World Vegan Day 2021
Today is World Vegan Day! I am celebrating by eating carrots - my favourite food.
I have been on-off vegan for years. I stopped buying milk in my early 20s (I get to say that now, I'm so old) and gradually cut out all dairy. Quitting eggs came a bit later. I was less aware of the harm caused to animals and the world in their production. I've not always been perfect but I'm very motivated to eat a plant-based diet.
When I started, animal welfare was the driving force. As a veggie from my teens, I hated the idea of animals suffering. It was learning that male chicks are disposed of in a heartless and gruesome way as a by-product of the industry that finally made me give up eggs.
But involvement in the vegan world soon shows you the other reasons to avoid animal products. The Netflix film Gamechangers focused on the health benefits of a plant based diet. And other films such as What the Health have demonstrated terrible truths about the meat industry. Animals injected with hormones and steroids, which can’t fail to pass along the food chain to humans.
Today, however, it is not the personal health benefits, or the animal welfare arguments that I want to focus on. It is climate change.
I have been on-off vegan for years. I stopped buying milk in my early 20s (I get to say that now, I'm so old) and gradually cut out all dairy. Quitting eggs came a bit later. I was less aware of the harm caused to animals and the world in their production. I've not always been perfect but I'm very motivated to eat a plant-based diet.
When I started, animal welfare was the driving force. As a veggie from my teens, I hated the idea of animals suffering. It was learning that male chicks are disposed of in a heartless and gruesome way as a by-product of the industry that finally made me give up eggs.
But involvement in the vegan world soon shows you the other reasons to avoid animal products. The Netflix film Gamechangers focused on the health benefits of a plant based diet. And other films such as What the Health have demonstrated terrible truths about the meat industry. Animals injected with hormones and steroids, which can’t fail to pass along the food chain to humans.
Today, however, it is not the personal health benefits, or the animal welfare arguments that I want to focus on. It is climate change.
Photo by Gabriel Gurrola on Unsplash
It has been reported that reducing meat consumption is good for the environment. But it's easy to consider the effects of one person's actions as too small to count. Some reports suggest that replacing beef burgers with tofu ones will only have a 3% reduction in carbon emissions. It doesn't really seem worth it, especially if that individual is replacing meat with avocados from Peru and other exotic delicacies which have been flown thousands of miles.
As the COP26 Summit begins, I truly believe that it is through government action that real change can be made. Frank Mitloehner, professor and air quality extension specialist at the University of California and Davis, goes so far as to suggest that putting responsibility on the individual is a distraction from causing bigger changes:
As the COP26 Summit begins, I truly believe that it is through government action that real change can be made. Frank Mitloehner, professor and air quality extension specialist at the University of California and Davis, goes so far as to suggest that putting responsibility on the individual is a distraction from causing bigger changes:
"f we really want to make a difference in carbon emissions we need to change policy. We need to have a cost for carbon that is appropriate. We need to incentivise those who can reduce greenhouse gas emissions to do so,".
Governments must act on behalf of all of us. And it works when they do. Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has managed to successfully implement the Ultra Low Emission Zone - cutting the number of cars in the centre of London by 13,500 per day when it was first introduced in 2019. So successful, today also marks the extension of the Zone, with the ambitious and headline catching stat of saving 600 deaths from pollution each year.
So what's the point in eating more plants and fewer animals if it is only through policy change that significant improvements will be made? Well, consumer power can be pretty powerful. By buying plant-based products, we are voting with our money, creating demand for products that are better for the planet. All of us have to eat everyday. That’s a lot of voting power!
And also, have you heard of climate anxiety? It's that feeling of impending doom, that the world is f**k*d and there’s nothing we can do. I have climate anxiety when I think about the refugee crisis. There are enough reasons for people to have to leave their homes and migrate to different countries. War and persecution affect people in countries too numerous to mention, but when climate change is also causing your town to disappear, devastating weather events mean that food supplies are destroyed and the irresponsible practices of the West are affecting your daily life - then you have to think about finding a new life somewhere else.
My friend Chiara Fabbro is a photographer. She met Ricardo Ortega in Gran Canaria, he is from a generation of fishermen, but there are no fish left.
So what's the point in eating more plants and fewer animals if it is only through policy change that significant improvements will be made? Well, consumer power can be pretty powerful. By buying plant-based products, we are voting with our money, creating demand for products that are better for the planet. All of us have to eat everyday. That’s a lot of voting power!
And also, have you heard of climate anxiety? It's that feeling of impending doom, that the world is f**k*d and there’s nothing we can do. I have climate anxiety when I think about the refugee crisis. There are enough reasons for people to have to leave their homes and migrate to different countries. War and persecution affect people in countries too numerous to mention, but when climate change is also causing your town to disappear, devastating weather events mean that food supplies are destroyed and the irresponsible practices of the West are affecting your daily life - then you have to think about finding a new life somewhere else.
My friend Chiara Fabbro is a photographer. She met Ricardo Ortega in Gran Canaria, he is from a generation of fishermen, but there are no fish left.
"The ever-intensifying effects of industrial fishing have been suffocating the local fishing communities over the course of the last 20 years. "European industrial fishing fleets claim to fish sustainably, but they don't""
With an estimated 82.4 million people already 'forcibly displaced', and the West unwilling to show hospitality and compassion towards those forced to move, it seems only logical that we would work to prevent this from happening.
We must be aware of the interconnectedness of everything. Our consumer choices have an impact on the world.
So, whilst my carrot-eating habits aren't going to change everything, perhaps if all of us ate fewer meat burgers and more carrots, we're showing the government that we want to change. Maybe by discussing our eating-habits and listening to the opinions of others, we can open a dialogue for change. And perhaps by demonstrating the need for change with our shopping habits, governments will realise that the people they represent will support them in policy changes that will see a reduction in the speed of climate-change.
What do you think? Would you swap meaty meals a couple of times a week as a gesture towards change? ​Do you think it's too late and we might as well give up? Or do you think that promoting discussion with people who have different opinions can lead to ripples in a pond? Comment below and continue the dialogue.
We must be aware of the interconnectedness of everything. Our consumer choices have an impact on the world.
So, whilst my carrot-eating habits aren't going to change everything, perhaps if all of us ate fewer meat burgers and more carrots, we're showing the government that we want to change. Maybe by discussing our eating-habits and listening to the opinions of others, we can open a dialogue for change. And perhaps by demonstrating the need for change with our shopping habits, governments will realise that the people they represent will support them in policy changes that will see a reduction in the speed of climate-change.
What do you think? Would you swap meaty meals a couple of times a week as a gesture towards change? ​Do you think it's too late and we might as well give up? Or do you think that promoting discussion with people who have different opinions can lead to ripples in a pond? Comment below and continue the dialogue.
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