> This is the food web One major contributor to the overshoot is our current agricultural practices, with animal agriculture being a primary offender. It's re

> This is the food web One major contributor to the overshoot is our current agricultural practices, with animal agriculture being a primary offender. It's responsible for a significant amount of greenhouse gases, it's a leading driver of biodiversity loss and deforestation, and it contributes to soil degradation and water pollution. https://ourworldindata.org/land-use https://ourworldindata.org/land-use https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/10/World-Map-by-Land-Use-01.png https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/10/World-Map-by-Land... BIODIVERSITY LOSS https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01448-4 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01448-4 Humans are driving one million species to extinction - UN backed report finds that agriculture is one of the biggest threats to Earth’s ecosystems https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/press-release/our-global-food-system-primary-driver-biodiversity-loss https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/press-release/our-glob... Our global food system is the primary driver of biodiversity loss https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26231772/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26231772/ Biodiversity conservation: The key is reducing meat consumption DEFORESTATION https://ourworldindata.org/drivers-of-deforestation https://ourworldindata.org/drivers-of-deforestation Drivers of Deforestation - combined, beef and oilseeds for animal feed account for nearly 60% of deforestation https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/whats-driving-deforestation https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/whats-driving-deforestation Just four commodities — beef, soy, palm oil, and wood products—drive the majority of tropical deforestation. Beef - 2.71 million hectares / year Soy - 480,000 ha / year (77% for animal feed) Palm Oil - 270,000 ha / year Wood - 380,000 ha / year (but probably more) GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS CO2 - 16.5+% animal agriculture (https://www.researchgate.net/publication/352100490_Emissions_from_Animal_Agriculture-165_Is_the_New_Minimum_Figure https://www.researchgate.net/publication/352100490_Emissions...) Methane - animal agriculture leading driver, https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector#methane-ch4-emissions-by-sector https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector#methane-ch4-e... N20 - animal agriculture leads again, https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector#nitrous-oxide-n2o-emissions-by-sector https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector#nitrous-oxide... SOLUTIONS We can significantly reduce our footprint by adopting plant-based diets, reforesting the pastures (more than 50% of which were originally forests), and allowing biodiversity to recover. https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-diets https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-diets If the world adopted a plant-based diet we would reduce global agricultural land use from 4 to 1 billion hectares https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00603-4 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00603-4 The carbon opportunity cost of animal-sourced food production on land - shifts in global food production to plant-based diets by 2050 could lead to sequestration of 332–547 GtCO2, equivalent to 99–163% of the CO2 emissions budget consistent with a 66% chance of limiting warming to 1.5 °C https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/917471 https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/917471 Feeding 10 billion people by 2050 within planetary limits may be achievable