Michelle Mueller Ihrig
cafeteria@isb.ac.th
Earth Week welcomes us back to school after Songkran commencing April 20. The Cafeteria plays a large role in this week, this year by raising awareness of meat production and its impact on the environment, specifically in the case of beef. A little food for thought on this matter as taken from an excerpt from TIME and The Guardian respectively:
“You may think you live on a planet, but really you live on a gigantic farm, one occasionally broken up by cities, forests and the oceans. Some 40% of the world’s land surface is used for the purposes of keeping all 7 billion of us fed. The vast majority of that land — about 30% of the word’s total ice-free surface — is used not to raise grains, fruits and vegetables that are directly fed to human beings, but to support the chickens, pigs and cattle that we eventually eat.” (TIME 12/2013)
Out of all the meats produced, beef has the largest impact on our environment. “Beef’s environmental impact dwarfs that of other meat including chicken and pork, new research reveals, with one expert saying that eating less red meat would be a better way for people to cut carbon emissions than giving up their cars. The heavy impact on the environment of meat production was known but the research shows a new scale and scope of damage, particularly for beef. The popular red meat requires 28 times more land to produce than pork or chicken, 11 times more water and results in five times more climate-warming emissions. When compared to staples like potatoes, wheat, and rice, the impact of beef per calorie is even more extreme, requiring 160 times more land and producing 11 times more greenhouse gases.” (The Guardian 7/2014)
The entire Earth Week at the Cafeteria will be an ISB ‘Meatless Monday’ with reduced offerings of meat at each section, thereby featuring some tasty, new vegetarian alternatives. Our aim is simply to invoke some mindfulness about meats and their impact on the environment, especially when it comes to beef.
Enjoy.
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