food production

Factory farming impact blog #5

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MacDonald, Mia, and Gene Baur. “In Order to ‘Feed the World’ We Must Stop Factory Farming Our Animals.” TheHill, 15 Oct. 2018, thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/411371-in-order-to-feed-the-world-we-must-stop-factory-farming-our.

  • Nine billion chickens and 120 million pigs are killed every year in the United States.

The Paris Agreement had a goal of keeping the rise of the Earth’s temperature to only 1.5 degree Celsius higher than the pre-industrial temperature. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said that we possibly only have 12 years to reduce the greenhouse gasses in order to meet this goal. This can be done by reducing the carbon from world wide energy system, and reducing the methane that comes from animal agriculture. “Animal agriculture is responsible for 90 percent of methane emissions and the U.S. habit of raising animals for food contributes more than half of our carbon footprint.” Humans use 3/4 of the world’s arable land, and 1/3 of cereal crops in order to nourish the animals in farms. Plus, with the rising demand for meat products, the amount of cereal crops to feed animals may rise to half by 2050. 

 

extinction of animals blog #4

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Carrington, Damian. “Humanity Has Wiped out 60% of Animals since 1970, Major Report Finds.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 30 Oct. 2018, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/30/humanity-wiped-out-animals-since-1970-major-report-finds.

Since 1970, humans have obliterated 60% of mammals, birds, fish and reptiles. The rise of extensive usage of food and resources by the worldwide population hurts the web of life of which humans depend on for pure water, safe air, energy, and environment.

Quote→ “If there was a 60% decline in the human population, that would be equivalent to emptying North America, South America, Africa, Europe, China and Oceania. That is the scale of what we have done.”

This is deeper than just losing “wonders of nature”, humanity and wildlife depend on nature to survive in the future generations. Scientists consider this to be the sixth mass extinction, and the first extinction caused by humans. Furthermore, if we were to end the extinction now, it would take an estimate of 5-7 million years to get the same diversity back.

The reason that these animals are going extinct is due to the fact that we are destroying natural habitats primarily to create farmland. Another reason is the fact that we are killing the animals for food, specifically 300 mammal species, plus the over fishing of oceans. Similarly, chemicals in the ocean and the diseases from global trade also kill the species.