Tax meat and dairy to cut emissions and save lives, study urges

Climate taxes on meat and milk would lead to huge and vital cuts in carbon emissions as well as saving half a million lives a year via healthier diets, according to the first global analysis of the issue.

Surcharges of 40% on beef and 20% on milk would account for the damage their production causes people via climate change, an Oxford University team has calculated. These taxes would then deter people from consuming as much of these foods, reducing both emissions and illness, the team said.

Food production causes a quarter of all the greenhouse gas emissions that are driving global warming, largely from the raising of cattle and other livestock. These emissions are increasing as people around the world become richer and eat more meat.

Marco Springmann, from the Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Food, who led the study, said: “It is clear that if we don’t do something about the emissions from our food system, we have no chance of limiting climate change below 2C.

“But if you’d have to pay 40% more for your steak, you might choose to have it once a week instead of twice.”

Meat and dairy tax

The research, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, evaluated the tax required for each food type to compensate for the climate damage its production causes. Beef has a heavy footprint, due to the deforestation and methane emissions associated with cattle and the grains they are fed, and needed a 40% tax on average across the world.

The scientists then assessed how much less of each food type would be eaten as a result of the taxes. They examined different tax regimes and found the optimum arrangement in terms of both emissions and health was to combine the taxes with subsidies for healthy foods, such as fruit and vegetables, and payments to people to compensate for price increases. This ensured poorer people did not end up with worse diets as the result of taxation.

This optimum tax plan would reduce climate emissions by 1 billion tonnes a year – the same as the entire global aviation industry. This huge potential cut in emissions surprised Springmann, as did the heavy impact of dairy products.

Changes to how food is produced and consumed have largely been ignored in the battle against climate change, due to public sensitivity about their food choices, fears about increasing hunger in poorer parts of the world and the lack of straightforward measures to tackle the problem.

“If people see any food price rise, they get angry, so you have to explain why you are doing it,” said Springmann, adding that a successful food tax policy could spend all the money it raised on ensuring people could afford healthier diets. He said a tax in Denmark on unhealthy saturated fats, where the government simply kept all the revenue, was aborted after a year. But in Mexico, a sugar tax on soft drinks has been successful after the funds were spent on free drinking water in schools.

Most of the foods with big climate impacts also happen to be unhealthy when eaten in large quantities, such as beef and dairy. Therefore, if climate taxes cut consumption, fewer people would die from related diseases such as heart disease, strokes and cancers. In the US, for example, people eat three times the recommended level of meat. The researchers found climate taxes would save more than half a million early deaths every year, largely in Europe, the US, Australia and China.

However, cutting the demand for meat and dairy would not be easy, said Rob Bailey, research director at UK thinktank Chatham House: “The challenge is political. As the new research demonstrates, in many countries there is a very strong public health and climate case for dietary change, but it isn’t happening. Governments are reluctant to ‘interfere’ in people’s lifestyle choices for fear of a public backlash and criticism for ‘nanny statism’, as well as the reaction from powerful interests in the food industry and agricultural lobby.”

Bailey said there was currently little pressure on governments to act, partly because the public understanding of the link between diet and climate change is low. But, when people are informed, they find meat taxes far less unpalatable than is supposed, he said.

Calls to cut meat-eating, by the UN and high-profile figures including climate change experts and the economist Lord Stern, have so far been both rare and controversial.

The new research found the taxes needed to compensate for climate damage were 15% on lamb, 8.5% on chicken, 7% on pork and 5% on eggs. Vegetable oil required a large tax of 25%, but this was due to the low initial price of the product, making a relatively modest surcharge look high.

These tax levels were global averages but there was significant variation with, for example, the beef tax being higher in Latin America, where cattle-raising produces more emissions than in other regions. The optimum tax plan also had regional variations, including limiting climate taxes to beef in the lowest income countries, to ensure people there were still able to afford decent diets.

Springmann said it was critical to find a way to cut the environmental impact of food production: “Either we have climate change and more heart disease, diabetes and obesity, or we do something about the food system.”

Tax meat and dairy to cut emissions and save lives, study urges

Bioengineered animal-free dairy coming to a grocer near you

Synthetic biology start-up company Perfect Day, formerly Muufri, is close to introducing a new kind of dairy to the food industry, sans cows. You read right; Perfect Day has created a genetically modified (GMO) strain of yeast called “Buttercup,” which turns plant-based sugars and fats into real milk proteins. Founders of Perfect Day have been working to provide a humane and ultra-sustainable dairy alternative since 2014 and anticipate having their products in stores towards the end of 2017.

Perfect Day co-founder Perumal Gandhi said, “We’re trying to make a ‘Goldilocks product’ that is better than anything out there: something that has the best of dairy products, but also the best of the alternatives.” While the company has started with cow milk, they plan to engineer goat milk, buffalo milk, and more. “We were hungry for a solution that empowered you to help make the world a kinder, greener place without giving up the delicious dairy foods you love.”

The company’s website totes claim that their crafting process is “cleaner, greener, and kinder” than the factory farming methods used to produce milk and dairy products. Preliminary studies suggest that their engineering process will use 98% less water, 91% less land, 65% less energy, and produce 84% less greenhouse gas emissions than industrial dairy production.

The company is citing superior nutrition, greater versatility, and better taste and texture as reasons consumers might choose their products instead of vegan dairy alternatives. However, it appears that their primary target market includes lacto-vegetarians who have not found the flavor and texture of vegan alternatives suitable and those who are lactose intolerant. They expect pricing to be comparable to organic dairy products.

“There will certainly be a “yuck factor” to the first food products created with industrial biotech and tissue-engineering platforms, but a steel fermentation vessel is a heck of a lot more sterile than a dirty cow or dairy farm,” said Maxx Charski of the Motley Fool. “You don’t drink milk because it comes from cows; you drink milk because you want milk. In other words, the milk is the product, not the cow. So why should the production system come into play in your purchasing decision? If you truly care about the impacts of your food, then you’ll consider the benefits of each on a case-by-case basis, not because one is labeled organic.” Obviously, the products will not be organic as USDA organic certification prohibits the use of genetically modified organisms in any aspect of production.

Perfect Day founders have vowed to practice transparency and to create products people will want to eat. They invite customers to submit product suggestions on their website and to stop by their Berkeley, California brewery for samples. Despite promises of transparency, the company fails to address concerning research against genetically modified (GMO) foods, GMO labeling, or global efforts to ban GMO foods.

The Perfect Day website states, “Our products are 100% free of genetically-modified organisms. However, we relied on genetic engineering to create a type of yeast that produces milk proteins. This is how vegetarian rennet, ethical vanilla, insulin, and many other everyday products are made. We then carefully filter and purify our milk proteins to ensure they’re 100% free of any yeast before adding them to our food products — this is why we can be sure they’re totally non-GMO.”

There are a lot of unanswered questions here, but the consumer will be the final judge.

Source for this article include:

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/08/10/why-vegan-cow-free-dairy-milk-presents-a-major-pro.aspx

http://www.sciencealert.com/this-new-dairy-alternative-is-made-from-real-milk-proteins-but-with-no-cows-required

http://www.perfectdayfoods.com/faq/

https://www.fastcoexist.com/3062905/these-vegan-dairy-products-are-made-from-milk-there-just-arent-any-cows-involved

http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/07/us-senate-passes-gm-food-labeling-bill

Bioengineered animal-free dairy coming to a grocer near you

"Give up dairy products to beat cancer"

Within six weeks the lump in her neck had disappeared; within a year, she was in remission and remained cancer-free for the next 18 years. Convinced that her diet had helped, she devised the Plant programme – a dairy-free diet, relying largely on plant proteins such as soy – similar, she says, to the traditional diet in rural China.

It was originally intended to help other women with breast cancer and, later, men with prostate cancer. Her book about her experience, Your Life in Your Hands, caused a sensation when it was published in 2000, with many cancer patients claiming it helped them to recover.

But in 2011, Prof Plant’s breast cancer returned for the sixth time, with the discovery of a large lump beneath the collarbone and some small tumours in her lungs. Under stress writing an academic book, she had become lax about both her diet and lifestyle – regularly eating, among other forbidden items, calves’ liver cooked in butter at a restaurant, and falafel made from milk powder.

“I went straight back to my oncologist, who prescribed letrozole [an oestrogen suppressor]. But I also went back on my strict diet, as well as walking regularly and doing meditation.” After a few months, her cancer was again in remission.

All of which may sound too good to be true, but Plant, 69, is no crackpot. Professor of geochemistry at Imperial College London, where she specialises in environmental carcinogens, she is highly regarded in her field, having been awarded a CBE in 1997 for her services to earth science; and her approach to cancer is supported by some eminent scientists. Her latest book, co-written with Mustafa Djamgoz, professor of cancer biology at Imperial, has a foreword from Prof Sir Graeme Catto, president of the College of Medicine, who describes its findings as “illuminating… even, at times, shocking” but all backed up by scientific research.

Prof Plant, however, is not dismissive of conventional cancer treatment, having had, at various times, a mastectomy, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and irradiation of her ovaries to induce menopause.

She believes new and “wonderful” anti-cancer treatments are vital – but so, she argues, is a dairy-free diet, as well as other diet and lifestyle measures, such as stress reduction.

Much of the advice in the new book, Beat Cancer, chimes with current guidance on how to reduce cancer risk, such as eating more plant food and less red meat, salt, sugar and fat; taking regular exercise and reducing stress.

She also advises going organic, using complementary therapies where there is good evidence they help recovery, and avoiding potential pollutants such as pesticides.

But her far more radical message is that a diet that totally excludes dairy products – milk, cheese, butter and yoghurt – can be successfully used to help stop the disease “in its tracks”, by depriving cancer cells of the conditions they need to grow.

“We have all been brought up with the idea that milk is good for you,” says Prof Plant. “But there is evidence now that the growth factors and hormones it contains are not just risky for breast cancer, but also other hormone-related cancers, of the prostate, testicles and ovary.”

Going dairy-free, she says, may also help patients with colorectal cancer, lymphoma and throat (but not lung) cancer. “Cows’ milk is good for calves – but not for us,” she adds.

With the relatively new science of epigenetics, scientists now understand that cancer-causing genes may not become active unless particular conditions arise that switch them on – and if those conditions change, they may be switched off. “This means that what you eat can have an impact at the genetic level,” says Prof Plant.

_{For those with cancer or at high risk of the disease, Prof Plant advocates cutting out all dairy}

Cancer cells, scientists now believe, are hypersensitive to chemical messenger proteins called growth factors, as well as (in the case of hormone- dependent cancers) hormones such as oestrogen. Produced by our own bodies, growth factors perform vital tasks such as making cells grow. Other substances called binding proteins normally control them, including their potential impact on cancer cells. The risk of cancer arises when we have abnormally high levels of “unbound” growth factors (or hormones) circulating in our blood.

This can happen, say Profs Plant and Djamgoz, because the same growth factors and hormones as we produce are found in food that comes from animals, providing the very “fertiliser” that cancer cells need. Casein, the main protein in cows’ milk, is considered most dangerous. One eminent US nutritional scientist, Prof Colin Campbell at Cornell University, argues that it should be regarded just like oestrogen – as a leading carcinogen.

“Cow’s milk [organic or otherwise] has been shown to contain 35 different hormones and 11 growth factors,” says Prof Plant. High circulating levels of one such growth factor in milk, called IGF-1, is now strongly linked to the development of many cancers. Research has also found that “unbound” IGF levels are lower in vegans than in both meat-eaters and other vegetarians.

“This means that a vegan diet is lower in cancer-promoting molecules and higher in the binding proteins that reduce the action of these molecules,” she argues.

A second growth factor implicated in cancer spread is VEGF, found at high levels in cancer patients and a target for some newer anti-cancer drugs. Prof Plant points out that in the udders of cows with mastitis, VEGF is present to help fight infection. Mastitis is thought to affect nearly half of all cows in Britain. “There are increasing numbers of papers about high levels of VEGF in milk, particularly from high- yielding cattle breeds typical of modern industrialised dairy units.

“It seems likely that if a cancer patient is consuming dairy products, they are also consuming VEGF, especially if the milk originated from cows with mastitis. That is not helping to defeat their illness – and it may be making things worse.”

She is particularly worried about the fashion for high- protein diets, pointing out that there is evidence that too much protein generally – particularly from animals – is “at best unhelpful and at worst dangerous to those at risk of cancer”.

A second theory around diet concerns the levels of acid in our bodies. Prof Plant explains that if we consume too much acid-generating food, our bodies become acidic – an environment in which cancer cells can flourish. The foods highest in generating acid (not, as might be assumed, citrus fruit) include eggs, meat, fish and dairy – with cheese the most acid generating-food of all.

For those with cancer or at high risk of the disease, Prof Plant advocates, among other things, cutting out all dairy – from cows, sheep and goats, and whether organic or not. “If you have active cancer, there are no half-measures here.”

She also recommends limiting consumption of other animal protein, such as meat, fish and eggs, replacing this with vegetable protein such as soya – the main source of protein, she points out, in a traditional, rural Chinese diet.

But if the evidence that cutting out dairy can successfully “beat cancer” is that strong, why haven’t we been told?

Prof Plant puts it down to vested interests – the dairy industry represents about 12 per cent of Britain’s GDP – and medical conservatism: oncologists, she says, “might be excellent at conventional treatments but are not experts in nutritional biochemistry”. The big cancer charities, for their part, place too much emphasis on drug development. As a result, “if you rely solely on the cancer prevention advice from government, charities, health professionals or the media, you will be missing out on vital and potentially life- saving information.”

Cancer Research UK argues that so far studies investigating a link between cancer and dairy products have not given clear results.

“There’s no good evidence to support avoiding all dairy with the aim of reducing cancer risk,” said Martin Ledwick at Cancer Research UK. “It isn’t known if avoiding dairy plays a role in stopping cancer coming back. Patients should speak to their doctor or a qualified dietician before making any changes to their diet.”

Prof Plant acknowledges that advising cancer patients – and anyone keen on prevention – to change what they eat so radically is “a big ask”. Yet her own menu for that day – Weetabix and soya milk with molasses and linseeds for breakfast, wholegrain bread with hummus and salad for lunch and for that night, minestrone soup with cannellini beans, followed by pasta with homemade tomato sauce – is not so alien.

“People always worry about where they will get calcium if they give up dairy,” she says. “But you can get it from many plant sources.” Growth factors and hormones should be labelled on all dairy products, she argues, although eventually a wholesale shift away from dairy is needed.

Approaching her 70th birthday, Prof Plant has so far survived 27 years and six diagnoses of cancer and is a pretty convincing advert for the diet she advocates. Her story, though, has a sting in its tail: two weeks ago, a scan undertaken for a broken collarbone picked up two small secondaries, one in each lung. She is now taking tamoxifen and seems confident that a combination of medical treatment, diet and relaxation will knock this recurrence on the head.

“As a scientist, all I can do is tell the truth based on the evidence,” she says. “I started my first book because I didn’t want my daughter [Emma, now 39] to go through what I went through. All my books have come out of not wanting this to happen to others.”

‘Beat Cancer: The 10-Step Plan to Help you Overcome and Prevent Cancer’ by Prof Mustafa Djamgoz and Prof Jane Plant is published by Vermilion (£14.99)

THE ‘BEAT CANCER’ DIET

Beat Cancer advises anyone with cancer or at high risk of the disease to cut out all dairy products, organic or not, from cows, sheep, goats and all other animals. Replace:

Dairy milk with almond, coconut, rice or soya milk

Hard cheese with tofu or bean curd for sauces, soft cheese with hummus

Dairy yoghurt with soya or coconut yoghurt

Crème fraiche, fromage frais and cream with coconut or soya cream

Butter and margarines containing dairy with soya spreads, hummus, peanut or other nut or seed butter

Dairy ice cream with soya, coconut ice cream or other dairy-free types; milk chocolate with dark chocolate

Other advice includes replacing refined and processed oils with

extra-virgin olive oil; refined and man-made sugars with raw cane sugar; refined white bread, pasta and rice with unrefined wholegrain products; and cutting out preservatives and artificial flavourings and colourings.

Consumption of meat, fish and eggs should also be limited. Instead, eat unrefined carbohydrates, beans, nuts, vegetables and fruit. Salt is best replaced by herbs, and coffee by homemade juices, tap water and herbal tea.

"Give up dairy products to beat cancer"

Halving meat and dairy consumption could slash farming emissions

Cutting meat and dairy consumption in half would also lead to a forty% minimize in Europeans’ consumption of saturated fats. Photograph: Tim Graham/Getty Photos

Greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture would be reduce by 25-forty% if Europeans lower their meat and dairy consumption by half, in accordance to a UN report.

Scientists from the UN Financial Commission for Europe say that as nicely as cutting air and water pollution, adopting a “demitarian diet program” – cutting meat and dairy consumption in half – would lead to a forty% reduce in Europeans’ intake of saturated fats.

The huge majority of saturated fats come from animal items that can lead to cholesterol troubles and weight problems, and this kind of a lower would deliver amounts to within a variety recommended by the Globe Health Organisation.

Prof Mark Sutton, one particular of the authors who coined the term demitarian and is one particular himself, explained regardless of strong farming lobbies it was not “pie in the sky” to envisage this kind of a cut in meat consumption. But he said the staff was not taking a position on how very best to encourage men and women to modify their meals routines.

“When we have seen people urged to be vegetarians I have personally witnessed that that can lead to a backlash since several individuals want to eat meat. From the environmental level of view, it truly is not about no matter whether you eat meat or dairy, it truly is about how significantly,” he said in London on Thursday.

The report, Nitrogen on the Table, examined the impacts that modifications in buyer food routines would have on nitrogen emissions from livestock. It mentioned a 50% cut in meat and dairy consumption would reduce greenhouse gasoline emissions by 25-40% depending on what the freed-up land was utilised for. The volume of imported soybeans, largely used to feed livestock, would fall by 75%.

The taskforce concluded that the amount of nitrogen misplaced into the wider setting – into the air and into water – was 25 instances larger per unit of meals protein from beef than for cereals.

Nitrous oxide is a single of the most strong greenhouse gases, far a lot more potent than carbon dioxide. Nitrogen releases from agriculture have other negative environmental results, mixing with emissions from cars to develop small particulate pollution that is damaging to people. When it runs off farmland into rivers it can end up in the sea and cause algal blooms.

A dramatic reduction in meat and dairy farming – which would meet sturdy opposition from farming bodies in the Uk – would also free of charge up land either for expanding cereals or biofuels, the UN team mentioned.

“The EU could grow to be a significant exporter of food items, alternatively of a key importer of, for example, soybeans,” said Henk Westhoek, the report’s lead writer and programme manager at the Netherlands Atmosphere Assessment Company.

But he admitted that drastically lowering cattle farming would not in all instances free-up land appropriate for expanding cereal crops rather. “It would not be favourable to take out all the beef manufacturing since then we can’t use all our organic and semi-natural grasslands,” he mentioned.

Dr Diane Mitchell, chief atmosphere adviser at the Nationwide Farmers Union, said: “Farmers and land managers have currently taken fantastic measures to decreasing its use by way of much better management and efficiency – in fact, its use is down considerably over the previous 20 years.

“Eating significantly less meat is a simplistic answer to what is a extremely complex situation. Agricultural production in the Uk is currently responsible for close to 10% of complete United kingdom greenhouse gasoline emissions and the British livestock and dairy sectors are already doing much to tackle their greenhouse fuel footprint. And it mustn’t be forgotten that meat and dairy products are an critical element of a wholesome, balanced diet plan.

She added: “More, the view that agricultural land must be taken away from livestock for other generate is nonsensical – some of this land can only be utilized for pasture and at the identical time goes some way to safeguarding our superb countryside.”

Sutton also speculated on the cultural influence that this kind of a move by Europe would have elsewhere about the world, in which meat consumption is growing quickly. One particular-third of the world’s meat now comes from China, where meat consumption per man or woman is headed towards US and European ranges.

“I would posit a hypothesis that if Europe were to make such a change that would have this kind of cultural ripples that it would have interactions with other parts of the globe. Nobody can tell the Chinese or anybody else what they need to be doing but if we have been to modify our culture, that would have a ripple, it would be an outstanding sea alter,” he stated.

The executive summary of the report was published on Friday, with the full report following up coming month. It follows a major assessment in 2011 by the exact same staff, which concluded that the annual cost of nitrogen pollution was in the region of £62bn-£282bn.

A spokesperson for the Department for Atmosphere, Meals and Rural Affairs said: “We’re operating with farmers to lessen greenhouse gasoline emissions, and we just lately launched a £4.5m initiative to support farmers turn into more environmentally sustainable. We’re also four years into an ambitious £12m analysis programme to improve our knowing of how we can lessen the affect of agriculture on emissions.”

Halving meat and dairy consumption could slash farming emissions