By replacing animal products, consumers have enormous power to spare land for biodiversity and carbon capture, halt greenhouse gas emissions at the source, and alleviate demand on freshwater needed for healthy ecosystems
By Boris Esono Nwenfor
BUEA, Cameroon – Climate change is one of the world’s greatest security threats today with effects respecting no territorial boundaries or any particular individual. Fighting such an irksome threat without putting in place mechanisms that reduce the rate of meat consumption is more or less like playing a football match but constantly scoring your own goal.
In its efforts to fight against climate change, a government-run school in the country’s capital has edified students on the production of plant-based meat, as opposed to regular meat from animals and dairy products.
“If a part of the population consumes plant-based meat produced from soil, it will contribute in a way to combating climate change,” said Marie-Noelle Abena, Women’s Training Center Director.
Through the process of creating plant-based products, the students also learn the nutritional benefits of plant-based meat. A new study in Nature Communications shows substituting 50% of meat and dairy with plant-based food alternatives can reduce global emissions from agriculture by 31%, save forests, and improve nutrition for millions of people.
“Learning how to make soy meat will allow me to help people who naturally do not eat animal meat. They will have an option which is to eat soy meat, which is said to have several nutrients, said Clementine Nguini.
The increasing consumption of meat and wildlife species is, therefore, a great contributor to the ugly face of climate change that Cameroon is seeing today. The magnitude and recurrence of climate change-induced disasters like floods and landslides within the last decade consumed thousands of lives and properties.
Enormous efforts have been made by the Cameroon Government to reverse this plight including her pledge to reduce emissions by 32 % by 2035. They have increased the creation of forest reserves and national parks, and most recently pledged to restore over 12 million hectares of deforested and degraded land by 2030 as part of the Bonn Challenge Initiative amongst others, meat consumption remains a perilous but neglected maggot thwarting every effort to fight against climate change all together.
“Most of these animals in the wild eat a lot of fruit, and through their scavenging disperse the seeds, which eventually germinate. Some trees only germinate after going through the stomach of these animals,” said Nkeng Rudolf, a Geography Teacher in one of the forest communities in the Lebialem Division-South West Cameroon.
“I don’t know what is in their stomach but these trees grow up and dominate the forest, serving as a carbon sink and reducing the adverse effect of climate change.”
According to a study published in Nature Communications, additional climate and biodiversity benefits could accrue from reforesting land spared from livestock production when meat and milk products are substituted by plant-based alternatives, more than doubling the climate benefits and halving future declines of ecosystem integrity by 2050.
“We need much more than ‘Meatless Mondays’ to reduce the global GHG emissions driving climate change—and this study shows us a path forward,” said study co-author Eva Wollenberg of the University of Vermont (UVM). “Plant-based meats are not just a novel food product, but a critical opportunity for achieving food security and climate goals while also achieving health and biodiversity objectives worldwide. Such transitions are challenging and require a range of technological innovations and policy interventions.”
“While the analyzed dietary shifts serve as a powerful enabler for reaching climate and biodiversity goals, they must be accompanied by targeted production side policies to deliver their full potential. Otherwise, these benefits will be partly lost due to production extensification and resulting GHG and land-use efficiency losses,” explains IIASA Biodiversity and Natural Resources Program Director Petr Havlík.
