Climate change and the environment
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I think it would be great that every inhabitant gets a meat card. Ypu take the card to the store, restaurant etc. Everyone is allowed to eat expl. 300 gr. A week. When you pass the 300 gr's you re not allowed to eat anymore meat for the rest of the week
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No, this is a horrible idea that is forcing people to go vegan. While I agree that we, as a society, are eating too much meat, which is bad for both the environment and our health, this will only create tension and anger towards the EU. Also, I have no illusions that rich and influential people won't find a way to get as much meat as they want and then distribute it on the black market. We need to positively motivate people to eat less meat instead.
If I can talk for myself, I would like to eat less meat, but the thing is, that 1) I don't know many meatless meals that I could cook and 2) the cantine where I'm going to lunch doesn't offer enough meatless meals. I think that cheeper and more effective way would be rewarding people who eat less meat. For example, lower health insurance cost.
Thanks for commenting. I don t want to force people into beeing vegetarian. I would love to see more people beeing active towards cooking meatfree. As a tip i can give you to replace your meat with chickpeas or linzes. There are many websites where you can find countless ideas for vegetarian cooking. And yes, a vegetarian lifestyle is a step towards vegan lifestyle. Good luck !
Linzes is actually lentils in English 👌
Thank you for your advice I'll try to remember it when I'll have to start cooking for myself more frequently next year. 😊
Es gibt schon viele Organisationen und Bewegungen, die einfache vegane Rezepte verschicken- Veganuary zum Beispiel; oder auch viele Tierschutz- und Tierrechts- Organisatíonen. Ich wohne in Deutschland und unsere Geschäfte und Supermärkte bieten zunehmend mehr vegetarische und vegane Gerichte an. Ich koche nicht sehr gerne, als schaue ich in der Tierkühl-Abteilung häufig nach kompletten gefrorenen Gerichten oder vegane Würstchen oder Schnitzel zum Beisp, die ich dann mit Salat und Brot schnell zu einem Mal zusammenstellen kann! 😃
i think that making a simple widely available cook book with simple vegan and vegetarian recipes as to make the transition less daunting to people and making sure that it is reasonably priced.
Administrating such idea how do you propose?
Will it give rise to a black market?
Will people just drive to the neighbouring country and buy more?
Remember we are 27 eu states and 27 different interests.
Bloomberg quicktake made a video (its on youtube) where they took artificial grown meat from cells in steel tanks.
Personally i would be more open to that than certain ideas with vega.
I have a better idea: Reduce Environment Pollution by Immigration Policy
Your idea has a lot of rashly points and there is no scientific basis. To say it is a better idea to get people to eat less meat is wrong.
Das sehe ich ähnlich! Tiere sind lebende und fühlende Wesen und es gibt auch von Seiten der Wissenschaft Belege dafür, dass sie Schmerz und Angst empfinden wie wir! In unserer Gesellschaft muss ein Umdenken stattfinden hin zu einem respektvollen Umgang. ( Mit Mensch und Tier).
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I definitely agree that we have to eat less meat. Just recently there was just another reason to eat less meat: The EU is responsible for the second most destruction of the amazon rainforest, because we import so much soja, for the animals. Not to mention the awful conditions the animals live in.
But I think forcing people to eat a limited amount of meet is totally the wrong way because of the following reasons:
1. It would cause so much more bureaucracy
2. forbidding it would understandibly make a lot of people very mad. I mean who likes to be told what to eat?
3. I think it's important to have a freedom to eat what you want
I think a much better solution would be to increase the tax on meat. Making it less attractive for people.
True, i have to admit, forcing people is not the right way. It was also a suggestion to get the conversation going ☺️ perhaps we should look into subsedising less the meatindustry and look more into what we can learn from optimalisation in the production of plantbased products.
I very much agree that we must have a strategy to make meat consumption less attractive and more expensive, while at the same time show alternatives. Even large firms involved in factory farming and slaughtering offer plant based food as an alternative already!
I partially agree with you. Indeed, I believe it should be better to talk about financial incentives to those who produce food (of any kind, meat included) respecting the environment rather than imposing a tax on everyone (which means imposing a tax on those ones who work by respecting the environment as well).
In brief, I believe we should focus on the PROCESS and not the PRODUCT.
If someone produces respecting the environment, he/she should be helped and rewarded which also shows the other what they should do as well :)
I agree, but at the same time we have to prevent the import of meat -(products) from countries which don*t have any animal protection laws...!
Agreed. Not very sure about the tax though. Meat is already more expensive than meatless products (and if it isn't in some countries, we should reduce the price of meatless products instead). While making things more expensive is definitely better than banning them, it also isn't a step that won't make anyone mad.
I am not sure about a meat tax though. It could have the effect that it creates a price pressure to produce meat even cheaper. Due to economy of scales, big corporations can reduce production costs easier than smaller farms. This could make the conditions for animals even worse.
The EU is subsiding agriculture heavily. Those subsidies should be restructured. Today, harmful activities to the environment or climate oftentimes are rewarded through subsidies, not only in meat production. For instance in Germany, agricultural Diesel has a lower tax rate – which means that a farmer who is burning the most fossil fuel also receives the most money out of that subsidy. Instead of subsidizing agricultural Diesel, ecological farming should incentivized through subsidies.
Ma contribution à ce débat intéressant :
Je pense qu’il est important de faire la différence entre les types de viande :
Dans le pire des cas, nous avons la viande importée de pays hors Europe venant d’élevages intensifs. Mais de l’autre côté, nous avons la viande venant de petites exploitations, des régions européennes. Certaines régions sont rurales et l’élevage fait partie des sociétés locales, ou même du paysage et des écosystèmes à préserver. La viande issue de ces origines devrait être reconnaissable.
De même la viande issue de vache de réforme après la production de lait devrait être préférée à la viande produite pour cette unique raison.
L’utilisation de complément alimentaire type soja devrait aussi être limité (taxe à l’import?)
Voilà pour ma petite contribution 🙂
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The source of meat may be more important than the quantity an individual consumes. Meat from sustainable or ecological sources should not really be banned or punished, that kind of production can even be ecologically beneficial.
Well yes, but sustainable modes of production will end up using so much land that you would not be able to provide much more meat per person than what you're already seeing in the proposal above. The EAT-Lancet commission estimated that sustainable farming would produce around 14g red meat + 29g chicken = 43g / day = 301g / week (excluding fish, which could be another 28g/day, for a total of 497g/week). So you'd still end up with the same quantity limitation, it's just a question of how you get people to change their habits (where it's just a problem of choice) and how you distribute enough nutritious food to those who don't have it yet (where choice is not the problem, e.g. where starchy vegetables or cereals or fish are overconsumed due to a lack of other options).
I was only referring to the source of production, but I agree: sustainable production cannot sustain the population the Earth now has. And I belive that the human race is not entitled to grow any futher without solving this problem - it is not only selfish, it will eventually destroy us and many other species. Still, we are already capable "manufacturing" artifical meat, so who knows?
I agree with your point on the use of land, but please consider that some regions in Europe are very rural and agricultural activities must be supported there. For the economy but also for certain ecosystems and the landscapes. But intensive farms are indeed non sense to me. Regards to you guys
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Your abhorrent idea reminds me of a horrible time in the history of this continent.
You know, during communist times every person in Romania (maybe other countries as well) had a card that entitled him/her to buy a specific quantity of products, nothing more: half a bread a day; one liter of cooking oil a month; 1 kg of sugar a month; 39 kg of meat/year; 78 liters of milk/year; 166 kg of vegetables/year.
If this is the future you want, in the name of whatever green bs, it means you have learned nothing from the history. Rest asured though, many others did and before they are condemned to repeat it, will rightfully fight tooth and nail against the new communism people like you envision.
Thanks for your answer. If you use a word as powerful as abhorrent it gives me the idea that you overlooked some factors about the production of meat. it is impacting the environment by a large extend. let a part the animal hurt, with is gruesome.
Have you watched the movie " cowspiracy" ?
I have heard about what you are describing and want to point out I am not advocating to change our system in a communist system.
However, that system was a derivative from ideas to have a more sustainable and happier life for all. It was rolled out but not in the way it was intended.
Also I understand that this system impacted you and your family and I am sorry for that.
Please do know that the capitalistic system which we currently live in, is also failing to answer a lot of issues modern day society is facing .
It's not about me or my family, but the hundreds of millions of people who suffered or died (and still die in some corners of the world) because of such ideas that were sold to people in packagings beautifully labeled with "a more sustainable and happier life for all". And to say that communism was a good idea turn bad is an insult to all of them, on top of denoting a lack of knowledge on both history and economy.
Btw, there is nothing sustainable in communism (unless killing people and turning Earth into a human-free natural reserve means "sustainability"): the communism itself is unsustainable, as 100 years of history proved to the fullest. No communist system was and will ever be able to support itself unless backed by terror. The first of its theoreticians understood this very well (unlike those European intellectuals who had only seen the glam of the utopian ideas) and that's why terror was always part of the revolutions they promoted. Read Lenin for more on that.
As i said in my comment, this idea is not about communism and to my believes communism isn't an answer to most of the problems society faces.
To give you an idea you should read something about the mondragon corporation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondragon_Corporation
This is an example of " a better way of living" as it was thought out by Marx.
I
I found nothing in that mondragon system (which I don't personally fancy, but if anyone else wants to create such a corporation and live by those rules, it's their sovereign right to do so) saying anything about the food rations you want to see implemented.
You say "to my believes communism isn't an answer to most of the problems society faces", then you come with Marx. That is, with one of the ideological pillars of communism. Marx, that guy who wrote a book about "capital" while he wasn't ever able to manage his own capital and lived out of his wife's and Engel's charity, like a petty beggar.
And let me give you another example of the "better way of living" as it was thought out by Marx: "We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.". Sadly, this is exactly what happened throughout the last century, nothing towards "a better way of livng". This is marxism/communism/any leftism. Thanks, but no, thanks.
Yes, the capitalist system is not bulletproof; but it still is better than any form of communism, by a huge margin. I happen to have lived under both systems, therefore I can claim to have a competent opinion. Please do the same, go live for a few years in a system where the state tells you how much are you allowed to eat (or drink, or travel, or think), then come back (if you can) and tell us how nice is to have a life like that for the sake of "not impacting the environment".
I haven't watched cowspiracy - I'll probably do it when I'm in mood for a comedy. Then I'll sear myself another juicy T-bone that weighs more than the "weekly allowance" you want to see implemented.
if these kind's of issues are comedy for you, please don't bother responding.
You're doing a horrible job at defending your point of view
I really don't need to defend any point of view here: your point of view is naturally defenseless. The only thing I do is to raise awareness to anyone else reading here about the extremes some green fundamentalists are ready - even eager - to go to. Extremes that have correspondents in history - and who doesn't learn from history is condemned to repeat it (and suffer).
And yes, hearing that I should eat half of my t-bone a week (!) is a comedy to me. It would be a tragedy if I were indeed forced to obey such an insane rule, but this will never happen.
Very good that you are raising awareness on Communism! Many people within the Climate change movement have good intentions and want the world to be a better and cleaner place but have not understood that the movement has been hijacked by Marxists who can’t wait for a new era of destruction to start.Everyone who really cares about the environment should look at facts and what measures can be implemented fast and effective enough to make an impact.The least we need now is people without common sense and facts to take on this urgent problem. Guess who were very high on the list to be slaughtered by communism? Small farmers, simply because they were not allowed to own anything and the state would decide who would produce what and who would be fed. Result: starvation to millions.People who are on FB screaming all the time, read a book instead about how many innocent people suffered from the evilness of Communism (Gulag - Applebaum). And no that was not due to bad implementation.
While I agree that consumption of food that is less polluting, it cannot be restricted. I do agree, however, to promote consumption of meats like chicken or turkey, that take less resources to produce.
Hard to enforce and would be not popular enough to make the vote.
Simply cutting subsidies to meat production, ensuring safe working conditions and fair payment for employees, including externalised costs into the price(CO2/Methane, water use and pollution by fertilizer and antibiotica) Would substantially increase the price of meat and thus reduce consumption
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I believe that the problem is not WHAT we eat but rather HOW food is produced.
When we talk about meat we should make a distinction between industrial production (which is damaging our environment) and family-run businesses' once (which does not). Instead of prohibiting food (something that is practically speaking impossible to do) we should rather enhance local food solutions and increase people's awareness regarding the impact of their buying choices. Our goal should be making local products and green goods available to everyone and not a privilege of people who are wealthy enough to be able to afford them.
Actually, most family-run agricultural businesses harm the environment, too, especially those rearing animals. With meat production, what matters is largely what the animals are fed and how much waste /biogas is produced (and whether it is captured or not). Small farms are not necessarily less harmful per kg of meat than big ones. With the animal fodder, the questions are: what are the CO2 costs, land use, freshwater, etc. - grains having big costs in that area. And: how does the animal digest the food / what waste gases does it produce. Grass-fed cattle being the most famous example of methane production (with methane being a worse greenhouse gas than CO2). Some research suggests that kelp-feeding cows may reduce methane significantly while not having a negative environmental impact in fodder production, but AFAIK kelp is not a widely used fodder.
Yes you are absolutely right, I just wanted to make an example to better explain myself and I took the example of family-run businesses because, overall speaking, small businesses are more likely to have less waste than big firms. Indeed, as small business tend to produce less goods, costs they have to sustain are (in proportion) higher than those of bigger firms. As a result, throwing products away has a stronger negative impact on small businesses than on big ones. This said, I agree with you for what regards the fact that we should pay more attention on HOW we do things, how we produce goods (food included), and the impact of our lifestyle and economiy on the environment. Finally, I just want to remind that humans have always eaten meat in the past thousand years, the problem started when we began to produce meat on a large scale, throught industrial (and not natural) techniques. We should respect nature more and exploit it less.
the reason why i wrote this down is because of the fact it is also related to "How much" we eat. If you eat the same amount of bio or small business produced meat, it will impact the environment in the same way.
there are countless of examples human kind can survive without (over)consumption' of meat and/or dairy products.
Personally, several months ago i stopped buying meat ( sometimes a pizza hawai) and the times I ate meat for dinner can be counted on one hand.
It makes me feel good about the animals that were saved and I have the same amount of energy as before.
sidenote: did you know on a chickenfarm the roosters get terminated right away. its not gentle, they get shredded. and yes this is also being done in biofarms.
i do take vitamines, cause that's important :)
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Meat production is one of the big climate killers, so it makes sense to look for methods to reduce demand for meat. Doing so in a way that does not disadvantage people based on wealth is hard: taxes would mainly affect lower earners, and if meat simply becomes expensive, it just gains social status. Meat rationing seems like a logical solution, but in democracies, it's not feasible to go against popular will that way. Besides, having sausages as symbol of freedom and vegetarian food as symbol of oppression seems counterproductive.
What solutions does that leave us with? Vegetarian / climate friendly alternatives should be made more desirable, and meat less desirable. Subsidies should move from animal farming to developers and producers of plant-based alternatives. Carbon taxes should apply. Eventually, meat packaging might have to include ugly labels like cigarettes. Once culture-sourced meat hits the market, then perhaps restrictions on animal rearing might become justified.
The idea of ugly labels reminding environmental poisoning of meat production is definitely a good one! But in the same way long distance imports even if labelled with eco sticks. It should be reminded how many miles those products travel and the carbon footprint
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what do you think of my idea? humans need meat for healthy hormone levels, it's not possible to leave a healthy life without meat!
Reduce Environment Pollution by Immigration Policy
it cannot be taken serious
Maybe 500gr weekly and if you eat no meat then you get a bonus for a vegetable.
Ermutigen Sie die Wirtschaft, vor allem FastFood-Ketten und Schnellrestaurants, wenn oder wo möglich mit kontrollierter Selbstverpflichtung oder maßvollen und verhältnismäßigen Gesetzen und Verordnungen, weniger Werbung für Fleischprodukte zu machen. Werbung und Öffentlichkeitsarbeit weckt Erwartungen beim Verbraucher - und Erwartungen können tier-, pflanzen- oder menschenfreundlich oder tier-, pflanzen- oder menschenschädlich oder umweltfreundlich oder umweltschädlich sein.
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Beef and other ruminants are actually a very good way of production essential amino acides (i.e. the very reason we eat meat in the first place. A rigourous LCA should be applied to vegan-bio-organic etc. options before making them political objects.
Sehr tolle Idee. Früher gab es auch nur ein mal in der Woche Fleisch, weil es so teuer wahr. Und jetzt werden fühlende Lebewesen verramscht. Eine Schande ist das. Viele diskutiern ob Vegetarisch oder Vegan gesund sein soll. Leute, ganz Indien ist fast Vegan.
It seems like an idea that might be difficult to implement without a raise of black market. I may recall the Spanish "estraperlo" after the Civil War. But if it comes to banning and restrictions, may I recall that banning smoking in public spaces is nowadays commonly accepted? But maybe more useful to put taxes on grain production or trade for cattle feeding? And no subvention at all of animal production. Difficult issue anyway to think of discouraging measures both on consumption and production
I think forcing people to do certain things doesn't bring a change in the long term because people often don't get to know why they have to change.
Instead, I think it all starts with education - we should educate people and our kids about these things and therefore I think it would be a great idea to discuss and learn about topics like that in school.
The government does not have any right to use the taxpayer's money to propagandize the people to encourage what to eat and not to eat. It is not the responsibility of the government.
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Die Idee ist im Grunde gut, aber sehr schwer umzusetzen. Ein Beispiel: Meine Familie und ich kaufen alle paar Monate ganzes Hähnchen bei einem Bauernhof in der Nähe. Es hatte dann ein gutes glückliches Leben und sein Fleisch wird anschließend komplett verspeist. Jedoch wiegt es dann nicht nur 300g, sondern 3 - 4 kg. Also deutlich mehr als in deinem Vorschlag. Es hatte dafür aber ein gutes Leben, wurde ohne Transportwege direkt auf dem Bauernhof geschlachtet und auch nach seinem Tod ist es dann nur noch circa 4km bis zu uns gefahren worden, und nicht erst noch in einen Supermarkt oder ähnliches.
Die Idee ist im Grunde nicht gar nicht gut. Wieso sollte der Staat die erklären/erziehen, was du essen solltest? Wir sind doch alle Erwachsen.
a way better Option would be to raise all meat prices and animalproducts in general
you have to think about the implementation. Just being able to buy meat by having a "meatcard" would be a lot more bureaucratic effort. Furthermore you devide society into two groups. The one who are allowed and the others who are not. By looking at this topic more accurate the tecnical efford wouldn't stand in relation to the positiv sides of your opinion.
I support the title of this idea but not the the method proposed here.
Instead, simply reduce subsidies for livestock, as proposed e.g. here:
* Reduce subsidies for livestock and fisheries Reducir las subvenciones a la ganadería y la pesca.
* Stop wasting billions on livestock subsidies Stop wasting billions on livestock subsidies
I also think that rewarding works better than then punishment - and the idea of meat card is a little bit like a punishment. I changed my nutrition to vegan but I would not force anybody else to do so, because that would not convince anybody. I like and can relate from my own experience the observation from @Jan Štěch that it is difficult to get vegan food in canteens. One idea could be to offer subsidies to canteens with vegan options for the employees.
I'm totally against this. It would only make more people hate the EU and point at it as authoritarian. Putting a higher tax on meat is also a no, beacause we already pay too much taxes on everything, we don't need new taxes. A good idea would be to reward everyone that buys less meat with tax cuts. However, knowing what a certain person buys is hard... how can you know how much meat I bought in a week? So, it should go on a regional level: the regions that consume less meat should get a reward, for instance -1 VAT tax on other foods.
Bueno dado que te tomas la maravillosa molestia de contestar y lo agradezco te escribiré mi opinión. Recientemente buscando un empleo que ni en fantasías y no por falta de capacidad sino por debilidad mental y distorsiones podría yo realizar, me encontré un trabajo como socióloga de jefa de equipo de un proyecto de plantaciones transgénicas a gran escala que estaban intentando producir carne en vegetales para la nueva revolución industrial que se avecina. a su vez a partir de células madre es posible, aunque muy caro crear carne artificial...creo que ese es el camino. a corto plazo tu propuesta pudiera ser buena pero no es más que una demanda capitalista para que no les hagamos gastar tanto en alimentarnos y estemos contentos con hormonas y con alguna que otra lechuguita. yo exijo unos alimentos justos con masivos campos de ganadería extensiva. ¿el agua? energías renovables e inversión. antes de que se consuma viviremos en una Matriohska Brain.
Horrible idea. Next you will limit water or air?!?! or the rich will pay for extra meat or whatever. This is not the way to move on climate change. You can do much more via mass politics and not focus on individuals or limit their freedoms. If you want stop eating meat, i wont
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