To Be or Not to Be... Vegetarian? I say veggo is the way to go!

101 reasons to go veg.- http://www.flex.com... Every year in the UK we feed our livestock enough food to feed 250,000,000 people while in the world 30,000,000 people die of starvation 20 vegetarians can live off the land required by one meat eater Every 3 seconds a child dies of starvation somewhere in the world If Americans reduced their meat consumption by 10% it would free 12,000,000 tons of grain - enough to feed 60,000,000 people (the population of Great Britain) If all Americans became vegetarian, it would free enough grain to feed 600,000,000 people (the population of India) Intensification in animal farming has displaced 1,000,000's of people from their traditional lands - eg. indigenous people in south & central america, native americans in north america & crofters in Great Britain - this is continuing today People displaced from their lands into cities succumb to dietary deficiency, diseases, parasites & opportunistic diseases In third world countries 1 in 10 babies die before their first birthday The UK imports �46,000,000 worth of grain from third world countries to feed our livestock Due to overgrazing 850,000,000 people live on land threatened by desertification & over 230,000,000 already live on land so severely desertified that they are unable to sustain their existence & face imminent starvation 1,000,000,000 people in the west gorging on meat & dairy leave 1,000,000,000 to waste away & 3,500,000,000 teeter on the brink LAND If they continue to clear American forests to raise cattle at the present rate, in 50 years there will be none left 1 acre yields 165 lbs of beef or 20,000 lbs of potatoes 8/10 of cultivated land in the UK is used to grow food for animals (14,732,000 hectares) It takes 16lbs of high protein soya to produce 1 lb of beef Since 1945 in the UK we have lost 95% of flower meadows, 50% of ancient woodlands, 40% of heathlands, 50% of wet lands & 224,000 km of hedgerows all due to animal farming Pressure on land due to meat farming leads to soil erosion 6billion tons/year in the USA If everyone went vegetarian upto 90% of land used for animal farming could be taken out of production & used to replant woodlands, leisure activities etc. 25% of Central america's forests have been destroyed for cattle grazing since 1960 Between 1966-1983 38% of the Amazon rain forest was destroyed for cattle grazing 90% of cattle ranches established on cleared forest land go bankrupt in less than 8 years as the land becomes barren due to nutrient loss & overgrazing Overgrazing by cattle is destroying the land & increasing desertification, nearly 430 million acres in the USA alone has suffered a 25-50% reduction in yield since first grazed An inch of topsoil takes 200-1000 years to develop - yet in the USA they have lost around 1/3 of their prime topsoil in 200 years (around 7 inches) due to animal farming Land will be lost due to rises in sea level due to global warming due to animal farming AIR The destruction of the rainforest by cattle farmers is destroying the lungs of the planet & reducing the worlds capacity to replenish our oxygen supply The 1,300,000,000 cattle in the world emit 60,000,000 tons of methane per year (methane is a greenhouse gas & leads to global warming) Burning of forests, grasslands & agricultural waste associated with animal farming releases 50-100,000,000 tons of methane per year Combining these figures, 25% of methane emissions are due to animal farming (not including the billions of sheep, pigs & poultry so the real figure is much higher) Fertilizer used to grow crops to feed to animals releases nitrous oxide - thought to account for 6% of the greenhouse effect Fertilizer, weedkiller & pesticides sprayed on crops enter the atmosphere creating a noxious carcinogenic cocktail CFCs are released into the air from refrigeration units used to store decomposing flesh (meat), milk & butter - CFCs are destroy the ozone layer Ammonia from animal urine also pollutes the atmosphere CO2 is released by burning oil & petrol in lorries, ships, abattoirs, dairies, factories etc. associated with meat & dairy production Emissions from large chemical plants which produce fertilizer, weedkiller & other agricultural chemicals are also poisoning our air WATER 25 gallons of water to produce 1lb of wheat & 2500 gallons to produce 1lb of meat UK farm animals produce 200,000,000 tonnes of slurry (liquid excrement) every year, the majority of which ends up in our rivers Bloody waste water from abattoirs ends up in our rivers In the USA every second humans produce 12,000 lbs of effluent while farmed animals produce 250,000 lbs Nitrates & pesticides used on crops grown to feed livestock end up in our rivers Meat & dairy farming uses 70 litres of water per day per animal in the UK or 159,250,000,000 litres per year in total The water used to produce 10 lbs of steak is equivalent to the average consumption of water for an entire household for an entire year Depletion of groundwater reserves to grow crops for animals & to supply abattoirs will lead to greater water shortages Aquafers (stores of underground water) in the San Joaquin valley in the USA are being drained at the rate of 500,000,000,000 gallons/year to produce meat 18% of all agricultural land in the world is irrigated & as global warming increases (partly due to animal farming) it will cost $200,000,000 to keep these systems going The water used to produce a 1000 lb beef steer is enough to float a Destroyer battleship The liquid waste from the various parts of the meat & dairy industry flow into the rivers & from there into the seas polluting them & encouraging huge algal blooms to grow EFFICIENCY To produce 1calorie of energy from meat takes 60 calories of petrol, whereas growing grains & legumes to directly feed people produces 20 calories for each calorie of fuel used ( thats 1200 times more efficient) Meat & dairy farming uses billions of gallons of oil to run tractors, fuel ships & lorries (to move animal feed & animals), pump billions of gallons of water to irrigate fields & run slaughterhouses, power refrigeration units to prevent the corpses from decomposing & to power sewage plants to clean up some of the pollution produced Cattle convert only 6% of their energy intake (mainly grains & soya) into flesh, the remaining 94% is wasted as heat, movement (which is why they keep many animals in very close confinement), hair, bones, faeces etc 1lb of beef takes 1 gallon of petrol to produce A family of four eating beef for a year uses enough petrol to run a car for 6 months (obviously depending on how far you drive!) If the full ecological cost of meat was passed onto the consumer - the price would be quadrupled (at least) The EC spends �100,000,000's to subsidise animal production resulting in lakes of unwanted milk & mountains of unwanted meat & butter. This money could be better spent encouraging organic fruit, vegetable & grain production In the USA in 1979 145,000,000 tons of crops were fed to cattle resulting in only 21million tons of animal bodies - the cost of the wasted crops was $20,000,000,000 Between 1950 & 1985 grain production in Europe & the USA increased massively but 2/3 was fed to animals 70% of all grain is fed to animals Eating vast quantities of animal flesh, eggs, milk & butter is a luxury that most of the planet can not afford ANIMALS Fishing with drift (and other modern) nets weakens & destroys ecosystems by indiscriminately killing billions of sea creatures & disrupting the sea bed Fishermen's nets kill 10 times as many other animals as the fish they are hoping to catch Fish caught in nets die an agonising slow death of suffocation Each year 15,000,000,000 land animals are slaughtered for food & an unknown but much larger number of sea creatures (including 1000's of dolphins caught accide