Still from Team Plant video
If us grown-ups want to make a better world for our kids, we need to do something about meat.
The rampant growth of industrial meat and dairy production and consumption is making us and our planet sick. Intensive meat production leads to forest destruction and dumps animal waste into our waterways, dramatically increasing the dead zones in our oceans and rivers. The livestock industry contributes as much to climate change as all cars, trucks, planes, boats and trains combined.
Perhaps most insidious is this: ever-increasing meat and dairy production and consumption are behind a latent global health crisis. High red meat consumption has been linked to cancer, heart disease, obesity, and diabetes. Conversely, millions of lives could be saved each year if people had better access to a diet rich in plant-based foods.
We want a healthy future and a healthy planet for the next generation, but right now we grown-ups are clearly dropping the ball. So, we at Greenpeace decided to imagine what it would look like if kids were asked to solve this problem. Enter: Team Plant!
But, as cute as they are, six-year-olds can’t be expected to change the world alone. To address the rising impact of industrial animal agriculture on our planet and our health, Greenpeace is calling for a global change in how much meat and dairy we eat and how it’s produced. That means governments changing policies to support ecological farming over mega-farms and increasing healthier plant-based foods in schools. It means working alongside farmers to create a healthy and just food system and thinking about how we can reduce our own meat consumption.
The industrial meat and dairy system affects everyone, whether you are nine or ninety! With our environment at a critical juncture, a new global movement is growing in response: one hungry for a better way of eating and producing food. This is just the beginning – we can all do so much more to secure a healthy future for our children and the planet we call home.
In the words of Team Plant: Can you help us?