Living
What can I do? Guide
What can I do ?
Guide
Food
1) Eat low on the food chain, i.e. vegetarianism:
This is probably one of the easiest solutions, yet most people seem unwilling to wean themselves off of a meat-heavy diet. According to the USDA (US Department of Agriculture) we only need 5-5.5 ounces of meat. For vegetarians tofu, beans, nuts, and eggs are all perfectly healthy substitutes. So what’s with the 8-ounce sirloin, the 16-ounce T-bone—that’s more than your body needs in a day, let alone one meal. We don’t need all that much meat––or any for that matter. A meat-saturated diet has serious health implications as well, and although it’s difficult for scientists to clearly state that a cause-effect relationship exists between eating beyond our dietary needs of meat and the increase between heart-related diseases, there is strong correlation between the two.
Aside from health, consider the environmental implications.
- Potatoes
- 500 liters
- Wheat
- 900 liters
- Maize (corn)
- 1,400 liters
- Rice
- 1,910 liters
- Soy beans
- 2,000 liters
- Chicken
- 3,500 liters
- Beef
- 100,000 liters
Even more important is eating “lower on the food chain,” meaning eating less meat and more grains, fruits, and vegetables. If this lifestyle change became common, the benefits for environmental problems, dietary health, and food security would be enormous. It would save money and energy and reduce your intake of fats that contribute to obesity, heart disease, and other disorders. It also would reduce air and water pollution, water use, deforestation, soil erosion, overgrazing, species extinction, and emissions of greenhouse gases (methane) produced by cattle. In the United States, animal agriculture pollutes more fresh water than all municipal and industrial uses combined. If Americans reduced their meat intake by only 10%, the savings in grain and soybeans could adequately feed 60 million people (Salem’s note, there are currently 30 million malnourished Americans). More than half of U.S. cropland is devoted to growing livestock feed. Livestock also consume more than half of the water used in the United States, either by direct consumption or irrigating to grow their feed or processing their manure. Each time a single American becomes a vegetarian, 1 acre of trees and 1.1 million gallons of water are saved each year, and that individual pollutes half as much water. Currently only about 3% of Americans are vegetarian. (189)
Environment and Society by Dr. Charles L. Harper of Creighton University(I know this may sound a little one-sided, but I assure you that these are facts, unbiased by propaganda. The author, Dr. Harper is not even a vegetarian himself, also in his years researching and teaching on environmental issues, he and his family have drastically reduced their intake, and they buy “naturally-raised” grass-fed beef. I don’t think US Beef can say the same about their facts.)
For most people turning vegetarian is a tall order, and I understand this. But at the least, a decrease in meat intake can significantly improve current pollution and obesity caused by a high saturated fat diet problems, as well as nearly eliminate issues on the flip-side that affect 50% of the world’s population: malnutrition and water shortage.
I understand that Japan may not have problems in this area to the degree that other industrialized countries. While in Japan, getting an early start are reducing or eliminating meat from your can help when/if you return home, where the meat issue is more prevalent. And if you are going to eat meat, I strongly urge you to think locally (in Japanese 地元—じもと) raised products, and I certainly recommend chicken to beef.
That leads me to… 2) Eat locally:
- Read more about "vegetarian"? : Living / Vegetarian
- Try some of our "vegetarian Recipes" : Living / Recipes
- Find out where to buy products for "vegetarian" food : Ecobiz / All Japan
