CO: Livestock and the food they eat occupy 30% of the world's landmass and produce loads of terrible green house gases (GHG).
NEIL REYNOLDS Globe and Mail Update - August 1, 2007 at 5:59 AM EDT
We all emit greenhouse gases simply by breathing - one kilogram of
carbon dioxide a day, on average, per person. Since there are six
billion of us, we collectively emit more than two trillion kilograms of
carbon dioxide a year. Scientists don't hold these emissions against
us. What public policy options, after all, exist? Breath control?
All animals emit greenhouse gases and by comparison, humans are
relatively restrained respirators. The planet's livestock animals
alone, for example, breathe out three billion tonnes of CO{-2} a year.
Livestock, indeed, emit more GHG into the atmosphere than all of the
cars, freight trucks, railways, airplanes and container ships in the
entire world.
...
Together, livestock animals account for 20 per cent "of terrestrial
animal biomass" - in other words, of all living land creatures, humans
included.
Feed crops take 30 per cent of the world's arable land. Livestock
command 70 per cent of the planet's agricultural land and 30 per cent
of its entire land surface.
Directly and indirectly, livestock account for 18 per cent of
greenhouse gas emissions, the FAO says - more than "all transport"
combined. These animals emit 9 per cent of human-induced carbon
dioxide, 37 per cent of human-induced methane, 64 per cent of
human-induced nitrous oxide and 65 per cent of human-induced ammonia.
...
Animal husbandry, the FAO finds, "is responsible for the production
of gases with far higher potential to warm the atmosphere than carbon
dioxide." These gases cause other problems as well. Though measured in
the atmosphere in parts per billion, nitrous oxide can overwhelm
forests, producing what the FAO calls "forest dieback." The excessive
nitrogen load essentially reverses the growth effect of CO{-2} and
reduces the capacity of the forests to act as "carbon sinks."
...
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