The HSUS Urges Increased Attention to Animal Agriculture’s Contribution to Global Warming

With the commencement of the United Nations Climate Change Conference next week, The Humane Society of the United States is urging policy-makers and consumers to address animal agriculture's contributions to global warming by releasing a white paper today that focuses on the issue.

The paper, entitled An HSUS Report: The Impact of Animal Agriculture on Global Warming and Climate Change, points to the significant role that meat, egg and dairy production play in climate change and other serious environmental problems.

"Given the urgent environmental problems posed by animal agribusiness, it's critical that policy-makers develop concrete mitigation and adaptation strategies for the farm animal sector," said Danielle Nierenberg, The HSUS' animal agriculture and climate change specialist. "As a society, we can also help reduce environmental degradation by reducing the total number of animals who we raise and kill for food."

The HSUS recommends several steps that animal agriculture should take to help mitigate some of its environmental problems, including moving away from intensive farm animal confinement systems and the use of energy-intensive fertilizers and grain.

To help draw more attention to this issue, The HSUS will be leading a break-out session on animal agriculture and climate change at the annual National Council for Science and the Environment conference in January 2008. 

Facts:

• According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, meat, egg and dairy production are responsible for nearly one-fifth of human-induced greenhouse gas emissions, even more than transportation.

• Animal agriculture is responsible for 9 percent of human-induced carbon dioxide emissions, 37 percent of methane emissions (which has more than 20 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide) and 65 percent of nitrous oxide emissions.

• According to the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, growth in farm animal populations, particularly in large, confined operations, has greatly increased emissions of methane from both animals and their manure.

• The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has cited an increased numbers of birds raised for eggs and meat and the escalating confinement of pigs and dairy cows as catalysts for rising emissions of powerful greenhouse gases.

Timeline:

• September 2007 — The Lancet, the world's leading independent general medical journal, publishes a study that advocates a reduction in meat and milk consumption for residents of high-income countries, both to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to benefit human health.

• November 2006 — The United Nations Food and Agriculture Association releases Livestock's Long Shadow: Environmental Issues and Options , which states that animal agriculture is "one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems" and is a major driver of climate change.

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To see a copy of the white paper, go to humanesociety.org/climatechange .

To see a copy of The HSUS' global warming advertisement, click here.

To get more information about the 2008 National Council for Science and the Environment conference, go to ncseonline.org/2008conference/cms.cfm?id=1909