So, during this lockdown, one of my personal missions is to learn a bit more about Climate Change. I’ve never been particularly ‘sciencey’, but I want to understand why it’s good to make some choices and not so good to make others. The first of these choices that I wanted to look at was not eating beef. Now, I know that beef isn’t great for the planet, I know that health professionals don’t recommend eating very much of it, and I know that cows fart a lot, but I don’t really know what any of that has to do with the planet. So, here’s some stuff that I have learnt about cows and beef production.
There are over 1.5 billion cows on the planet, and they take up roughly 30% of the land on earth. Cows belong to a family of mammals called Ruminants, which includes cows, sheep, goats, calves and deer. In ruminants, a byproduct of their digestion is methane (CH4), which is a greenhouse gas (like carbon dioxide (C02)). This means that when cows eat, they burp and fart which releases methane into the atmosphere. Methane, like all greenhouse gases, traps the heat of the sun in our atmosphere, which has a warming effect on the earth. The problem is that methane is about 25x more powerful than carbon dioxide at trapping heat. Despite this, methane gas emissions have increased by 150% since the turn of the 19th century. So where do cows fit into this? According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN in 2006, ‘the livestock sector generates more greenhouse gas emissions than transport’ – that’s the whole transport sector put together!
So cows produce methane by burping and farting, but what else is there? Well, part of the reason that they produce so much methane is because of their diets. Before the 1970’s, most cows were grass fed, but as demand for beef grew, their diets changed to things like corn, which they find harder to digest. This diet also requires a lot of land and fertiliser in order to grow enough for all the cows – it takes 8x as much land to feed cows as it does to feed humans. Cow feed is also one of the number one causes of deforestation, as more and more fields are needed to grow food to feed the cows in order to meet demand for beef. Cows also use a lot of water, with 30% of the world’s water going to livestock.
That’s just the bit before cows are slaughtered, which I won’t be talking about (because we all know what that entails really). The crucial take away from this information is that it is the increasing demand for beef that is making cows such a big problem for the planet. If the demand for beef is lower, then there are fewer cows on the planet, which results in less methane, less land being taken up , less water useage, less deforestation etc. There are advancements being made in what cows eat, as a change in diet could help them to produce less methane, but overall, the most obvious answer seems to be for everyone to lower their beef consumption. Now, I’m not saying that everyone has to give up beef altogether, but even one less beef based meal a week would be a help.
So that was the sciency bit, so next time you hear from me I’ll be talking about ways to reduce your beef intake, or cut it out altogether if that’s something you want to do!
Sources:
The Truth about Hamburgers – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mvvJ-uaEtY&t=190s
The diet that helps fight Climate Change: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUnJQWO4YJY
Cow Farts and Climate Change: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26qzmw_xG58
The hidden costs of Hamburgers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ut3URdEzlKQ
Do Cow Farts really significantly contribute to Global Warming?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Md2M2SKExmI
Waste Makes Waste 