Food & Diet

Food Sovereignty = People & Planet before profit

Reducing the Carbon Footprint of Food and Encouraging Healthy Eating

Reducing Waste and exploding myths that add to your carbon footprint

Working with Biodiversity &  Understanding Environmental Limits

PARALLEL PROJECTS WITH FRIENDS OF THE EARTH SIERRA LEONE & KINGSTON'S SCHOOLS

SPOUTING SEEDS FOR KINGSTON's SCHOOLS FUNDED BY RBK (Announced July 2008)



More and more grain and vegetable oil which should be used for food is being
turned into biofuels for transport. This means cereals - corn, wheat, bread
and pasta - and vegetable oil are becoming more expensive. It also makes
meat and dairy more expensive, because grain is now turned into ethanol
(biofuel), instead of feeding animals. High food prices are causing hardship
in industrialised countries. In poorer countries, high food prices mean more
people going hungry or starving.

Avoiding GM and monoculture 

 protecting land, protecting ecosystems

 reducing carbon footprint and providing carbon sinks

See our Organics page for additional information

See the UN Food and Agriculture report Livestock's Long Shadow report which found that the livestock industry is one of the most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems the world faces. See a summary on the wikipedia website.  

Friends of the Earth has launched a new Food Chain campaign that aims to change the way that meat and dairy is produced in the UK.  

 

Why Going Vegetarian/Reducing Meat In Your Diet Helps the Planet

"To be truly sustainable as a society, we need to reduce our exploitation of all the world's resources and that includes animals, plus the water and feed they consume".
The Vegetarian Society   

Animal farming uses more land, energy and water than plant-based agriculture. So reducing animal products in your diet can have an impact on your carbon footprint. This is because:

  1. The main source of methane - one of the major greenhouse gases - is farmed animals. There are now three times as many farmed animals as people on the planet.

  2. Farm supplies, animal feed and farmed animals are transported great distances, producing carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide.

  3. Heat and electricity used by slaughterhouses and farms further increases energy demand - currently met by carbon emitting power stations.

Plant-based agriculture is far more efficient. It uses less than a quarter of the land required for a meat-based diet because crops are fed directly to humans and so use fewer resources. For example, the most water-intensive plant crop - soya - uses 2,000 litres of water per kg of food produced, compared to beef, which requires 100,000 litres per kg.

So reducing animal products in your will diet is a very effective way to reduce your carbon footprint. In addition you will also be helping to avoid suffering to thousands of intensively farmed animals -  and improve your health!

As a first step avoid buying battery eggs and opt for eggs labelled 'free range' or 'organic'. Far too many laying hens in the UK are still kept in battery conditions. If you want to go a step further, you can even rehome a hen that's typically spent its life in an area smaller than a sheet of A4 paper - see the Battery Hen Welfare Trust website for further information. For more information about battery cages ands what you can do see the Compassion in World Farming website.

For more information about vegetarian diets see the Vegetarian Society website. To find out more about the link betweem climate change and animal farming and/or to get a free Go Vegan pack see the Animal Aid website