Going veggie... for the environment
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There are many good reasons for going vegetarian. Over two million farm animals are slaughtered for food every day in the UK alone.
A balanced vegetarian diet includes all the nutrients you need to stay on top form and vegetarians have absolutely no trouble eating the recommended five portions of fruit and vegetables a day.
But what about the environment? Studies estimate that a meat-based diet requires up to three times as many resources as a vegetarian diet and here are the reasons why.
Land use and sustainability
The number of hungry people in the world is rising and, put simply, livestock farming is inefficient. Animals need to eat. In fact, they consume more than half the wheat and 60% of the barley grown in the UK and around 90% of the world’s soya harvest.
They also need to breathe, move around, grow and reproduce and all of that uses up most of the energy and nutrition in the food they eat. Cattle consume around 7kg of grain for every 1kg of beef produced when they are ...
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