Page 103 - How to Be a Conscious Eater - Making Food Choices That Are Good for You

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THE CONSCIOUS CARNIVORE:

FIRST, LESS. THEN, BETTER.

hen cattle, goats, and sheep burp, fart, and poop, they
emit methane and nitrous oxide. Methane is roughly
W30 times more earth warming than carbon dioxide.
Nitrous oxide is roughly 290 times more potent than carbon
dioxide. Water use is sky-high for livestock, as is land use for
not just raising animals but growing their feed, edging out land
to grow other crops that are often more nutritious and could
be eaten directly. Not to mention cutting down forests (which
store carbon) to make way for more pastureland. This activity
currently occupies an area the size of both North and South
America combined. All together, the whole operation of feeding,
raising, slaughtering, and transporting livestock accounts for
more greenhouse gas emissions than the entire transportation
sector—every plane, train, and automobile combined. These
are some of the reasons why we should eat less meat. And less
red meat in particular.
But there’s more. Those who work in the industrial live-
stock industry or live nearby are exposed to toxic gases—from
ammonia to hydrogen sulfide—released from the waste of fac-
tory farms. The human health effects range from the direct
impacts—children raised near these “farms,” more appropri-
ately dubbed confined animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, are
more likely to develop asthma, for example—to the indirect cli-
mate change impact these farms incur: extreme weather events
and flooding ➔ contaminated water and the spread of disease
➔ disproportionate health burden on low-income families.

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