The meat industry blocked the IPCC’s attempt to recommend a plant-based diet

https://qz.com/ipcc-report-on-climate-change-meat-industry-1850261179

by kitkat_new • 3 years ago

168 206 3 years ago

I'm actually surprised how much dairy products contribute to global warming. It's only veganism that really cuts down on carbon emissions.

Tade06• 3 years ago

Not really. I looked at the different scenarios and we would probably do fine on chicken and cheese in terms of water consumption, CO2 and land use.

Pork is where it starts being risky.

Beef, lamb etc. are the most problematic parts.

choeger3• 3 years ago

This. There needs to be a pyramid in top of the food pyramid. Beef is not bad per se, it just shouldn't be your weekly meat.

klipt• 3 years ago

Isn't beef bad because cows release methane, but feeding cows seaweed can mitigate that?

himinlomax7• 3 years ago

The water use claim regarding beef has been debunked, it was based on the weird accounting trick where you count rainfall on pasture as wasted water for some reason.

Also speaking of pasture, afaik the equation for cattle is completely different whether they're fed corn vs grazing on marginal land as they're supposed to.

choeger3• 3 years ago

I often wonder, how much double counting goes into these stats. Of course, dairy currently relies on fossile energy often. But how much of it is attributed elsewhere as well? Diesel, for instance, is often also attributed to big oil companies like shell. Cows are slaughtered and sold as meat at some point - is the dairy CO2 emission subtracted here? I don't think so.

cinntaile2• 3 years ago

Since you often wonder, I suggest you spend some time reading some relevant papers and their methodology. You won't have to guess and assume if you do that.

NovaDudely2• 3 years ago

I'm not too surprised, in some ways Dairy is the meat industry by proxy. All dairy cattle end up in the same abattoirs.

asterix_pano4• 3 years ago

On top of that they have one of the most miserable life we could imagine. Birthing babies and getting them taken away ASAP to give milk to a machine and getting slaughtered when you are less productive... It's hard to describe our lack of empathy to create and accept such systems.

Aromasin• 3 years ago

One of the major issue's isn't just the calorific inefficiencies in the fodder->dairy process, but the simple act of creating pastures for animals. About 85% of deforestation world-wide is being driven by animal agriculture; of which dairy makes up a huge part of that. We could use less land to produce food if we ate less dairy, by a huge margin.

karmakurtisaani3• 3 years ago

I suppose theoretically optimal diet would have to be some flavour of vegan, plus maybe some fish if available. In practice, a major reduction of meat and dairy would probably be enough to make a difference.

waihtis7• 3 years ago

The discussion around plants, meat and dairy need to become much more nuanced.

Let's take dairy as an example - has a great effect in boosting mTORC1 activity which causes better growth in children. Now, a non-insignificant set of people who have bought into zealous veganry are raising children who will be physically more fragile just because they've been marketed with the idea that dairy == bad.

On the other hand, overactivation of mTORC1 is a driver of "growth-related diseases" like cancer, which suggests you should limit it post-adolescence.

In conclusion, I think it is right for us not to listen to political panels who are sticking their finger up in the air to measure what is the politically correct thing to say today and prescribe policies based on that. People should have the freedom to research and choose.

I am a layman on this topic; feel free to correct any errors in my claims.

cinntaile2• 3 years ago

I am a layman on this topic; feel free to correct any errors in my claims.

This isn't how this works. You should back up your own claims with sources.

at_compile_time2• 3 years ago

mTOR makes children grow faster, but everything I've heard suggests that it doesn't make them any taller as adults. Meanwhile, obesity rates in children keep growing, and atherogenesis doesn't wait until adulthood.

Heart disease and cancer are still the leading causes of death in America. COVID's taken the #3 spot, which affected those with obesity and diabetes much more than those without, but I don't expect it to stick around on this list. Somehow, frailty due to not eating meat didn't make the top 10.

If we want kids to be strong and healthy, get them outside and get them moving. No diet will see them healthy if they're sedentary.

waihtis7• 3 years ago

indeed, that is a good addition / counterpoint.

tsimionescu3• 3 years ago

You should note that large parts of the world's population have never consumed dairy throughout their history (except as infants, of course), and are still doing very well today (China being the largest such group). I don't think this is a good line of argument.

cfn4• 3 years ago

But they certainly are not vegan.

000ooo0002• 3 years ago

You concede being a layman yet lay out a conclusion as though you are not. Was there any real point to your comment beyond taking a stab at 'zealous vegans'?

waihtis7• 3 years ago

The point was that black-and-white thinking / reducing decisions to be made over single variables leads to suboptimal outcomes. Please try a bit harder to be generous with your reading interpretation.

asterix_pano4• 3 years ago

I have looked extensively for this and there is no study that shows that vegan children will be more fragile. Often they boast healthier cholesterol levels and body fat and better nutrient levels. And then, if that were true, is it better to be bigger? Dairy and meat increase the risk of developing cancers and cardiovascular diseases. Is it worth it?

imeron• 3 years ago

The brain contains approximately 20% of whole body cholesterol, you can't get away with not eating fats. Your brain needs fats.

jmkr• 3 years ago

I have no idea what mTORC1, but this post is in bad faith.

Now, a non-insignificant set of people who have bought into zealous veganry are raising children who will be physically more fragile just because they've been marketed with the idea that dairy == bad.
It is the position of the American Dietetic Association that appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. Well-planned vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence, and for athletes.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19562864/

There's plenty of sources saying a properly planned vegan diet is fine. Lots of vegans take supplements, and lots of food is fortified.

sprucevoid11• 3 years ago

feel free to correct any errors in my claims

What you say about mTORC1 is not supported by the leading academic researcher organizations in the field of nutrition.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27886704/ "It is the position of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics that appropriately planned vegetarian, including vegan, diets are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits for the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. These diets are appropriate for all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, adolescence, older adulthood, and for athletes."

If you think you have greater scientific expertize about this then I urge you to pursue a career in the related fields, publish your scientific evidence in the top journals and eventually change the recommendations. Until you accomplish that me and everyone else reading this should rely on the position cited above.

political panels who are sticking their finger up in the air ...

That is not the situation here. The climate policy recommendations on eating are based on the best current scientific evidence. See https://eatforum.org/eat-lancet-commission/

GoblinSlayer2• 3 years ago

How many people have great scientific expertize to appropriately plan their diets if half of them believe in geocentrism?

waihtis7• 3 years ago

Your linked paper doesn't reference mTORC1 a single time. Moreover, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics has faced numerous criticisms about it's close ties to corporate groups such as McDonald's, Coca-Cola, Mars, and others.* It is fully within their interest to state "vegans need reliable sources of vitamin B-12, such as fortified foods or supplements" (a direct quote from your linked paper) as it supports the business models of their corporate partners.

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academy_of_Nutrition_and_Diete...

prepend4• 3 years ago

Your quote doesn’t dispute that dairy is good for promoting growth in adolescents.

It just says that vegan diets are appropriate. If one is concerned with optimization then you would want to consider diets that are superior, not just adequate.

Not taking a side, I just get frustrated when people present material to refute that doesn’t actually refute. For example a paper saying “daily is not superior to non-dairy diets in adolescents” would be a good refutation.

lexa1979• 3 years ago

If they really read both pieces of papers, they'd read the footnote 53 in the final draft, detailing what the IPCC is calling a "sustainable healthy diet".

"53 ‘Sustainable healthy diets’ promote all dimensions of individuals’ health and well-being; have low environmental pressure and impact; are accessible, affordable, safe and equitable; and are culturally acceptable, as described in FAO and WHO. The related concept of ‘balanced diets’ refers to diets that feature plant-based foods, such as those based on coarse grains, legumes, fruits and vegetables, nuts and seeds, and animal-sourced food produced in resilient, sustainable and low-GHG emission systems, as described in SRCCL"

Is Scientist Rebellion a lobby ? Who's pushing an agenda here ?

anonyfox8• 3 years ago

No matter where you stand (some meat eaters tend to become extremely emotional on this):

The fact that the scientific results and recommendations get utterly censored like this before publication makes me really angry.

It’s somewhat fine for me if people/governments choose to ignore or argue against these results after publication, but this is just absurd… and is then used from people all over the world to point to „see, even scientists say it’s fine!“!

We must find a way to eliminate this lobbying/corruption, rather soon! Meanwhile, of course a vegan diet is better for the environment and renewables/green energy should be a top priority, and yes every bit counts, and if everyone would agree and do this instead of arguing we would have solved the issue already.

autoexec3• 3 years ago

We must find a way to eliminate this lobbying/corruption, rather soon!

Who is the person who is caving to pressure or accepting bribes and making changes to scientific results? We could start by finding names and calling for them to become unemployable anywhere they could cause further damage.

incone1233• 3 years ago

"calling for them to become unemployable "

Good luck with that. One common form of corruption is companies hiring public officials who helped them out.

scns• 3 years ago

How bout punishing those handing out the bribes? Oh noes they are rich, powerful, well connected and have an army of lawyers. Let's rather fry the small fish. No snark intended.

roenxi• 3 years ago

The UN is literally an international political organisation. The shocking truth here is that all the work they do is political.

Whether they are helping or hindering is only a question of what your political leanings are.

mnd999• 3 years ago

Those in power both in government and in the private sector seem to have completely lost interest in the bigger picture and are optimising for short-term personal wealth at pretty much any cost. Perhaps a benevolent AI is the only way forward.

asterix_pano4• 3 years ago

Eating a plant based diet seems more straightforward to me.

anonyfox8• 3 years ago

just look even at the comments here on HN (not specifically in this thread): so many people are defending viewpoints that somewhat A is not as bad as B if only C would happen, or pulling up weird conspiracy stuff or whatever only to be able to deny what needs to be done.

We have the knowledge, the tech, the wealth, and everything possibly needed lined up to tackle the problem. But then people get somehow catched by wird arguments and turn against each other instead of simply doing what needs to be done together.

ajsnigrutin8• 3 years ago

The problem here is, that the giant corporations can pollute the environment (eg. coca cola in a plastic bottle, with a plastic cap, with a plastic label, wrapped in a plastic 6-pack, with a plastic handle, on a plastic pallet wrapped in plastic foil), and rich environmentalists then fly their private jets to some 'green' conference and tell an 'average joe' that he shouldn't drive his car and eat meat, and should pay for plastic bags.

anonyfox8• 3 years ago

the point is it doesn't matter that you are right - all involved parties have to do their part. rich guys point at average Joes and vice versa, and both don't take action because "but the others".

asterix_pano4• 3 years ago

The average joe can think about all the unnecessary suffering caused by animal agriculture. Entities do not have empathy, but humans do.

doctor_eval3• 3 years ago

The trope of the rich environmentalist flying their private jet, is just that. I’m sure that some exist, but the vast majority take far more care of the environment than that.

seba_dos16• 3 years ago

That's true, but I don't really see how the existence of assholes should give me a free pass for being an asshole myself.

flangola7• 3 years ago

Just because they're hypocrites doesn't mean they're wrong. Carpooling or using public transportation and reducing meat intake (especially beef) are empirically direct actions that reduce emissions. There's obviously a lot more power structures could do like stop using taxpayer money to subsidize oil and meat company profits, but that won't stop me from doing what I can with my own two hands.

Refusing to engage in good action because you don't like the messenger is teenage angst behavior, not rational decision making.

vintermann6• 3 years ago

Most people who complain about rich environmentalists flying on private planes seem to be on the right. I don't quite get this: you aren't opposed to the existence of millionaires, are you?

You already accept that some people, through their hard work or inheritance or whatever, are entitled to a larger share of material goods. Why shouldn't they also be entitled to a larger share of the total emissions we decide we can handle? As long as they compensate the rest of us for the privilege, maybe - though people on the right tend not to be too excited over severance taxes either.

Assuming they're OK with great material inequality, which sadly they usually are, a rich environmentalist is not especially hypocritical for talking a bigger share of what nature can bear.

revelio8• 3 years ago

Yes it would be terrible if IPCC reports were somehow to be censored or politically biased!

https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Im...

Climatologist: "We have to get rid of the medieval warm period"

https://www.rossmckitrick.com/uploads/4/8/0/8/4808045/climat...

Climategate emails (IPCC):

"It seems that a few people have a very strong say, and no matter how much talking goes on beforehand, the big decisions are made at the eleventh hour by a select core group.

Is it true that only climate sceptics have political interests and are potentially biased? If not, how can we deal with this? How should we deal with flaws inside the climate community? I think, that "our" reaction on the errors found in Mike Mann's work were not especially honest.

All these decisions about IPCC chairs and co-chairs are deeply political

I can't see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow - even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is !

IPCC report:

https://report.ipcc.ch/ar6syr/pdf/IPCC_AR6_SYR_SPM.pdf

"Equity remains a central element in the UN climate regime ... Prioritising equity, climate justice, social justice, inclusion and just transition processes can enable adaptation and ambitious mitigation actions and climate resilient development ... cash transfers and public works programs [are] highly feasible and increase resilience to climate change"

IPCC press release:

https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2023/03/IPCC_AR6_SYR...

"these choices need to be rooted in our diverse values, worldviews and knowledges, including scientific knowledge, Indigenous Knowledge and local knowledge"

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/feb/01/leaked-e...

Today the Guardian reveals how Jones withheld the information requested under freedom of information laws. Subsequently a senior colleague told him he feared that Jones's collaborator, Wei-Chyung Wang of the University at Albany, had "screwed up".

The apparent attempts to cover up problems with temperature data from the Chinese weather stations provide the first link between the email scandal and the UN's embattled climate science body, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, as a paper based on the measurements was used to bolster IPCC statements about rapid global warming in recent decades.

TheOtherHobbes• 3 years ago

Now try the real climate science.

https://news.climate.columbia.edu/2019/07/24/climate-epochs-....

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2023/01/harvard-led-a...

friend_and_foe• 3 years ago

Well, speaking on the report, you'll find that all these bodies and their reports are written by committees of special interests in their entirety. There wasn't some report of substance here that was muddied and made less truthful by the meat industry. It had always been this way, even the UN Declaration of Human Rights was written so as to ensure membership in the UN by the big states of the time, and not principled based on some understanding of human rights. Theyre always statements and decisions of convenience for the interests of the attendant parties.

cowl5• 3 years ago

No matter where you stand, these type naive recommandations are responsible for some of the greatest enviornmental dissasters of the last century. "Bio"-Fuels being one of the main culprits of deforestation that has created way bigger problems than the ones they were trying to fix. In this case a Plant based Diet would require much more agricultural land for the same calorie intake than a balanced meat and plant one. And guess where that land will come from? guess how much more automation will be needed to take care of that extra agriculture, so more machinery, more pesticides, more transport etc. There is nothing scientific about a recomandation. it's a hypotesis that until gets implemented can not be called scientific. Like the the implementation of BioFules showed, that recommandation was not scentific at all. And by definition can not be scientific.

There's an inflation of the word "scientific" nowadays that is beinng used for any study that makes it almost a religion. the core concept of Scientific it is always to question and especially can not be applied to new un-tested procedures that however rigorous they might have been on planning phase, can not by definition account for all variables. Something that is un-tested by definition can not be scientific.

anonyfox8• 3 years ago

so you say that the amount of land and water needed to grow a cow that ultimately I can eat is LESS than if I would use that land to grow food to eat directly? thats pretty wild, I'd think. Not even thinking about the methane issues with cows and other things they add ontop of land use.

BioFuels are a joke, though, a result of lobbyism, fully agree. Individually owned ICEs on a large scale are the problem here, that BioFuel shit is just deflecting blame.

midland_trucker3• 3 years ago

In this case a Plant based Diet would require much more agricultural land for the same calorie intake than a balanced meat and plant one.

Where do you think the calories in meat ultimately comes from?

nradov4• 3 years ago

This was an ideological recommendation, not a scientific one. It's fine for scientists to also engage in political advocacy but we should be clear about which role they're playing at the time.

jrootabega2• 3 years ago

Meanwhile, of course a vegan diet is better for the environment

This is not a matter of course. Humans are part of the environment, and it is not a matter of course that a vegan diet is healthy for humans. The idea (I don't want to say fact, but I believe it) that meat and dairy consumption/industry are currently happening at a scale that is harmful does not mean that meat and dairy are bad for the environment.

dTal3• 3 years ago

I don't understand the structure of your argument. What do you mean by "not a matter of course"? There is plenty of evidence that 1) vegan diets are associated with improved health outcomes, broadly speaking and 2) animal consumption has a disproportionate environmental impact for the nutrients obtained (which is unsurprising from a physics perspective, since the animals eat plants that humans could eat directly).

Perhaps these things are not "inherently" true in that one can easily come up with edge-case counterexamples, but they are true on the whole.

GoblinSlayer2• 3 years ago

Meanwhile, of course a vegan diet is better for the environment

Doesn't agriculture cause deforestation? That said what is better for environment?

hdhrufjdi• 3 years ago

With meat there is more demand on agriculture

vegetablepotpie• 3 years ago

It really does feel like we’re living in bizzaro world. If you want to make recommendations based on evidence, make sure it doesn’t impact the profits of powerful groups.

Many negative things we see in public policy stem from this fact. Lack of right to repair, lack of broadband in America, lack of cyber security in corporations, US tax law.

Maybe you like your meat. That’s fine. You can make decisions for your self, but we should at least be able to acknowledge the impacts of those decisions.

I think the solution is to blanket ban corporate speech. It really is different than individuals speaking and we need to acknowledge that.

incone1233• 3 years ago

"I think the solution is to blanket ban corporate speech."

How will you ban corporate shills?

vintermann6• 3 years ago

It shouldn't be all that hard, really. We ban prostitution (whether we should or not is another question). It's the same principle: you can do the thing as much as you like, but you can't pay people for it.

It doesn't have to be strict. It doesn't have to be two sided. For simplicity, maybe you want to only ban the paying side. Say there can't be a post in your budget that says "influence politicians for favourable legislation" if you're an LLC. How limited liability corporations spend money is already pretty monitored, for obvious reasons, so it wouldn't be that hard.

revelio8• 3 years ago

"I think the solution is to blanket ban corporate speech. It really is different than individuals speaking"

Does that apply to universities, government employees and claims about the "consensus" too? Or are they all individuals?

karmakurtisaani3• 3 years ago

You know, I'm also fine with people eating meat. I just would like them to pay for the damage they cause, and would not like to subsidise their consumption with my tax money.

tdeck• 3 years ago

Why bother? Hardly anything the IPCC says seems to translate into policy.

sofixa• 3 years ago

Hardly anything the IPCC says seems to translate into policy.

Following their reports multiple countries have adopted measures directly citing those reports, with targets based on those reports. E.g. to maintain warming below X C, we'll have to reduce by Y our annual CO2 emissions, so we'll ban new internal combustion engine cars sales starting 20ZZ, while also doing this and that.

Seen across the EU and the US btw.

fwungy2• 3 years ago

Were these the same people who told us the glaciers would be melted and the Maldives under water by 2000?

How narcissistic do you have to be to believe the world is going to end in your little eye blink of a lifetime?

Look, the West can go carbon negative, but it makes no difference at all if China and India just use the West's carbon virtue to increase their own carbon consumption (that the West isn't using).

We really should be thinking about next generation nuclear and mitigation as first tier strategies and not attempting to remake human nature in a few generations time.

ajsnigrutin8• 3 years ago

We really should be thinking about next generation nuclear and mitigation as first tier strategies and not attempting to remake human nature in a few generations time.

It's funny, because a lot of "greens" are asking for less carbon-* or carbon neutral stuff, but are immediately against anything nuclear, even though it's the only option we have, to generate enough power, even on windless nights.

There are even comics made about this: https://i.redd.it/x1saxijbtj7a1.png

sunbum• 3 years ago

Because the "greens" of the cold war are the same people today. Totally yes that must entirely be it!

kzrdude• 3 years ago

I think greens are not alone in this - our whole culture has been part of demonizing nuclear power. Non-activist people accepted avoiding nuclear as a good compromise since it was a touchy subject. The luxury of considering no externalities (i.e allowing fossil fuel emissions) enabled this.

frereubu• 3 years ago

I take your point, but this isn't a zero-sum game, as has been shown by the plummeting cost of solar energy. If enough countries move towards renewable enegy (and in the mid-term nuclear, agreed) it will become cheap enough that other will adopt it for purely economic reasons.

Sankozi2• 3 years ago

This is pure FUD.

Were these the same people who told us the glaciers would be melted and the Maldives under water by 2000?

Were they? Please tell us.

How narcissistic do you have to be to believe the world is going to end in your little eye blink of a lifetime?

Who says that? Where in the article have you read something like that?

Look, the West can go carbon negative, but it makes no difference at all if China and India just use the West's carbon virtue to increase their own carbon consumption (that the West isn't using).

India emissions per capita are very low. China emissions per capita (7.61T) are lower than average of developed nations (US is almost two times bigger - 14.6T).

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.ATM.CO2E.PC?contextu...

iakov2• 3 years ago

The FUD is spread by climate activists so often that nobody takes them seriously anymore. Look, this [0] is the latest example - I've heard about it from my friends. They were mocking the poster child of climate change activists and her doom-and-gloom prophecies that she promptly deleted once it became clear that the permanent ice is still there, and that humanity is not, in fact, extinct. Of course now it's an "imprecise paraphrase" and not meant to be taken at face value, because even to a layman the FUD is clearly visible.

All this screaming, kicking and general attentionwhoring did nothing positive to the climate change topic. My friends are not conspiracy nuts or some low-life crazies, they're normal people with uni degrees working tech jobs and living middle-class lives. They have heard so much about their carbon footprint, about the inevitable climate catastrophe the upcoming years that is getting postponed every time, that they are just tired of that. There is no constructive solution from our elected leaders, just endless fear-mongering, finger-pointing and uncertain predictions.

[0] https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/greta-thunberg-deleted-201...

fwungy2• 3 years ago

The populations are huge and their consumption is going up. If fossil fuels get cheaper because the West isn't buying them the East will happily consume them.

sprucevoid11• 3 years ago

Were these the same people who ...

No. The article reports on scientific evidence. Are you a scientist doing scientific work on the climate impact of the meat industry or a scientist studying meat industry lobbying? If no then on what evidence do you base your scepticism about what the linked article says?

mejutoco4• 3 years ago

I find it bad that scientific results get censored, and I am also wondering if there is proof that a plant-based diet is more healthy. My suspicion is it might be for the average American, but it is based on gut feeling (pun intended).

I remember margarine (plant-based) was all the rage too and IIRC it was much less healthy than butter (animal-based).

My guess is it depends on the specific meals.

colordrops2• 3 years ago

Margarine is a synthetic product, with the oil created in complex refineries then hydrogenated. You can't compare this to something like lentil stew or a salad.

If the recommendation is that eating anything you want as long as the origin can be traced back to plants, then I agree, plant based diets aren't necessarily healthier. A WFPB (whole foods plant based) diet is undeniably healthy though.

The problem with margarine is orthogonal - it's due to processing. Processing has been shown to be very unhealthy whether with plant based products like margarine, or animal based products like hot dogs.

In any case the IPCC's recommendation is about the environment, and there is no doubt that animal foods are far worse for the environment.

mejutoco4• 3 years ago

Those are very good points. I agree on animal foods being worse for the environment too. Cheers.

vintermann6• 3 years ago

The idea that "processed food" is bad annoys me, because it's so impossibly broad. Milling, roasting, fermenting, freezing, drying, smoking, chopping, soaking, skimming, distilling, salting, curing, pickling, sieving, threshing, squeezing, and yes, hydrogenation - Anything we do to food is processing, and a lot of food is not safe to eat without processing. Veganism is one thing, but the "raw food" diet is damn near impossible to make work, so much that the alternative people who embrace every other fad like that warn against it.

It is specific forms of processing which are bad, in specific circumstances. Smoking is, sadly, bad because the substances which preserve the food are carcinogenic. Partial hydrogenation of oils is bad because half of the partially hydrogenated products will be trans fats which the body really isn't good at handling.

mft_2• 3 years ago

There’s pretty good evidence that an unprocessed plant-based diet is the healthiest option.

This is a good place to start: https://nutritionfacts.org/

mejutoco4• 3 years ago

For the benefit of other readers, the closest I could find in there to answer my question was:

Only one diet has ever been proven to reverse the progression of heart disease, our number one killer, and be effective in treating, arresting, and even reversing other deadly diseases, such as type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure. And, that same diet—a whole food, plant-based diet—appears to be the most effective diet for healthy weight loss.

ZeroGravitas• 3 years ago

The Eat Lancet report covers this from health, carbon and pollution angles:

https://eatforum.org/eat-lancet-commission/

The results are pretty much what you'd think.

mejutoco4• 3 years ago

Thanks. To spare a click to others. The part I found relevant to my question: Animal-based being healthier or not, independently of the environment in general.

Current overconsumption of meat in Western diets is a significant contributor to poor health and increases a person’s risk of becoming overweight, obese or developing certain noncommunicable diseases. Projections show that a global adoption of a Western diet high in meat intake matched with global population and economic growth will drive significant health burdens and push food systems well beyond environmental limits – multiple studies make the same predictions.
Avoiding these risks calls for a significant reduction of unhealthy food consumption – particularly poorly produced meat – in high- income countries, in addition to avoiding increasing consumption trends in middle-income countries. At the same time, it is critical that the food system ensures sufficient access to healthy levels of protein that are sustainably produced where hunger and malnutrition persist.

It seems overconsumption of meat and poorly produced meat are the health problems, according to this report (with respect to individual health, environment concerns aside). I wonder how overconsumption is defined. Will try to dig in later.

guerby• 3 years ago

You always have to be careful for averages kgCO2/unit of some product where there are multiple ways to produce the stuff.

To take beef for example (since it usually tops the kgCO2/unit food charts) if we just replaced the millions of bisons exterminated in the USA:

https://theconversation.com/historical-photo-of-mountain-of-...

(30-60 millions bisons to ... about 500).

By cattle, on the same grass lands (no land use change - important), the impact on climate change would be exactly zero vs pre industrial levels.

We could probable have some quantity of near CO2 neutral meat if we wanted to.

When I want beef I buy from a local farmer (grass fed 10km from my home), I don't think removing it would really help the climate vs things I've done like insulating my house, switching to heat pump, remote work, and switching to EV.

m0llusk• 3 years ago

Do official recommendations like this really influence people's food choices? There have been calls for plant based diets for a long time and yet meat eating has been increasing.

sprucevoid11• 3 years ago

Well no report by itself has a big impact. It is a matter of incremental change over time. Like with anything some people are early and they've already switched to plant based eating. Others move later. Like with any commercial sector with interest misaligned with the needed climate policy there is a lot of lobbying and greenwashing going on. This piece covers that well https://newrepublic.com/article/168766/meat-industry-lobbyin...

jononomo2• 3 years ago

Interestingly, if you eat a diet of ONLY beef, as I do, then you will find that your health and fitness improve dramatically and that you spend dramatically less time preparing, cooking, and eating food.

Also, if you eat only beef then you completely stop farting (and the volume of your poop falls by 80%).

I've often wondered why "cow farts" are considered such a terrible climate change concern but "human farts" aren't.

leethargo• 3 years ago

According to the bar chart in the article, chocolate and coffee are also big factors. Why are these not talked about more?

I'm guessing their impact is mostly from deforestation. Does somebody know more?

bigtex• 3 years ago

These are the same people who fly on commercial planes to beautiful destinations to then lecture me about the food I eat and the cars I drive. I guarantee none of the people authoring the IPCC report are eating bugs or lab grown meat steaks at these fancy conferences.

postdb• 3 years ago

Wow pork emits less than chess and farmed fish! Very interesting!

throwaway22032• 3 years ago

I want to eat meat. I think it's better for me. Not only my health, but specific goals I have.

I will do what is necessary in order to do so.

This is generally how I operate. I also want to drive a car, own a house (not an apartment), have children, etcetera.

It strictly benefits me to recommend that you (as a stranger) don't do any of this. I'd rather have less competition.

That's all this stuff comes down to, to me. Convince everyone else to reduce their standard of living.

I'm just not going to eat the bugs, sorry. Try as hard as you like.

The meat industry blocked the IPCC’s attempt to recommend a plant-based diet

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