Less meat is good for us and the planet - why are politicians shy to say so?

The case for cutting meat consumption is so compelling that you would think politicians would be less shy about making it. Yet while campaigners warn with increasing urgency that global livestock production is accelerating climate breakdown and causing devastating damage to nature and human health, governments remain reluctant to tackle meat-eating.

Industrial livestock systems designed to extract ever greater commercial value from farmed animals have repeatedly been shown to depend on cruelty to animals and the armies of workers processing them.

Animal foods have been long promoted as superior as the source of “complete” protein, containing in one package all the amino acids we need for the body’s building blocks. Plant food that only contained some of them, or needed to be eaten in combination to obtain all of them, was seen as inferior.

Protein deficiencies are rare in developed countries and most of us, including vegetarians, eat much more than we need. Yet the cultural preferences persist.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/commentisfree/2021/sep/30/less-meat-is-good-for-us-and-the-planet-why-are-politicians-shy-to-say-so

The full article is a good one. Honestly, it is a little pollyannnish. We have yet to eliminate slavery from our food supply (Cough Thai fishing vessels Cough).


For example, a farm in Spain might supply oranges to a distributor who then on-sells to a grocery chain in the UK and a grocery chain in Australia. The Australian and British customers may ask the distributor to complete a questionnaire. The distributor will need to ask its farmers what the status ogf their indentured workforce. – including the farm in Spain. The farm in Spain may not be able to use slaves for production that goes to those distributors.