Convenient Conservation
What You Can Do
Former Vice President Al Gore has brought environmental issues to the movie viewing public, with a serious sense of urgency infused with wit. On the website of the new film "An Inconvenient Truth," the declaration is made that, "Humanity is sitting on a ticking time bomb. If the vast majority of the world's scientists are right, we have just ten years to avert a major catastrophe that could send our entire planet into a tail-spin of epic destruction involving extreme weather, floods, droughts, epidemics, and killer heat waves beyond anything we have ever experienced … With 2005, the worst storm season ever experienced in America just behind us, it seems we may be reaching a tipping point."
The recent heat wave that has hit the United States makes this film all the more real to viewers. Confined in factory farms and feedlots, thousands of farm animals continue to perish when temperatures peak. However, the film does not delve into the environmental consequences of mass-produced animal flesh.
Behind every hamburger, hot dog or other fast-food item, are hidden costs in environmental destruction. The costs of meat mass-production are becoming increasingly difficult to ignore, since raising such a high volume of animals involves:
highly inefficient use of resources, such as freshwater, land and fossil fuels. Instead of being eaten by people, the vast majority of grain harvested in the U.S. is fed to farm animals. It takes up to 10 pounds of grain to produce just 1 pound of animal flesh.
the heavy pollution of air, water and soil from farm runoff, including feces, insecticides, pesticides, and other chemicals.
deforestation and loss of wildlife habitat and topsoil as some of the results of extensive grazing.
Time magazine reports that, "Throughout the developing world today, one of the first things people do as they climb out of poverty is to shift from their peasant diet of mainly grains and beans to one that is rich in pork or beef. Since 1950, per capita consumption of meat around the globe has more than doubled." As Time magazine goes on to explain, in order to meet these expectations, valuable resources are inefficiently wasted. To produce merely
"1 lb. of feedlot beef requires 7 lbs. of feed grain, which takes 7,000 lbs. of water to grow. Pass up one hamburger, and you'll save as much water as you save by taking 40 showers with a low-flow nozzle. Yet in the U.S., 70% of all the wheat, corn and other grain produced goes to feeding herds of livestock. Around the world, as more water is diverted to raising pigs and chickens instead of producing crops for direct consumption, millions of wells are going dry. India, China, North Africa and the U.S. are all running freshwater deficits, pumping more from their aquifers than rain can replenish…. Mass production of meat has also become a staggering source of pollution…. In the U.S., livestock now produce 130 times as much waste as people do. Just one hog farm in Utah, for example, produces more sewage than the city of Los Angeles. These megafarms are proliferating, and in populous areas their waste is tainting drinking water. In more pristine regions, from Indonesia to the Amazon, tropical rain forest is being burned down to make room for more and more cattle. Agriculture is the world's biggest cause of deforestation, and increasing demand for meat is the biggest force in the expansion of agriculture."
According to a recent investigation in the Amazon, millions of acres of rainforest were destroyed in order to grow crops used to feed chickens and other animals in factory farms. This destruction was traced via Cargill to KFC's European restaurants, which sell bucket-loads of cheap soya-fed chicken to millions of people every day. KFC is part of Yum! Brands, Inc., the world's largest restaurant chain, which includes Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, A&W and other fast food companies.
What You Can Do
Start by limiting your own meat consumption.
Distribute Farm Sanctuary's Factory Farming: Destroying the Environment brochures at showings of the film and elsewhere.
Educate yourself and others by promoting these websites about environmental consequences of factory farming:
FactoryFarming.com
VegForLife.org
AskFarmerBrown.org
What You Can Do
Former Vice President Al Gore has brought environmental issues to the movie viewing public, with a serious sense of urgency infused with wit. On the website of the new film "An Inconvenient Truth," the declaration is made that, "Humanity is sitting on a ticking time bomb. If the vast majority of the world's scientists are right, we have just ten years to avert a major catastrophe that could send our entire planet into a tail-spin of epic destruction involving extreme weather, floods, droughts, epidemics, and killer heat waves beyond anything we have ever experienced … With 2005, the worst storm season ever experienced in America just behind us, it seems we may be reaching a tipping point."
The recent heat wave that has hit the United States makes this film all the more real to viewers. Confined in factory farms and feedlots, thousands of farm animals continue to perish when temperatures peak. However, the film does not delve into the environmental consequences of mass-produced animal flesh.
Behind every hamburger, hot dog or other fast-food item, are hidden costs in environmental destruction. The costs of meat mass-production are becoming increasingly difficult to ignore, since raising such a high volume of animals involves:
highly inefficient use of resources, such as freshwater, land and fossil fuels. Instead of being eaten by people, the vast majority of grain harvested in the U.S. is fed to farm animals. It takes up to 10 pounds of grain to produce just 1 pound of animal flesh.
the heavy pollution of air, water and soil from farm runoff, including feces, insecticides, pesticides, and other chemicals.
deforestation and loss of wildlife habitat and topsoil as some of the results of extensive grazing.
Time magazine reports that, "Throughout the developing world today, one of the first things people do as they climb out of poverty is to shift from their peasant diet of mainly grains and beans to one that is rich in pork or beef. Since 1950, per capita consumption of meat around the globe has more than doubled." As Time magazine goes on to explain, in order to meet these expectations, valuable resources are inefficiently wasted. To produce merely
"1 lb. of feedlot beef requires 7 lbs. of feed grain, which takes 7,000 lbs. of water to grow. Pass up one hamburger, and you'll save as much water as you save by taking 40 showers with a low-flow nozzle. Yet in the U.S., 70% of all the wheat, corn and other grain produced goes to feeding herds of livestock. Around the world, as more water is diverted to raising pigs and chickens instead of producing crops for direct consumption, millions of wells are going dry. India, China, North Africa and the U.S. are all running freshwater deficits, pumping more from their aquifers than rain can replenish…. Mass production of meat has also become a staggering source of pollution…. In the U.S., livestock now produce 130 times as much waste as people do. Just one hog farm in Utah, for example, produces more sewage than the city of Los Angeles. These megafarms are proliferating, and in populous areas their waste is tainting drinking water. In more pristine regions, from Indonesia to the Amazon, tropical rain forest is being burned down to make room for more and more cattle. Agriculture is the world's biggest cause of deforestation, and increasing demand for meat is the biggest force in the expansion of agriculture."
According to a recent investigation in the Amazon, millions of acres of rainforest were destroyed in order to grow crops used to feed chickens and other animals in factory farms. This destruction was traced via Cargill to KFC's European restaurants, which sell bucket-loads of cheap soya-fed chicken to millions of people every day. KFC is part of Yum! Brands, Inc., the world's largest restaurant chain, which includes Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, A&W and other fast food companies.
What You Can Do
Start by limiting your own meat consumption.
Distribute Farm Sanctuary's Factory Farming: Destroying the Environment brochures at showings of the film and elsewhere.
Educate yourself and others by promoting these websites about environmental consequences of factory farming:
FactoryFarming.com
VegForLife.org
AskFarmerBrown.org
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