Meatless Mondays

I chose to become vegetarian because I wanted to eat lower on the food chain and reduce my environmental foot-print. Now the Toronto Vegetarian Association is promoting Meatless Mondays. The goal of this campaign is to get all the omnivores out there give up meat for one day a week. It was also featured in The Toronto Star.

Now you may be asking yourself how not eating meat can reduce your impact on the planet. Well it's easy. It takes around 6-9lbs of corn to grow 1lbs on beef, you can take this the next step and think about how much water would be needed too. The commercial farming industry has grown so big that fecal matter from farms is starting to pollute ground water and neighbouring farm crops... ever wonder how spinach can get E Coli?
Here are some interesting facts and figures about meat consumption and the environment:

1)
The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) calls the meat industry “one of the most significant contributors to the world’s environmental problems,” including acid rain, deforestation, water and land pollution. According to the FAO, animal agriculture is responsible for 18% of global climate change, more than all forms of transportation.

2)
In 2000 alone, 40 billion chickens – more than six times the human population – were transported using massive amounts of fuel and generating tonnes of pollutants in the process. Going vegetarian would eliminate 1.5 tons of CO2 equivalent gas emissions per person, per year — an even bigger difference than switching from a SUV to a hybrid.

3)
In Canada, it takes seven times more land to feed a non-vegetarian than a vegetarian. With one-third of the world’s cereal harvest and 90 percent of the world’s soy harvest being raised for animal feed, the energy required to grow those crops is a major factor in toxic gas emissions. In the United States and Canada, half of all synthetic fertilizer is used for feed crops.

I'm trying to keep this strictly a green eco-blog, but I want to take this time to mention that even if you are an omnivore there isn't anything wrong with that. I just think that you should take the time to find out as much information as you can about the factory farming system. Chances are the meat on your plate didn't come from a place even remotely resembling what you think of when you think of a farm. If you're going to eat meat you should really be buying from local organic farmer and buy beef that has been grass fed, not grain.


If you're interested on finding out more facts and interesting information on vegetarianism, factory farming, organic farming, GMOs, and the environmental impact they have check out John Robbins book "The Food Revolution".

I guess this big long post makes up for my absence.

Please feel free to leave comments, lets get a dialogue going.