When the Green New Deal recently set out objectives to reduce agricultural emissions, sarcastic dismissal from conservative media and politicians was swift. Wyoming Senator John Barrasso instructed his colleagues in the Senate to “say goodbye to dairy, to beef, to family farms,”and Fox News Pundit Sean Hannity warned of “Government-Forced Veganism.”These examples may seem extreme, maybe even ridiculous enough to completely ignore. But hidden within the jokes of “cow farts”and “liberals taking away your burgers”lies a greater problem in how our society has distorted the causes of climate change.
The truth is, an accurate breakdown of greenhouse gas emissions has not been projected well to the general public. Although only 25% of global greenhouse gas emissions stem from energy production, most people still associate climate change with the billowing smokestacks of a coal power plant. Bill Gates has recently been vocal about this issue, known as the “The 75% Problem”: the idea that 75% of greenhouse emissions come from sources which we have no plan to address. Some of the biggest contributors include transportation (14%), manufacturing (21%), and buildings (6%).
Yet perhaps most startling in this emissions breakdown is the massive impact of agriculture on climate change: 24% of global emissions stem from our global food supply. Remarkably, this means that agriculture accounts for essentially the same share of global greenhouse emissions as the entire Earth’s energy production. And while bovine flatulence (“cow farts”) do play a major role, so do other aspects of feeding and raising livestock, growing crops, and disposing of food.
Carbon is released at every step of food production, from both natural and commercial processes that take place during food production, transportation, and consumption. During agricultural production, the unique digestive systems of certain animals like cows and sheep produce large quantities of methane, a greenhouse gas 25 times more potent to climate change than carbon dioxide.
Disruption in carbon-rich soil and the deforestation (and often combustion) of farmland also leads to huge quantities of carbon emissions. Synthetic and natural fertilizers react with chemicals in the ground to release greenhouse gases, and when trees are cut down they can no longer act as carbon sinks which pull greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere and help to slow climate change.
And we’re not done yet. As the food makes its way to your plate, transportation quick enough to keep food fresh has its own significant environmental cost. Finally in the stage of consumption, if the final meal on your plate gets thrown away its decomposition in an anaerobic environment leads to even more harmful methane emissions.
But if agriculture is such a major cause of climate change, why are we not talking about it or taking steps to fix it? Most Americans still see climate change as a problem rooted in coal power and gas cars. Even in informed environmental circles, conversations tend to focus on electric cars and solar energy. As a lifelong meat eater, I am certainly guilty of shrugging off the benefits of a plant-based diet for more comforting sustainability movements in energy.
Perhaps people driving environmental discussions are so quiet on the massive environmental impacts of agriculture because it is so daunting, so seemingly impossible to solve. With other sources of emissions like energy, manufacturing, and transportation, top-down government efforts can create change on large-scale issues. For example, governments have the power to ensure electricity grids run on renewable energy, or can invest in public transit systems which keep commuters out of their cars. In the past, governmental regulations such as the Clean Water Act have also proven that the most harmful practices of industry can be regulated and limited.
On the other hand, revolutionizing the entire food system is far less intuitive. Many of the necessary changes fall on a more personal and societal level. The government cannot regulate inevitable bovine flatulence like they do industrial pollutants – governments likely won’t be banning meat anytime soon – so if we want cows to produce less methane, it is simply up to individuals to consume less beef. But here’s the problem: people often find it hard to feel like individual actions actually matter in the grand scale of things, and swaying public opinion is a long, difficult process.
Some of the challenge in tackling agriculture’s understated impacts might also lie in the distinct cultural significance of food. Cultural barriers often pose fundamental roadblocks to many areas of sustainable development. To once again draw on parallels with the energy sector, the deep cultural ties coal production has to many parts of Appalachia helps to explain much of our continued reliance on it. In this case, intersections of culture, identity, and politics create forces stronger than the desire for clean energy.
Due to the role certain foods play in various culinary traditions, agriculture represents a magnification of this same intersection of sustainability and identity. Food is a uniting cultural tradition for many countries, cultures, and communities around the world. Attempting to shift away from certain modes of consumption and production thus carries a unique set of sensitive issues, especially among communities in which staple foods are implicated in that change. While the scare tactics used by Fox News to discount the effects of agriculture on climate change can seem ridiculous and unfounded, they also touch on the connection between food and culture – reduction in beef consumption is seen as an attack of American culture. In countries especially reliant on beef production – such as the U.S., many South American countries, and parts of East Asia – this dynamic could intersect with environmental causes in particularly severe ways.
So what can we do to address this overlooked sector of greenhouse gas production?
Many claim that individual dietary shifts are the solution: researchers at UC Davis found that if everyone switched to a mediterranean diet, global emissions would be reduced by 15%. Yet despite this theoretical potential, a global shift in culinary habits seems unlikely at best. Even if consumers in wealthier countries successfully cut meat intake, the global consumption trend will be dominated by developing countries in which meat is becoming an affordable – and therefore larger – part of people’s diets. Clearly, this is not an easy dilemma. After years of our own over-consumption of meat, it hardly seems fair to impose limits upon countries that have done little to contribute to historic emissions, especially when livestock often increases nutrition and food security.
Ultimately, this issue is likely one which will only be solved by technological innovation and new ways of thinking about our production of food. As part of his focus on the “other 75%”, Bill Gates emphasizes the need for creative solutions which reduce “emissions per product”as opposed to the actual amount of food created. Along with the organization Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Gates and his colleagues are currently looking into innovative solutions ranging from sustainable fertilizers to protective skins which keep food fresh longer and reduce food waste.
In addition, researchers and private companies are developing both innovative and established ways to bypass traditional agriculture practices entirely.Companies like Impossible Foods, a startup famous for their eerily beef-like vegan burger, are offering increasingly realistic plant-based meat substitutes to the food market. Other startups such as JUST are creating lab-grown meat at increasingly lower costs. We will likely never fully shift consumers over to plant-based diets, but if labs can recreate the experience of eating meat more sustainably and at a lower cost, fundamental shifts in how humans consume food could realistically happen.
We should also consider more sustainable ways to consume and produce the animal proteins we already have. Researchers at the University of California’s Carbon Neutrality Initiative are advocating for a scale-up of aquaculture (farmed-fish) as an animal-protein alternative to livestock. Researcher Steve Gaines argues that when done correctly, aquaculture is the most sustainable way to eat animal-protein, and that in some cases it can even provide a better alternative than a totally vegetarian diet.
It will no doubt be difficult to create meaningful change in our agriculture system, both here in the U.S. and around the world. Agriculture is still largely excluded from many climate change discussions, and suggesting its complicity in emitting greenhouse gases is often met with ridicule or public displeasure. Food is also one of the things held most closely to people, communities, and cultures, and attempting to change ways of production and consumption practiced for centuries will inevitably be remarkably hard. Yet there is reason for optimism – as researchers devise new ways to put food on the table more sustainably and as people increasingly make individual choices for sustainability, we can slowly chip away at the massive impact agricultural production has on the environment.
But until the day comes where lab grown meat is as good as the real thing and the Impossible Burger is sold at every burger joint, just try your best to take your parents’advice. Eat your veggies.