (e.g., http://tinyurl.com/2lvbww) — according to the FAO, only 100m tonnes of cereal crops go to biofuel, while 760m tonnes go to animal feed — and the latter figure isn’t even counting soy. As pointed out here:

There is plenty of food. It is just not reaching human stomachs. Of the 2.13bn tonnes likely to be consumed this year, only 1.01bn, according to the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization, will feed people…. But there is a bigger reason for global hunger, which is attracting less attention only because it has been there for longer. While 100m tonnes of food will be diverted this year to feed cars, 760m tonnes will be snatched from the mouths of humans to feed animals — which could cover the global food deficit 14 times. If you care about hunger, eat less meat.

Keep in mind, however, that beef is much, much less efficient than chicken (and eggs) — see, again, the Salon article:

Welcome, then, the savior of environmentally concerned carnivores everywhere: the chicken. Unlike cattle, chickens don’t burp methane. They also have an amazing ability to turn a relatively small amount of grain into a large amount of protein. A chicken requires 2 pounds of grain to produce a pound of meat, compared with about 6 pounds of grain for a feedlot cow and 3 pounds for a pig. Poultry waste produces only about one-tenth of the methane of hog and cattle manure.

Like thousands of activists over the past decades, I’d love to think there is some perfect, logical, self-interested argument that won’t just vindicate my veganism, but will convince large numbers of people to go vegan, while not leading others to eat more chickens. But this is not the case — there just aren’t lots of people out there who secretly want to be vegan but just need that one statistic. For nearly everyone, any change away from the status quo is difficult and resisted. As much as we’d love to argue otherwise, in response to health or environmental arguments, the first, easiest, most convenient, and socially acceptable step is to eat more chickens.

It is worth briefly considering why health and environmental arguments seem to be more easily “accepted” by people, and why most individuals are resistant and defensive when faced with the cruelty argument. Much of this could well be that health choices are personal (and easily overridden by habit, convenience, etc, even in the face of severe health issues), while environmental concerns are abstract and easily assuaged by taking some action (new lightbulbs, recycling) from the laundry list of suggested actions (“No one’s perfect!”).

The obvious cruelty and vicious brutality of factory farms, however, is both real, immediate, undeniable, and clearly an ethical challenge to our view of ourselves. For these reasons, the animals’ suffering can’t be easily dismissed and forgotten; thus it is important for meat eaters to avoid the issue as much as possible (and to make the messenger the issue, whenever possible). For the same reason, it is incumbent on us, as animal advocates, to actually advocate the animals’ case, so that no one can avoid facing the hidden reality.

As I’ve written elsewhere:

I’m not fooling myself – I know that exposing what goes on in factory farms and slaughterhouses isn’t going to reach everyone. But feel-good arguments that avoid the horrors of meat production are easily dismissed, and thus simply not compelling enough. We don’t want people to nod in agreement and continue on as before. It is far better if 95% of people turn away revolted and 5% open their minds to change, than if everyone smiles politely and continues on to McDonald’s for a chicken sandwich.

Let me repeat: Trying to appeal to everyone hasn’t worked, and it won’t work. It is well past time to give up the fantasy that there is some perfect self-centered argument that will magically compel everyone to change.

In deciding what to present to the public, our criteria shouldn’t be, “Does this seem to denigrate (some) meat and/or support veganism?” We shouldn’t be trying to justify our diet — we need to stand up for the animals. We don’t get to determine how people should react; we must consider how our chosen argument will actually play out to the general public and through the media. We must set aside our personal biases and needs, and honestly ask, “Is this the argument that will alleviate as much suffering as possible?” The animals are counting on us.

Reprinted from Vegan Outreach.

With April being a cold month in Toronto so far, it is hard to feel too concerned about global warming. But it is worth noting that the greenhouse effect can cause weather extremes in both directions.

Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth won an Oscar for best documentary in 2006. The clear message in this ground-breaking movie is that governments, industry and people must cut down on fossil fuel use, and soon.

We can also play a powerful role for positive change by adjusting what we eat. Global climate change is directly related to agriculture through the loss of wilderness to farmland, methane released from animals, and energy-intensive fertilizers, pesticides, food processing and transportation.

By eating low on the food chain, locally-grown and organic, you can make a significant difference.

Why didn’t Gore mention anything about agriculture in the movie? 

Likely Gore wanted to keep the message focused, and targeted to the political situation in the U.S.

The more in-depth book version of An Inconvenient Truth, does suggest buying local and eating less meat. On page 317 it says:

Americans consume almost a quarter of all the beef produced in the world. Aside from health issues associated with eating lots of meat, a high-meat diet translates into a tremendous amount of carbon emissions. It takes far more fossil-fuel energy to produce and transport meat than to deliver equivalent amounts of protein from plant sources.

In addition, much of the world’s deforestation is a result of clearing and burning to create grazing land for livestock. This creates further damage by destroying trees that would otherwise absorb carbon dioxide. Fruits, vegetables, and grains, on the other hand, require 95% less raw materials to produce and, when combined properly, can provide a complete and nutritious diet. If more Americans shifted to a less meat-intensive diet, we could greatly reduce CO2 emissions and also save vast quantities of water and other precious natural resources.”

When the movie was made, the role of diet may not have been as well known as it is now. An important report released in Nov. 2006 by the United Nations Food & Agriculture Organization shows that livestock production is responsible for an incredible 18 percent of human induced greenhouse gas emissions worldwide – more than all of the world’s motor vehicles.

Agriculture plays a significant role

Agriculture emits carbon dioxide through transportation, fertilizer production and the energy used for factory farming.

Deforestation (partly to clear land for agriculture) is responsible for 13% of climate change through the release of stored carbon dioxide. Methane causes 17.3% of climate change due to livestock digestion, animal manure, rice paddies, dams, fossil fuel extraction, and landfills. Nitrous Oxide (N₂O) accounts for 5.4% mostly due to fertilizers.

Surprisingly, the actual burning of fossil fuels accounts for only 39% of climate change mostly from cars, industry and heating homes. (This accounts for 75% of CO₂ emissions. The rest is due to deforestation.)

Figures are from Story Weather: 101 Solutions to Global Warming, by Guy Dauncey, 2001

Deforestation

At least 13% of climate change is due to cutting down or burning forests. A lot of forest is cleared for agriculture, especially in rainforest regions.

The photo to the right is a satellite image of the Brazilian State of Rondonia. Intact wilderness is dark green. Farms and recently deforested areas are lighter colours.

Satellite data shows that 600 fires were started each day on average during 2004 to clear land for farming. The rate of destruction has doubled in the last decade. Rainforests are home to one third of land species.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7547087 (picture 5)

Burning of fossil fuel

About 39% of climate change is due to using oil, natural gas and other fuels. Some of this energy is used for the processing, packaging, refrigeration, and transportation of food, factory farms, and the production of fertilizers and pesticides.

A 2002 Worldwatch report says that a typical meal made with ingredients from a supermarket takes four to 17 times more petroleum consumption in transport than the same meal made from local ingredients. And a head of lettuce grown in California and shipped nearly 3,000 miles to Washington, D.C., requires about 36 times as much fossil fuel energy in transport as it provides in food energy when it arrives.

In terms of production, animal foods demand a lot more energy than plant foods. According to one study, meat production requires 10 to 20 times more energy per edible tonne than grain production. Growing feed crops requires extensive energy for ploughing, harvesting, pumping irrigation water, transportation, and producing fertilizer and pesticides. Once grown, the crops are dried and processed using additional energy.

Furthermore, the housing of pigs and chickens in huge windowless sheds requires energy for artificial ventilation, conveyor belts and electric lighting. Slaughterhouses are also energy intensive.

For harvesting fish, extensive energy and resources go into building, maintaining and fueling fleets of trawlers.

Methane

Methane is responsible for 17.3% of climate change. The high percentage is due to the fact that methane is 23 times more potent than CO₂. The good news is that its warming effect only lasts 10 years compared to 100 years for carbon dioxide. Scaling back methane emissions will lead to a quicker reduction in climate change due to the shorter lag time.

Livestock digestion (i.e. burps and farts from cows and sheep) accounts for 18% of total global methane emissions, and factory farm waste lagoons account for a further 7% of emissions. Combined, these two sources equal 4.3% of total climate change. Other sources include dams (accounting for 20% of emissions), fossil fuel extraction (20%) and landfills (10%). Rice paddies account for around 10%, but rice is a staple food for a lot more people (half the world’s population) than cow meat is, and BBC reports that there are varieties of rice being developed that emit much less methane.

Dams are often built to hold water for irrigating crops – especially feed crops such as corn and soy. In Alberta, most large rivers have been dammed for the main purpose of collecting water for irrigation.

Nitrous Oxide

Nitrous Oxide (N₂O) is a powerful greenhouse gas that accounts for 5.4% of climate change. It has one of the longest atmosphere lifetimes of the greenhouse gases, lasting for up to 150 years. Since the Industrial Revolution, the level of nitrous oxide in the atmosphere has increased by 16%.

About 70% of human induced N₂0 emissions is due to the widespread use of nitrogen-based fertilizers. Tilling soil, transportation and industry make up much of the rest.

Farming practices and the loss of CO₂ from soil

In Canada and United States, farming practices amount to 8% of climate change due to the release of methane, CO₂, and N₂O. This figure doesn’t include deforestation when new farms are created. In the rest of the world, where there are fewer cars and industry, farming accounts for a much higher percentage of climate change.

Tilling soil causes carbon dioxide to be released. There are roughly 44 tons of C0₂ in an acre of healthy soil. Tilling a field releases up to 4 tons of CO₂ per acre. The United States has lost a third of the original topsoil since settlement.

Every year, the planet’s soils absorb roughly 50 billion tonnes of carbon from decaying vegetation and release 50 billion tonnes through decomposition. But forest destruction and farming weakens the soil, causing 1.5 billion tonnes to be lost to the atmosphere. It is estimated that about 7% of CO₂ in the atmosphere is from carbon that has been lost from soil.

Photo: Healthy soil is full of life and capable of absorbing carbon dioxide.

What you can do

Eat low on the food chain

Moving toward a vegetarian diet is the most powerful food choice you can make to reduce climate change. A meat-based diet uses far more agricultural land than a vegetarian diet because domesticated animals must also be fed. Taking individual weights into account, food animals outweigh people in North America by a factor of four to one! All these animals need food, water and transportation. Most of our farmland is dedicated to feeding them.

By curtailing our meat consumption we could free up millions of acres of agricultural land that could be returned to forest and wild prairie, absorbing tons of CO₂ in the process.

Using less farmland also means less soil erosion, less irrigation water, less pesticide, less N₂O emissions, and less fossil fuel for farm machinery and fertilizer production.

The United Nations Food & Agriculture Organization issued a stunning report on global warming in Nov. 2006. Livestock production is responsible for more climate change gasses than all the motor vehicles in the world. In total, it is responsible for 18 percent of human induced greenhouse gas emissions. It is also a major source of land and water degradation.

A recent study at the University of Chicago, found that a vegan diet is the most efficient, saving a ton and a half of CO₂ or equivalents per year when compared to a standard North American diet. By comparison, the average American car driver emits 1.9 to 4.7 tons of carbon dioxide, depending on the vehicle model and fuel efficiency. The study found that red meat and, surprisingly, fish were responsible for the highest emissions. Most seafood undergoes energy-intensive long-distance travel from ocean to market. Energy used for food production accounts for about 17 percent of all fossil fuel used in the United States. Furthermore, livestock production emits greenhouse gases not associated with fossil-fuel combustion, primarily methane and nitrous oxide.

Also see Meat production’s environmental toll,
and Fish & seafood – the environmental costs

Eat locally grown and organic

Buying locally grown food greatly reduces the energy and resources necessary to transport and store foods. Typically, produce from Mexico or California is shipped in refrigerated trucks. When you buy long-distance food part of the price you pay is for fuel and the truck. Fresh food from other continents is typically flown in by airplanes. Planes require staggering amounts of fuel to lift produce and meat into the air and across oceans.

Buying organic foods supports farmers that are using alternatives to nitrogen-based and petroleum-based fertilizers. Organic farming methods also tend to be more gentle on the soil, helping to reduce soil erosion and CO2 emissions from soil.

See Eating Local and Organic

Reduce food and packaging waste

A 2004 study, from the University of Arizona, found that half of all food ready for harvest never gets eaten. The average family of four throws out $600 worth of good food every year.

There is a huge opportunity to reduce this wastage by adjusting shopping, storage and eating habits. For example, eating leftovers is a great way to reduce the amount of garbage that ends up being trucked to landfill sites. Landfills emit methane, and food wastage requires more agricultural land.

Look for foods that require little or no packaging, such as whole fruits, vegetables, and bulk dry goods. By eating vegetarian meals, you can avoid animal products that tend to require more energy for processing, packaging, and refrigeration than plant-based foods.

See Minimizing wastage for simple ways to reduce waste.

Story Weather: 101 Solutions to Global Warming, by Guy Dauncey, 2001

In July 4, 2006, Guy Dauncey (earthfuture.com) informed us that “all emissions related to food, including CO2, methane from cattle, and nitrous oxides from fertilizing, are included in both Kyoto and national greenhouse gas emissions figures.”

Reprinted from the Toronto Vegetarian Association.

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommerical-No Derivative Works 2.l5 License.

These facts are not surprising to anyone who has spent time around these social, playful animals. Pigs, who have a great sense of smell and can live into their teens, are protective of their young and form bonds with other pigs. Pigs are clean animals, but they do not have sweat glands, so they take to the mud to stay cool and ward off flies.(3,4)

Problems With Factory Farms

Only pigs in movies spend their lives running across sprawling pastures and relaxing in the sun. On any given day in the United States, there are nearly 63 million pigs in factory farms, and 104 million are killed for food each year.(5,6) Factory-farming conditions are no better in Canada, which exports more than 8 million live pigs to the U.S. for slaughter each year.(7) In 2003, managers of Canada’s largest pig exporter faced cruelty-to-animals charges after 10,000 dead and dying pigs were found on the company’s farms. Investigators found dead pigs stacked behind barns and dead piglets in manure tanks, and all the live pigs “were in some form of distress.”(8)

Mother pigs (sows)-who account for more than 6 million of the pigs in the U.S.-spend most of their lives in individual “gestation” crates.(9) These crates are about 7 feet long and 2 feet wide-too small for them even to turn around.(10) After giving birth to piglets, sows are moved to “farrowing” crates, which are wide enough for them to lie down and nurse their babies but not big enough for them to turn around or build nests for their young.(11)

Piglets are separated from their mothers when they are as young as 10 days old. Once her piglets are gone, each sow is impregnated again, and the cycle continues for three or four years before she is slaughtered.(12,13) This intensive confinement produces stress- and boredom-related behaviors, such as chewing on cage bars and obsessively pressing against water bottles.(14,15)

After they are taken from their mothers, piglets are confined to pens until they are separated to be raised for breeding or meat.(16) Every year in the United States, 50 million male piglets are castrated (usually without anesthesia) because people who eat pork complain of “boar taint” in meat that comes from intact animals.(17) Perhaps because of the tremendous pain caused by the procedure, castration is thought to have long-term negative effects on piglets. Research conducted by Europe’s food safety agency found that castrated piglets tended to spend less time with their mothers and other piglets; according to one Norwegian researcher, “Sometimes they get depressed.”(18) Norway banned piglet castration without anesthesia in 2002, and the procedure will be prohibited entirely as of 2009.(19)

Because they, too, are extremely crowded and prone to stress-related behaviors (such as cannibalism and tail-biting), farmers chop off piglets’ tails and use pliers to break off the ends of their teeth-without any pinkillers.(20) For identification purposes, farmers also cut out chunks of the young animals’ ears.(21)

Transportation and Slaughter

Farms all over North America ship piglets (called “feeder pigs”) to Corn Belt states such as Illinois and Indiana for “growing” and “finishing.” When they are transported on trucks, piglets weighing up to 100 pounds are given no more than 2.4 square feet of space, and farmers are warned that the piglets “probably will get sick within a few days after arrival.”(22) One study confirmed that vibrations, like those made by a moving truck, are “very aversive” to pigs. When pigs “were trained to press a switch panel to stop for 30 seconds vibration and noise in a transport simulator … the animals worked very hard to get the 30 seconds of rest.”(23)

Once pigs reach “market weight” (about 250 to 270 pounds), the industry refers to them as “hogs” and they are sent to be slaughtered. The animals are shipped from all over the U.S. and Canada to slaughterhouses, most of which are in the Midwest. According to industry reports, more than 1 million pigs die en route to slaughter each year.(24) There are no laws to regulate the duration of transport, frequency of rest, or provisions of food and water for the animals.(25,26) Pigs tend to resist getting into the trailers, which can be made from converted school buses or multidecked trucks with steep ramps, so workers use electric prods to move them along. There are no federal laws to regulate the voltage or use of electric prods on pigs, and a study showed that when electric prods were used, pigs “vocalized, lost their balance and tr[ied] to jump out of the loading area” and that their “[h]eart rate and body temperature was significantly higher … when compared to pigs loaded using a hurdle [movable chute].”(27) A former pig transporter told PETA that pigs are “packed in so tight, their guts actually pop out their butts-a little softball of guts actually comes out.”(28) When a transport truck owned by Smithfield Foods-the largest pork producer in the world-and loaded with 180 pigs flipped over in Virginia, many pigs were killed in the accident, while others lay along the side of the road, injured and dying. PETA officials arrived on the scene and offered to humanely euthanize the injured animals, but Smithfield refused to allow the suffering animals a humane death because it is illegal to sell the flesh of animals who have been euthanized.(29)

A typical slaughterhouse kills about 1,000 hogs per hour.(30) The sheer number of animals killed makes it impossible for pigs’ deaths to be humane and painless. Because of improper stunning, many hogs are alive when they reach the scalding-hot water baths, which are intended to soften their skin and remove their hair.(31) The U.S. Department of Agriculture documented 14 humane-slaughter violations at one processing plant, where inspectors found hogs who “were walking and squealing after being stunned [with a stun gun] as many as four times.”(32) An industry report explains that “continuous pig squealing is a sign of … rough handling and excessive use of electric prods.” The report found that the pigs at one federally inspected slaughter plant squealed 100 percent of the time “because electric prods were used to force pigs to jump on top of each other.”(33) A PETA investigation found that workers at an Oklahoma farm were killing pigs by slamming the animals’ heads against the floor and beating them with a hammer.(34)

Health Problems Caused by Eating Pork

The consumption of pork and other animal products has been linked to cancers of the mouth, throat, colon, and stomach.(35,36,37) A study of more than 90,000 women concluded that “frequent consumption of bacon, hot dogs, and sausage was … associated with an increased risk of diabetes.”(38) However, those pork products are on the daily menu for 25 percent of kids between the ages of 19 months and 2 years.(39) According to another study, the children of pregnant women who consume cured meats on a daily basis run a “substantial risk of [growing a] paediatric brain tumour.”(40)

Every year in the United States, food poisoning sickens up to 76 million people and kills 5,000.(41) Pork products are known carriers of foodborne pathogens: One study found that more than 50 percent of the tested samples of ham were contaminated with staphylococcus, and another study determined that “traditional salting, drying and smoking of raw pork meat was not antimicrobiologically effective” against Salmonella typhimurium.(42)

Because crowding creates an environment conducive to the spread of disease, pigs in factory farms are fed and sprayed with huge amounts of pesticides and antibiotics. The pesticides and antibiotics remain in their bodies and are passed on to people who eat them, creating serious human health hazards. Pigs and other factory-farmed animals are fed 20 million pounds of antibiotics each year, and scientists believe that meat-eaters’ involuntary consumption of these drugs is giving rise to strains of bacteria that are resistant to treatment.(43)

Environmental Hazards

Each factory-farmed pig produces about 9 pounds of manure per day.(44) As a result, many tons of waste end up in giant pits in the ground or on crops, polluting the air and groundwater. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, agricultural runoff is the number one source of pollution in our waterways.(45) A Missouri-based hog farm had to pay a $1 million fine for illegally dumping waste, which caused the contamination of a nearby river and the deaths of more than 50,000 fish.(46) Smithfield Foods was fined $12.6 million for polluting the Pagan River with phosphorous-contaminated wastewater from its slaughter plant.(47)

Pigs and other farmed animals are the primary consumers of water in the U.S.; a single pig may require up to 21 gallons of drinking water per day.(48) Eighty percent of agricultural land in the U.S. is used to grow food to meet the needs of pigs and other factory-farmed animals.(49) In the “finishing” phase alone, during which pigs grow from 100 to 240 pounds, each hog consumes more than 500 pounds of grain, corn, and soybeans; this means that across the U.S., pigs eat tens of millions of tons of feed every year.(50)

What You Can Do

Stop factory-farming abuses by supporting legislation that abolishes intensive-confinement systems. Florida and Arizona voters have banned the use of gestation crates, as have voters in the United Kingdom.(51,52)

Stop giving your money to pig farms and slaughterhouses. Vegetarianism and veganism mean eating for life-for your life and for animals’ lives. Call or visit GoVeg.com to order a free vegetarian starter kit.

References

1) “New Slant on Chump Chops,” Cambridge Daily News 29 Mar. 2002.
2) “The Millennium List,” The Times 9 Jan. 2000.
3) M.K. Holder, “Smart Puzzle #3 Pig,” Center for the Integrative Study of Animal Behaviors, Indiana University, 1999.
4) Meg Meier, “Oink, Moo, Quack,” Star Tribune 27 Aug. 2002.
5) National Agricultural Statistics Service, “USDA Quarterly Pigs and Hogs Report: September 2006,” U.S. Department of Agriculture, 29 Sep. 2006.
6) Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, “Pigmeat, Slaughtered/Production Animals (Head) 2002,” 1 Dec. 2006.
7) Lisa Anderson, “Canada Livestock and Products Semi-Annual 2006,” USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, Gain Report 1 Feb. 2006.
Kelly Pedro, “Pigs Found Dead, Dying. Seven Men Have Been Charged Over the Grim Discovery Involving 10,000 Animals,” The London Free Press 15 Sep. 2003.
9) National Agricultural Statistics Service, “USDA Quarterly Pigs and Hogs Report: September 2006,” U.S. Department of Agriculture, 29 Sep. 2006.
10) Marc Kaufman, “In Pig Farming, Growing Concern,” The Washington Post 18 Jun. 2001.
11) Kaufman, “In Pig Farming, Growing Concern.”
12) A.J. Zanella and O. Duran, “Pig Welfare During Loading and Transportation: A North American Perspective,” I Conferencia Virtual Internacional Sobre Qualidade de Carne Suina, via Internet, 16 Nov. 2000.
13) Kaufman, “In Pig Farming, Growing Concern.”
14) Zanella and Duran.
15) Kaufman, “In Pig Farming, Growing Concern.”
16) Glenn Selk, “Managing the Sow and Litter,” Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service, Jul. 2003.
17) Joellen Perry and Mary Jacoby, “These Little Pigs Get Special Care From Norwegians,” The Wall Street Journal 6 Aug. 2007.
18) Perry and Jacoby.
19) Guro Å. Skarstad and Svein O. Borgen, “Norwegian Pig Producers’ View on Animal Welfare,” Norwegian Agricultural Economics Research Institute, Mar. 2007.
20) Selk.
21) L. Michael Neary and Ann Yager, “Methods of Livestock Identification,” Purdue University Department of Animal Sciences, Dec. 2002.
22) John C. Rea and George W. Jesse, “Managing Purchased Feeder Pigs,” Department of Animal Sciences, University of Missouri-Columbia, 1 Oct. 1993.
23) Zanella and Duran.
24) “Research Looks at Transport Losses,” Feedstuffs 17 Apr. 2006.
25) Dennis A. Shields and Kenneth H. Mathews Jr., “Interstate Livestock Movements,” U.S. Department of Agriculture, Jun. 2003.
26) Zanella and Duran.
27) Zanella and Duran.
28) Carla Bennett, “The Joy and Sorrow of Pigs,” Animal Times Fall 1996.
29) Linda McNatt, “25 Hogs Die in Smithfield Truck Accident,” The Virginian Pilot 30 Mar. 2004.
30) Lance Gay, “Faulty Practices Result in Inhumane Slaughterhouses,” Scripps Howard News Service, Feb. 2001.
31) Joby Warrick, “‘They Die Piece by Piece’; In Overtaxed Plants, Humane Treatment of Cattle Is Often a Battle Lost,” The Washington Post 10 Apr. 2001.
32) Warrick.
33) Temple Grandin, “2001 Restaurant Audits of Stunning and Handling in Federally Inspected Beef and Pork Slaughter Plants,” 2002 Meat Institute Animal Handling and Stunning Conference, Colorado State University: Department of Animal Sciences, 2002.
34) Marc Kaufman, “Ex-Pig Farm Manager Charged With Cruelty,” The Washington Post 9 Sep. 2001.
35) F. Levi et al., “Food Groups and Risk of Oral and Pharyngeal Cancer,” International Journal of Cancer 77 (1998): 705-9.
36) F. Levi et al., “Food Groups and Colorectal Cancer Risk,” British Journal of Cancer 79 (1999): 1283-7.
37) P.A. van den Brandt et al., “Salt Intake, Cured Meat Consumption, Refrigerator Use and Stomach Cancer Incidence: A Prospective Cohort Study (Netherlands),” Cancer Causes and Control 14 (2003): 427-38.
38) M.B. Schulze et al., “Processed Meat Intake and Incidence of Type 2 Diabetes in Younger and Middle-Aged Women,” Diabetologia 24 Oct. 2003.
39) T.A. Badger, “Infants, Toddlers Developing Bad Eating Habits, Study Finds,” Associated Press, 26 Oct. 2003.
40) J.M. Pogoda, “Maternal Cured Meat Consumption During Pregnancy and Risk of Paediatric Brain Tumour in Offspring: Potentially Harmful Levels of Intake,” Public Health Nutrition 2 (2001): 1303-5.
41) Paul S. Mead et al., “Food-Related Illness and Death in the United States,” Emerging Infectious Diseases 5.5 (1999): 607-25.
42) P.L. Mertens, “An Epidemic of Salmonella Typhimurium Associated With Traditional Salted, Smoked, and Dried Ham,” Ned Tijdschr Geneeskd 143 (1999): 1046-9.
43) Jeff Donn, “Contaminated Meat Spurs Concern. Study Finds 1 in 5 Market Samples Contained Drug-Resistant Bacteria,” Associated Press, 18 Oct. 2001.
44) “Rains Swell Waste Lagoons at Four Hog Farms,” Associated Press, 1 Dec. 2006.
45) Sen. Tom Harkin, “Animal Waste Pollution in America: An Emerging National Problem,” U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, Dec. 1997.
46) “Cargill Fined $1 Million for Dumping Hog Waste in River,” Associated Press, 20 Feb. 2002.
47) Bob Piazza and Rex Springston, “Smithfield Is Fined $12.6 Million,” Richmond Times-Dispatch 9 Aug. 1997.
48) Theo van Kempen, “Whole Farm Water Use,” North Carolina State University Swine Extension, Jul. 2003.
49) Marlow Vesterby and Kenneth S. Krupa, “Major Uses of Land in the United States, 1997,” Statistical Bulletin No. 973. U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1997.
50) John Carlson, “Evaluation of Corn Processing By-Products in Swine Diets,” Western Illinois University, 3 Apr. 1996.
51) “Arizona Says ‘No’ to Gestation Crates,” PigProgress.net, 9 Nov. 2006.
52) John J. McGlone, “Current Status of Housing and Penning Systems for Sows,” Pork Industry Institute, Texas Tech University, May 2002.

This article was reprinted from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PeTA)

Environmental Health Perspectives Article Implicates Role of Animal Agriculture in Climate Change

An article in the current issue of Environmental Health Perspectives highlights the connection between animal agriculture and the most pressing environmental issue of our time-climate change. Published in the peer-reviewed journal of the U.S. government’s National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, a subdivision of the National Institutes of Health, the piece written by staff members of The Humane Society of the United States will reach public health and environmental experts and policy makers worldwide.

In their article, Gowri Koneswaran, Esq., director of animal agricultural impacts, and Danielle Nierenberg, M.S., animal agriculture and climate change specialist, detail how the farm animal production sector contributes to climate change and global warming during nearly every stage of production-from the greenhouse gases emitted by fertilizer and feed production to the fossil fuels required to operate factory farms and to slaughter and process animals. Koneswaran and Nierenberg discuss a variety of mitigation strategies not only to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but also to improve the welfare of billions of farm animals. These strategies include encouraging more pasture-raised and organic animal agriculture and reducing consumption of meat, eggs, and dairy products to make production more sustainable.

“Although factory farming’s impacts on the environment, public health, and animal welfare are increasingly well-documented, only recently has the animal agriculture sector’s role in climate change been evaluated, and the preliminary findings are staggering,” says Nierenberg. According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, meat, egg, and dairy production accounts for an estimated 18 percent, nearly one-fifth, of human-induced greenhouse gas emissions-a larger share than all transportation combined.

According to Koneswaran, “There is already a growing list of critical reasons to shun industrial animal agribusiness, and that sector’s starring role in climate change is yet another. Choosing non-factory farmed products and reducing consumption of meat, eggs, and milk are two important ways to help lessen the devastating effects of animal farming on climate change.”

Entitled “Global Farm Animal Production and Global Warming: Impacting and Mitigating Climate Change,” the article appears in the May 2008 issue of the journal.

Facts:

• Globally, approximately 56 billion land animals are reared and slaughtered annually for human consumption. Farm animal populations are expected to double by 2050.
• Over the last few decades, factory farming has grown at twice the rate of mixed farming systems (crop and farm animal) and at more than six times the rate of pasture-based systems. Industrial operations account for an estimated 67 percent of poultry production, 50 percent of egg production and 42 percent of pork production.
• Climate change’s far-reaching impacts not only threaten the environment, but also contribute to increased conflict, hunger and disease.

Timeline:

• April 2008-The Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production releases the results of a two-year study, concluding that factory farms pose unacceptable risks to public health, the environment and animal welfare.
• January 2008-Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), stresses the importance of lifestyle changes, including eating less meat, as a way to combat climate change.
• January 2008-National Council for Science and the Environment’s conference “Climate Change: Science and Solutions” includes breakout session on animal agriculture and climate change, organized by staff of The Humane Society of the United States.
• December 2007-On behalf of the IPCC, Dr. Pachauri accepts the Nobel Peace Prize with co-recipient Al Gore “for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change.”
• November 2007-The Humane Society of the United States releases its report, “The Impact of Animal Agriculture on Global Warming and Climate Change,” pointing to the significant roles that meat, egg and dairy production play in climate change and other serious environmental problems.
• September 2007-The Lancet, the world’s leading independent general medical journal, publishes a study that advocates a reduction in meat and milk consumption for residents of high-income countries, both to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and for human health benefits.
• May 2007-The IPCC releases its long-awaited report on climate change science, impacts and mitigation strategies, finding that greenhouse gas emissions have risen due to human activities, with an increase of 70 percent between 1970 and 2004.
• November 2006-The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations releases “Livestock’s Long Shadow: Environmental Issues and Options,” which states that animal agriculture is “one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems” and is a major driver of climate change.

-30-

The Humane Society of the United States is the nation’s largest animal protection organization – backed by 10.5 million Americans, or one of every 30. For more than a half-century, The HSUS has been fighting for the protection of all animals through advocacy, education, and hands-on programs. Celebrating animals and confronting cruelty – On the web at humanesociety.org.

Animal Products Lead to Heart Disease
Heart disease is the number one health problem in the United States, accounting for more than a million heart attacks and a half million deaths every year.(2) Because we now know what causes heart attacks, we can prevent them. In many studies, researchers have found that higher levels of cholesterol are linked to a greater risk of having a heart attack. For every 1 percent increase in the amount of cholesterol in your blood, there is a 2 percent increase in your risk of having a heart attack; conversely, every 1 percent reduction in your cholesterol level reduces your risk by 2 percent.(3)

Thanks to the dedicated efforts of the meat, dairy, and egg industries, many Americans still believe that animal products are necessary for good health. One of the largest studies on lifestyle and health found that heart disease mortality rates for lacto-ovo vegetarian males was only one-third that of meat-eating men.(4) The British Medical Journal published findings from a study concluding that lifelong vegans have a 57 percent reduced risk of death from heart disease.(5)

Plant foods contain no cholesterol, whereas meat, eggs, and dairy products contain large amounts of cholesterol, saturated fats, and concentrated protein-all harmful substances. Also, the high fiber content of a vegetarian diet (meat, dairy products, and eggs are devoid of fiber) helps “wash away” excess cholesterol in your digestive tract.

A vegetarian diet can even reverse damage already done. When Dr. Dean Ornish put patients with coronary artery disease on a low-fat vegetarian diet combined with moderate exercise and relaxation techniques, he found that they reversed the buildup of plaque in their arteries.(6)

Cancer’s Connection to Animal Products
The number one recommendation in the American Cancer Society’s (ACS) Guidelines on Nutrition for Cancer Prevention is to eat a diet “with an emphasis on plant sources.”(7) Researchers have found that vegetarians are between 25 and 50 percent less likely to suffer from cancer, even after controlling for other factors, such as smoking.(8) A recent study by the ACS found that people who ate 3 ounces of meat a day were 30 to 40 percent more likely to develop colon cancer.(9) Researchers for the ACS have also found that while plant foods lower men’s risk of prostate cancer, eating meat raises their risk.(10) Researchers from Yale University report that meat-based diets can cause cancers of the stomach and esophagus, as well as lymphoma (cancer of the lymphatic system).(11,12) Scientists have also found that people who regularly chow down on hot dogs, sausages, or other processed or cured meat suffer from a 70 percent increase in pancreatic cancer rates.(13)
Meat Can Be Poisonous
In addition to causing heart disease and cancer, animal products also contain harmful contaminants-including bacteria, arsenic, dioxins, and mercury-that can affect our health both in the short and long terms.

Every year in the U.S., there are 75 million cases of food poisoning, and 5,000 of these cases are fatal.(14) The overuse of antibiotics in factory farms has caused many of the bacteria found on animal flesh to become antibiotic-resistant. Scientists at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health recently reported that 96 percent of Tyson chicken flesh is contaminated with dangerous antibiotic-resistant campylobacter bacteria.(15) In a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) study, researchers found that 66 percent of beef samples were contaminated with super-bugs resistant to antibiotics.(16) A recent report by the U.S. General Accounting Office warns, “Antibiotic-resistant bacteria have been transferred from animals to humans, and many of the studies we reviewed found that this transference poses significant risks for human health.”(17)

It is not uncommon for farmers to lace chicken feed with arsenic to kill parasites, and some of the arsenic stays in the animals’ flesh. One USDA study concluded, “Eating 2 ounces of chicken per day-the equivalent of a third to a half of a boneless breast-exposes a consumer to 3 to 5 micrograms of inorganic arsenic, the element’s most toxic form.”(18) Daily exposure to low doses of arsenic can cause cancer and other ailments in humans.(19)

Fish flesh is also not a healthy food. Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), residual industrial compounds that can be found in the environment, have caused cancer in animals and skin problems and liver damage in humans.(20) Fish flesh has been found to harbor levels of PCBs thousands of times higher than those in the water in which they live.(21) Researchers at the University of Illinois found that fish-eaters with high levels of PCBs in their blood had difficulty recalling information that they had learned just 30 minutes earlier.(22) Fish also accumulate methylmercury in their bodies, and pregnant women and children have been cautioned not to eat fish that may contain high levels of this toxic substance.(23)

Factory Farming Hurts Animals
Animals are much more intelligent and complex than most people realize, and scientists are providing more and more evidence of this all the time.

According to researchers, cows enjoy mental challenges and feel excitement when they use their intellect to overcome an obstacle. Dr. Donald Broom, a professor at Cambridge University, says that when cows figure out a solution to a problem, “The brainwaves showed their excitement; their heartbeat went up and some even jumped into the air. We called it their Eureka moment.”(24) Scientists now know that pigs have the cognitive skills of 3-year-old human children.(25) Biologists wrote in Fish and Fisheries that fish are “steeped in social intelligence, pursuing Machiavellian strategies of manipulation, punishment and reconciliation, exhibiting stable cultural traditions, and cooperating to inspect predators and catch food.”(26) Chickens form friendships and social hierarchies, recognize one another, develop a pecking order, and even have cultural knowledge that is passed between generations.(27)

Nearly all the animals raised for food in America today spend their lives in factory farms. These animals, who feel pain and fear just as the dogs and cats who share our homes do, are separated from their families and crammed by the thousands into filthy warehouses. They are mutilated without the use of painkillers and deprived of everything that is natural to them-they won’t be permitted to see the sun or breathe fresh air until the day when they are forced onto trucks bound for the slaughterhouse. On the killing floor, many animals are completely conscious and struggling to escape while their throats are cut-and some are still conscious while their bodies are hacked apart or when they are dunked into tanks of scalding-hot water.

Factory Farming Hurts Our Planet
Raising animals for food requires massive amounts of resources. Of all the agricultural land in the U.S., 80 percent is used to raise animals for food and to grow the grain to feed them-that’s almost half the total land mass of the lower 48 states.(28) Chickens, pigs, cattle, and other animals raised for food are the primary consumers of half the water in the U.S.(29)

Each day, factory farms produce billions of pounds of manure, which ends up in lakes, rivers, and drinking water. Farmed animals produce about 130 times as much excrement as does the entire human population of the United States-87,000 pounds of waste per second!(30,31) A California study found that a single dairy cow “emits 19.3 pounds of volatile organic compounds per year, making dairies the largest source of the smog-making gas, surpassing trucks and passenger cars.”(32)

What You Can Do

• Include high-fiber foods in your diet. Whole-wheat bread, brown rice, oats, flax seeds, and vegetables supply fiber, which helps lower cholesterol.
• Avoid dairy products; they contain cholesterol and saturated fats. Calcium can be obtained from beans, broccoli, sesame seeds, and green, leafy vegetables.
• Visit VegCooking.com for delicious eggless, nondairy vegetarian recipes.

• Call 1-888-VEG-FOOD or visit GoVeg.com for a free vegetarian starter kit.References

1) The American Dietetic Association, “Position of the American Dietetic Association and Dieticians of Canada: Vegetarian Diets,” Journal of the American Dietetic Association 103 (2003): 748-65.
2) American Heart Association, “Heart Attack and Angina Statistics,” 3 Oct. 2003.     

3) Neal Barnard, Food for Life (New York: Harmony Books, 1993) 34.
4) R.L. Phillips et al., “Coronary Heart Disease Mortality Among Seventh-Day Adventists With Differing Dietary Habits: A Preliminary Report,” American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 31 (1978): S191-8.
5) M. Thorogood et al., “Plasma Lipids and Lipoproteins in Groups With Different Dietary Practices Within Britain,” British Medical Journal 295 (1987): 351-3.
6) Dean Ornish et al., “Can Lifestyle Changes Reverse Coronary Heart Disease?” The Lancet 336 (1990): 624-6.
7) American Cancer Society, “Cancer Prevention and Early Detection: Facts and Figures, 2004,” 2004.
J. Chang-Claude et al., “Mortality Pattern of German Vegetarians After 11 Years of Follow-Up,” Epidemiology 3 (1992): 389-91.
9) Jessica Heslam, “Don’t Have a Cow, Man: Docs: Meat Hikes Cancer Risk by up to 50 Percent,” Boston Herald 12 Jan. 2005.
10) American Cancer Society, Inc., “‘Good’ Fat Linked to Lower Prostate Cancer Risk,” 29 Sep. 1999.
11) Yale University, “Animal-Based Nutrients Linked With Higher Risk of Stomach and Esophageal Cancers,” news release, 15 Oct. 2001.
12) Daniel DeNoon, “Diet Linked to Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma: Lots of Meat, Saturated Fat, Dairy May Raise Risk,” WebMD Medical News 9 Mar. 2004.
13) “Processed Meat May Cause Pancreatic Cancer,” Xinhua News 22 Apr. 2005.
14) Reuters, “CSPI: Seafood, Eggs Biggest Causes of Food Poisoning in U.S.,” CNN.com 7 Aug. 2000.
15) Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, “Drug-Resistant Bacteria on Poultry Products Differ by Brand,” Johns Hopkins Public Health News Center 16 Mar. 2005.
16) “Drug-Resistant Bacteria Found in U.S. Meat,” Reuters Medical News, 24 May 2001.
17) Dave DeWitte, “Report Urges USDA to Accelerate Study of Livestock Antibiotic Risks for Humans,” The Gazette 26 May 2004.
18) Dennis O’Brien, “Arsenic Used in Chicken Feed May Pose Threat,” The Baltimore Sun 4 May 2004.
19) O’Brien.
20) Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, “ToxFAQs for Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs)” 16 Sep. 2003.
21) Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.
22) Susan Schantz et al., “Impairments of Memory and Learning in Older Adults Exposed to Polychlorinated Biphenyls via Consumption of Great Lakes Fish,” Environmental Health Perspectives June 2001.
23) U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, “What You Need to Know About Mercury in Fish and Shellfish,” brochure, Mar. 2004.
24) Jonathan Leake, “Cows Hold Grudges, Say Scientists,” The Australian 28 Feb. 2005.
25) “New Slant on Chump Chops,” Cambridge Daily News 29 Mar. 2002.
26) “Scientists Highlight Fish ‘Intelligence,’” BBC News, 31 Aug. 2003.
27) Valerie Elliott, “Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road?” Times Online 18 Mar. 2005.
28) Marlow Vesterby and Kenneth S. Krupa, “Major Uses of Land in the United States, 1997″ Statistical Bulletin No. 973, U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1997.
29) Bill McKibben, “Taking the Pulse of the Planet,” Audubon Nov. 1999.
30) Ed Ayres, “Will We Still Eat Meat?” Time 8 Nov. 1999.
31) U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, “Animal Waste Pollution in America: An Emerging National Problem,” Dec. 1997.
32) Jennifer M. Fitzenberger, “Dairies Gear Up for Fight Over Air,” Fresno Bee 2 Aug. 2005.