CHANGE OUR DIET - reduce our meat consumption

When buying meat, environmental issues are not our first concern because at first sight breeding is not a polluting system. Yet behind the idea of the farm where animals are raised in green meadows there is a meat industry.

One of the first causes of environmental risks with meat production is the industrialization of the sector. Thanks to this industrialization, sales of animal products have fallen and consumption has exploded in developed and developing countries.

However, raising as many animals to feed humanity inevitably has a significant impact on the environment.

Direct pollution, the example of Brittany pork

In Brittany, the French region, pork production has progressively industrialized in recent decades. Today because of the manure produced by the many pigs bred in Brittany the rate of nitrates in the rivers has exploded causing the development of invasive algae. This algae, favored by intensive farming, is a short-term danger for the ecosystem of this region and therefore a significant environmental risk.

Indirect pollution

The industrialization of meat production has also led to a phenomenon of relocation of pollution. Indeed, livestock requires an indispensable calorie intake (cereal-based diet) which is very often imported from Brazil or Argentina. It is therefore a double source of pollution:

On the one hand, the production of cereals to feed the world's livestock has destroyed a large piece of virgin forest in order to transform them into a plot of intensive cultivation.

On the other hand to the direct pollution of the breeding adds:

• Production, often mechanized and consuming fossil energy (petroleum), cereals necessary to feed the animals. It is also a very polluting process for the water (watering) which leaves in the rivers without being cleared of phytosanitary products (fertilizer, pesticides ...) 
• The transportation of these resources across the oceans by boat, a major consumer of fossil energy. 

What can we do?

Eat less meat! Eat better meat! As consumers we can have two levers of action: quantity and quality. Reducing meat consumption is a citizen's act but also an excellent way to preserve one's health (meat is cited as a probable source of several cancers, it is also the main source of cholesterol). The second lever is to choose the quality. Cheap meat is inevitably produced under industrial conditions and therefore sources of pollution. Choosing a locally produced meat in a sustainable way is therefore reducing the environmental impact of its choice of consumption. And why not become a vegetarian?