UNEP Report

The new United Nations Environmental Programme released a report on June 2nd, 2010 that calls for a shift towards plant-based diets in an effort to curb carbon emissions of the meat industry.

The following is a direct quotation from the site on its proposal :

[…] the priorities for achieving transformational change are:-

• Agricultural goods, particularly products from animals, which are fed more than half of all world crops. Agricultural production accounts for 70% of the global freshwater consumption and 38% of the total land use. Food production accounts for 19% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions and 60% of the phosphorus and nitrogen pollution and 30% of toxic pollution in Europe;

• Users of fossil fuels, especially electrical utilities and other energy-intensive industries, residential heating, and transportation. Fossil-fuel production and consumption dominate as the world's leading cause of environmental degradation. Extraction from alternative fossil fuel sources, such as tar sands, poses potentially even heavier environmental consequences."

• Materials, especially plastics, iron, steel, and aluminium, use of which is growing, not least in the unsaturated emerging economies; and the energy requirements for which are rising because of declining grades of ore as they get used up.

'Agricultural Goods' gets FIRST MENTION. This is another huge success for vegetarian and vegan activists everywhere.

Here’s even an FAO report from 2006 that I just stumbled upon that illuminates the damages of animal agriculture.

The amount of administrative support for vegetarianism on at least a sustainability angle is enormous, and that’s pretty awesome. Let’s take a moment to appreciate the awesomeness of this.

Moment over. Let’s go kick some ass.

I live in the best place in the world...

When I first moved in, everything was so uncomfortably new, like a was an invader in some strange way, in spite of everyone saying that they wanted "short term guests" to feel just as welcome. All the kitchen drawers were foreign, the pots didn't make sense there, I couldn't figure out what anything in the fridge was so I just didn't eat. I didn't unpack my things because I didn't feel at home. I felt like a store-bought plant just taken out of its pot and dumped onto the lawn, my roots hesitating to unravel as my soil crumbles around me, because I was so unaccustomed to this earth beneath me.

I've only been here a little over a week, and I've realized co-ops are my home. Naturally, not all co-ops fit my needs, but I've learned in a short time that living cooperatively sustains me best. Individualized society numbs me, turns me cold against myself and my own creativity, whereas being in constant interaction with others allows me to be constantly creating. We can learn so much from each other, but when we're constantly taught to be in competition by the larger capitalist society, collaborating seems cause a bit more hesitation. Naturally, living cooperatively doesn't have to happen in the form of a co-op or commune, but it can often help.

At first I thought this specific house would be a little too 'ooshy gooshy' for me, a little too overly emotional, and well hey, i guess sometimes it can be a little bit. But at the same time, I feel an explicit connectedness with everyone in the house because everyone has explicitly said that they care deeply about each other. This house is an actual support network, and everyone works through their issues with everyone else -- often around good dumpstered food (tonight, potatoes, eggplant and polenta!) Yes, the word "share" is a buzzword of sorts, but I guess there are worse things in the world. For instance, not caring about the people you live with.

But one thing I can say is that I've moved into a completely foreign town, and using my housemates, I feel like this is could be my home already, like I could have lived in this town for several months already. I'm even considering moving here after graduation. Can't say that about too many places, now can you?

Of course it's not perfect. There is conflict and complexity to the house, especially this one in all of its non-conventionality, but it's so much better than so many other alternatives. I feel so oddly privileged that I happened to stumble upon this place and email them, in hopes that they might want a 2-month guest. And that it happens to be less than a mile away from my work. Seems oddly divine, though I'm not religious in the slightest way. It's going to be bizarre and painful to leave, but ay, it will show me the importance of growing the roots of a nomad. (I really like that line. One of my housemates said it in a meeting, and it still resonates with me very deeply. I feel like I'm constantly struggling to find a sense of community in a life that requires frequent moving around, and I'm trying to figure out what that means.)

More soon.