Nearly 10,000 bloggers around the world are taking part in Blog Action Day 2009, discussing this year’s topic, Global Warming, from the perspectives of their individual blogs. Here are my thoughts on meat’s giant carbon footprint.

Mae West once famously said, “Too much of a good thing can be wonderful!” Unfortunately, just about everywhere you look these days, the opposite is proving to be true. Take meat, for instance. America’s growing love affair with meat [and more recently, the developing world’s increasing infatuation with it] is having dire consequences for our health and the health of the planet.

How big is the world’s love of meat? In his 2008 article “Rethinking the Meat-Guzzler,” New York Times food writer Mark Bittman said, “The world’s total meat supply was 71 million tons in 1961. In 2007, it was estimated to be 284 million tons. Per capita consumption has more than doubled over that period. [In the developing world, it rose twice as fast, doubling in the last 20 years.] World meat consumption is expected to double again by 2050.”

What makes these numbers so scary? Consider this. According to Livestock’s Long Shadow, Continue reading “Blog Action Day 2009: Global warming and the meat of the matter” →