SOURCE: MEATINGPLACE, 7/20/18

A new report by two sustainable agriculture organizations contend that the greenhouse gas emissions by the five largest meat and dairy processors exceed those of Exxon, Shell or BP.

“Emissions impossible: How big meat and dairy are heating up the planet” is published by GRAIN, “a small international non-profit organization that works to support small farmers and social movements in their struggles for community-controlled and biodiversity-based food systems,” and the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, which “works locally and globally at the intersection of policy and practice to ensure fair and sustainable food, farm and trade systems,” according to their respective websites.

It has been called “blockbuster” in some media coverage.

The report is based on extensive calculations made based largely on USDA and UN data. Key to its conclusions is the fact that the report’s calculations of GHG emissions include those from on-farm operations, including livestock, manure, farm machinery fuel, livestock feed production, production of the inputs needed to produce that feed (such as fertilizer), land use changes made to accommodate livestock grazing and feed production, and other sources.

Most companies’ self-reported emissions data, the report says, only encompass direct emissions from company-owned facilities, processing plants and machinery; off-site emissions from, say, electricity generation; and perhaps emissions from livestock at company-owned farms.

Companies’ efforts to reduce GHG emissions are called into question in the report, because while emissions per measure of output – a pounds of meat product, for example – may go down, overall production by a company or the industry continues to increase to meet rising demand globally.

The only antidote to these contributions to global warming, the two groups contend, are “significant reductions in meat and dairy production and consumption” in those countries with high levels of meat and dairy in industry and diet, including the U.S. and Canada.

“Current industrial levels of production cannot be sustained, nor can growth models for meat and dairy remain unchanged. The paradox of the corporate business model based on high rates of annual growth versus the urgent climate imperative to scale back meat and dairy production and consumption in affluent countries and populations is untenable,” the report says.

To read the report, click here. 

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