September: the Month Britain Goes Veggie in 2008!

It’s a little known fact, but the meat and dairy industries are the number one cause of loss of biodiversity around the world. They top the list in making wildlife and plants extinct. Eating a burger doesn’t just cost the life of the cow, it also costs the lives of innumerable wild animals by destroying their natural habitat through clearing land to grow crops to feed farmed animals and ranching. So, by going veggie you not only save around 11,047 animals in a lifetime (by simply not eating them), you save thousands of wild animals, too! That’s the message of this year’s Veggie Month in September.

Eating the World

The unpalatable truth is the planet’s vital ecosystems of forests and soil are being trashed by the meat and dairy industries.

The outcome is that species are disappearing 100 to 1000 times faster than they should, judging by fossil records. One-third of all amphibians, a fifth of mammals and one in eight birds are now facing extinction.

Loss of forests and loss of biodiversity are one and the same thing. The primary cause is cattle ranching and growing soya for fodder and the scale is breathtaking. Since 1970, 285,590 square miles of Amazon rainforest have been felled. A typical four square mile patch of rainforest contains as many as 125 mammal species, 400 species of birds, 100 of reptiles, 60 of amphibians, and 150 different species of butterflies. Spider monkeys, Jaguars, Toucans and a whole host of other beautiful animals are losing their homes because of the West’s desire for meat and dairy.

Of cleared land in the Amazon, 70 per cent is grazed and the other 30 per cent grows soya fodder. Europe imports 18 million tons of the stuff every year and so every chicken nugget, burger, bacon rasher or turkey twizzler can claim a direct hand in rainforest destruction.

It is important that we reach people, and show just how damaging the average Western diet is. However, our message is a positive one: saying that just one individual can play a huge part in saving animals both here and abroad, both farmed and wild, just by simply ditching meat and dairy.

You can read more about loss of biodiversity in Viva!'s environment report Diet of Disaster.  

Get involved with Viva!'s Veggie Month 2008 here.