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PETA Points Out That Climate Change, Water Pollution, Resource Depletion and Land Erosion Are All Linked to Consumption of Meat and Dairy Products
For Immediate Release:
23 November 2011
Durban -- Covered from head to toe in bright-green bodypaint, members of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) Asia-Pacific will hold signs reading, "Go Green, Go Vegetarian", outside the Inkosi Albert Luthuli International Convention Centre, the venue for COP17, on Thursday to urge South Africans to switch to a healthy, humane and eco-friendly vegetarian diet:
Date: Thursday, 24 November
Time: 12 noon sharp
Place: Outside the entrance of Albert Luthuli International Convention Centre (ICC), on the corner of Bram Fischer Road and Stalwart Simelane
"The best thing that any of us can do for our health, for animals and for the environment is to go vegetarian", says PETA spokesperson Sarah Harrison. "Whether it's climate change, the overuse of land resources, massive water and air pollution or soil erosion, eating animals is wreaking havoc on the Earth."
The following points are examples of what scientists say about an animal-based diet's threat to the environment:
*A United Nations report concluded that a global shift towards a vegan diet is necessary to combat the worst effects of climate change.
*University of Chicago researchers concluded that switching from a standard meat-based diet to a vegan diet is more effective in the fight against climate change than switching from a standard car to a hybrid.
*A German study concluded that a meat-eater's diet is responsible for more than seven times as much greenhouse-gas emissions as a vegan's diet is.
*Waste, antibiotics and pesticides from factory farms and slaughterhouses contaminate water sources. Farmed animals produce 13 billion metric tonnes of excrement a year -- that's 48 times as much as the world's human population produces.
*Satisfying the world's appetite for animal flesh requires fuel to produce fertiliser for the crops that are fed to animals, petrol to run the trucks that take the animals to slaughter, electricity to freeze their carcasses and much more. It takes more than 10 times as much fossil fuel to make one calorie of animal protein as it does to make one calorie of plant protein.
Many leading environmental organisations -- including the Worldwatch Institute, the Sierra Club, the Union of Concerned Scientists and Al Gore's Live Earth -- recognise that raising animals for food damages the environment more than just about any other human activity. For more information, please visit PETAAsiaPacific.com.
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