Animal Agriculture And Its Impact On The Environment

Introduction (Attention Step): What do you think is the greatest cause of emission pollution? What do you believe is harming our planet? Well if you guessed that fossil fuel emissions are the biggest emission polluters, then you are completely wrong (attention getter). Animal Agriculture is actually the number one Greenhouse Gas emitter in the planet. Yes, cow farts are destroying the environment. It sounds crazy, but ever since the mid 60’s, agriculture associations have been spreading across the Americas and dominated the industry. The most destructive of all Ag corps are Livestock Corporation. These associations include IBP, Conagra, Perdue, Farmland National Beef, Cargill, etc … Animal Agriculture is effecting every single person in this room because we all breathe in the same air, drink the same water, and eat the same (credibility). The buildup of Animal Agriculture is a great destruction to our planet and our species because it is creating

One of the biggest controversies with livestock production is that the amount of greenhouse gas emissions that get released into the atmosphere. Its assumed that cars produce most if not all the greenhouse gas emissions however livestock has a big say in air pollution. According to Cassandra Brooks, writer for the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment, 18 percent of all global greenhouse gas emissions are due to livestock production. This is nearly 20% and can be greatly reduced if people reduced their demand for meat. The Environmental Working Group used a tangible variable for Americans stating “if everyone in the U.S. ate no meat or cheese just one day a week, it would be like not driving 91 billion miles – or taking 7.6 million

Attention getter: According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United States, animal agriculture is a leading source of carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and methane emissions, the top three greenhouse gasses (FAO, 2006).

Meat and dairy productions’ livestock is responsible for over 51% of the greenhouse gas emissions, that could be cut by over 70% if we changed our diets to vegan or vegetarian. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the animals on the farms produce over 500 million ton of manure each

Respectively, the most notable, easy and immediate solution to this issue has always been to take shorter showers and turn the faucet off when not in use. These solutions are undeniably practice and useful, but is nowhere near effective or adequate; consider this, domestic water usage only consists of 10% of global water expenditure whilst agricultural water consumption is 70%! Even more disturbingly, a single hamburger is the equivalent of taking a single shower for 2 months straight, every cow in the world requires 45 billion gallons of water a day, and 1000 gallons of water makes solely 1 gallon of milk. In perspective, turning off the faucet when brushing your teeth can save 200 gallons of water a month, but a single meal consisting of a hamburger and a glass of milk is exhausting 660.05 gallons of water. Moreover, raising cows for beef is incredibly resource extensive as water supplies are needed to manage manure and fertilizer runoff from dairy farms. In turn, the excessive nutrients in local waterways result to algae growth thus reducing oxygen for aquatic wildlife and plants; overall, this runoff causing extreme disruptions in the marine ecosystem originates from excessive water

The environmental impacts of a diet based in animal products is well documented and is the source of much debate. According to a report from the United Nations ' Livestock 's Long Shadow (2006),“[t]he livestock sector emerges as one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global.” For those committed to reducing their negative impact on the environment, one solution would be to transition to a vegetarian or vegan/plant-based diet. Its not ethical to prescribe one way of being for environmentalists all over the world, especially when considering potential cultural differences. However, most committed environmentalists should attempt to adopt a vegetarian or vegan diet. This is because (1) animal products are an inefficient source of protein in terms of environmental impact, (2) the greenhouse gas emissions from an animal product-based diet is significantly higher than a plant-based diet and (3) animals are part of the environment and their treatment is as important as the treatment of the planet as a whole.

More land is being used to create farmlands instead of simply reusing older land. 26% of the land is used for livestock and 33% is used for growing the food needed for livestock ("10 Scary Facts About Meat and the Environment." Para 5). The land that is left unused is reducing at a rapid rate due to the expansion of agricultural land and with that, more of Earth’s forests are being cut down. Additionally, it takes more than nine time the fossil fuel to produce one calorie of meat than it does for one calorie of plant protein and 51% of global greenhouses gases are attributed to livestock ("10 Scary Facts About Meat and the Environment." Para 4). Even to produce meat, an immense number of crops are used. It takes almost 5 pounds of feed to produce just one pound of chicken. With the rate of depletion of land, crops, and environmental quality, there needs to be a change in the agricultural

Environmentalist view animal agriculture as a major threat to the Earth and the population that fills it. Animal agriculture has caused mass extinction of species, the melting of Arctic sea, and the collapse of the world fisheries. According to many environmentalist, the earth is currently facing the greatest mass extinction of all in history roughly a thousand times greater than ever before. For example, the Earth has lost more plant and animal species in today's time compared to the period of the dinosaur extinction. Due to the constant increase of animal agriculture causing desertification and deforestation is leading to the increase of greenhouse gases in the Earth’s atmosphere and predominantly the unnatural change in the climate. In the

This movie documents why animal agriculture is the #1 contributor to greenhouse gases, the #1 environmental problem , the leading cause of rain forest destruction and habitat loss, creating massive amounts of untreated waste and using far more of our precious aquifers than if we all simply ate a plant-based diet.

Various proposals exist to eliminate and/or reduce the impact animal agriculture entails on climate change. The report released by the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations suggests alternatives to the various sectors to the livestock industry. They propose better efficiency so, “...a larger portion of the energy in the animals’ feed is directed toward the creation of useful products (milk, meat, draught power), so that methane emissions per unit product are reduced.” (qtd. in Shields 363). The Humane Society International also developed some solutions the overall population can contribute to reduce climate change issues in the environment. One suggestion is promoting a higher population of people with plant-based diets in order to reduce the environmental impact of greenhouse gas emissions. The Humane Society International also ties this suggestion to an overall improvement for not only animal welfare, but public heath too. (“The Impact of Animal Agriculture” n.p.).

Biodiversity is defined as the variety of life in an environment, specifically the existence of many different kinds of plants and animals [1] , but biodiversity is so much more than that. Biodiversity is incredibly important to a well functioning ecosystem, and without it, food webs would break down and many organisms wouldn’t be able to survive. Biodiversity is especially important in California, a biodiversity hotspot. California is home to 5,879 species of plants and animals, more than any other state. [2] California has ideal climate and geography for a wide range of species. The abundant variety of organisms in California is very important. The ecosystems provides

Most environmental issues today come from actions that are so-called “necessary” with the way the world operates in the 21st century. Examples of such activities and their consequences is driving a car and the release of nitrous oxides into the air, or heating and cooling homes and businesses which requires the use of fossil fuels. However, animal agriculture, the industrialized production of meat and animal related products, is an industry that is not necessary to the functionality of society today. People’s desire to consume animal products is more often than not driven by taste buds, not survival. Furthermore, most people are not aware of the wide scale degradation animal agriculture causes both the planet and peoples’ health. Although animal agriculture impacts the environment in many forms, the negative impacts on the world’s limited water resource is too severe for such an industry to be able to continue to operate how it does today.

Animal agriculture is a big part of the greenhouse gases. Cows produce a lot of methane which is one of the greenhouse gases. We kill trees to clear land to grow crops to feed animals that we are going to kill to make food. Making meat especially beef are one of the big factors in climate change.Fossil fuel-energy is 80% of greenhouse gases and 6% comes from animal agriculture.

Willem-Alexander, King of The Netherlands, noted that his country worked diligently with sustainable development, a goal indispensable. The talk offers no solution to address the stressors of the environment. Unless the Dutch look closely at the harm of animal agriculture. Land use and water requirement for meat harms' nature. Cows compete for space and with no space to roam eat to gain extraordinary weight, milked, and slaughtered. Cows evolved to produce milk for calves and growth hormone to add extreme weight violates the laws of nature. Have the farmer use land that is enumerable with nature and good health. The Dutch can excel and respect nature and show an example of sustainable development placing nature first. The United Nations

As stated in the quotation above, the percentage of greenhouse gasses caused by livestock accounts varies in studies found. Despite the varying percentages, the studies do show a great percentage of human caused greenhouse gas emissions comes from the meat and dairy industry. By choosing to not consume animal products people will lower the demand, resulting in a lower supply of animal products and production. Farms are affecting the environment by producing high levels of carbon dioxide and polluting water supplies with manure; by going vegan or vegetarian, you are benefiting the environment as well as your body (Glenn).