Barcelona, Day 4: Friends of the Earth accelerates…
Great new full day full!
There are no less than four FoE events going on today. A photo exhibit and concert organised by FoE Spain; a press release on Climate witnesses taking the concept of climate change to the level of social structures; FOEI’s side event against carbon trading and the release of our new report ‘A Dangerous Obsession’. An ‘Annex I states of Carbon Traders’ – dollar was made to promote the event. We started of this morning by handing them out to delegates, asking things like ‘Hi sir/madame, would you like a carbon dollar? Yes? Well, in that case you’d like to be aware of their negative consequences on the climate. We would like to invite you to our side event, where we’ll explain more about it!’
In between following meetings, press conferences and side events we prepared our tomorrow’s action. As tomorrow being the last day of climate talks before the true ‘exam’ in Copenhagen and so little progress made, we decided to help
country delegates out by writing progress reports for them. That way they know where they need to work on, revising for the final exams in Copenhagen. There’s no excuse for no succeeding in Copenhagen……and Young Friends of the Earth Europe does not accept the lowering of ambitiouns that seem to be happening this week!
Now we are taking off to the fundraising concert for Friends of the Earth Spain - all proceeds to the Big Ask climate campaign!
I love the way we are visible - even in Barcelona’s music scene !
In the run up to the Copenhagen climate change conference, it is vital the following information be disseminated to the public as well as to our political leaders.
A widely cited 2006 report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, Livestock’s Long Shadow, estimates that 18 percent of annual worldwide greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are attributable to livestock….however recent analysis by Goodland and Anhang co-authors of “Livestock and Climate Change” in the latest issue of World Watch magazine found that livestock and their byproducts actually account for at least 32.6 billion tons of carbon dioxide per year, or 51 percent of annual worldwide GHG emissions!
http://www.51percent.org
The main sources of GHGs from animal agriculture are: (1) Deforestation of the rainforests to grow feed for livestock. (2) Methane from manure waste. – Methane is 72 times more potent as a global warming gas than CO2 (3) Refrigeration and transport of meat around the world. (4) Raising, processing and slaughtering of the animal.
Meat production also uses a massive amount of water and other resources which would be better used to feed the world’s hungry and provide water to those in need.
Based on their research, Goodland and Anhang conclude that replacing livestock products with soy-based and other alternatives would be the best strategy for reversing climate change. They say “This approach would have far more rapid effects on GHG emissions and their atmospheric concentrations-and thus on the rate the climate is warming-than actions to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy.”
The fact is that we are being informed of the dangerous path we are on by depending greatly on animal flesh for human consumption. We still have the opportunity to make the most effective steps in saving ourselves and this planet. By simply choosing a plant based diet we can reduce our carbon foot print by a huge amount.
We are gambling with our lives and with those of our future generations to come. It’s madness to know we are fully aware of the possible consequences but yet are failing to act.
Promoting a plant based diet to the public is would be the most effective way to curb deforestation, we hope this will be adopted as a significant measure to save the rainforests and protect the delicate ecology.
Thank you for your consideration.