What we eat and how much we eat can cause a lot of strain on the environment. First of all, most of the food we eat comes from faraway places, traveling thousands of miles to get to your plate. The planes, trucks, boats, and other modes of transportation emit carbon dioxide and other poisonous gases into the air in order to transport food to you. There's also the issue of meat. Livestock puts methane into the atmosphere, a greenhouse gas and a powerful one at that, and also consumes much of our crops. Also, food waste is a big problem. We often buy more than we eat, and the leftover waste is put into landfills (which emit methane).The last big problem is packaged food, which wastes resources. Look below for ways your diet can become eco-friendly.
The easiest way to get an eco-friendly diet is to become a "locavore". Locavores only eat food that are locally grown. There are more than a few sources of local foods. The first is to find a local farmer's market. These often run once a week during the spring and summer and offer fresh produce and other products.If there are none near you, try to get your town to make one. The farmers would definitely be thankful! When farmer's markets aren't running, you can also order products to be delivered to your house from local farms. Go to this site and find a farm near you. Even if you can't always buy farm fresh products, you can find out where the food you eat comes from. Talk to the owner of your supermarket or restaurants you go to. Try to favor restaurants and supermarkets that buy from local places, or just buy the goods they say are local. All this makes a big impact on the environment, and lessens your carbon footprint by a ton.
The livestock we eat have huge negative impacts on the environment. Pastures take out trees which take out carbon dioxide, and the animals themselves consume a lot of crops and emit tons of methane. The energy needed to store and transport meat makes up for 18% of greenhouse gases. In order to fix this, the best thing to do is become a vegetarian. Not eating this meat means lessening the demand even just a little...and a little can go a long way, not to mention the health benefits of being a vegetarian. Think about it: making vegetarian dishes for your family and friends makes them eat meat that much less, and may even encourage them to go vegetarian.
Obviously not everyone has the willpower or even the health to go vegan tomorrow. There are still a few things you can do to make your diet more eco-friendly.
