Livestock Agriculture in Australia Does Not Kill the Climate

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LIVESTOCK AGRICULTURE IN AUSTRALIA DOES NOT KILL THE CLIMATE
Introduction
Global warming represents one of the facets of climate and defines the mean increase in the
temperatures of the global surface. Climate change, on the other hand, describes the changes in
statistics in the weather over time and may be inclusive of the changes in temperature, rainfall,
wind as well as different patterns.
As the extent as well as impacts of change in climate gain more alarm, meat has remained a
favourite target that needs action. Crusaders encourage the public to take minimized meat as well
as to conserve environment (Thamo et al., 2017). Some of the activists have even called for
heavy taxation of flesh to lower its consumption.
Livestock agriculture and climate change
One of the claims underlying such opinions holds that internationally, the production of meat
leads to the production of more greenhouse gases as compared to the whole transport industry.
Nonetheless, such an argument is demonstrably misleading as I will illustrate with its continued
support resulting in incorrect assumptions regarding the link between meat production and
consumption and change in climate.
My study concentrates on the methods where animal agriculture influences the quality of air as
well as a change in climate. In my perception, there exist numerous reasons for selecting either a
vegetarian choice or animal protein (Thornton and Herrero, 2015). Nonetheless, abandoning
meat and the associated meat products is not the guaranteed environmental solution a significant

number of people would push down our throats to believe. And if taken a step further, it may as
well have serious nutritional implications.
Putting it right on meat against greenhouse gases
A significant part of the ugly rap of meat revolves around the argument that livestock has turned
out to be the most significant greenhouse gases source globally. For instance, an analysis
conducted in 2009 and published by Worldwatch Institute which is based in Washington DC
made a declaration that to the tune of 51% of the world greenhouses gases emissions originate
from rearing and processing of livestock and livestock products (Ghahramani and Moore, 2016).
Production of electricity, transportation as well as industry accounted for the most significant
sources of emission of greenhouse gases in Australia in 2016 going by the Australian
Environmental Protection Agency. All the agriculture in the country during then accounted for
just 9 per cent of the total production. Of all the agriculture production, animal agriculture
accounted for barely half of the same amount which represented 3.9% of the total greenhouse
emissions in Australia. This sounds quite distant from making claims that livestock is accounting
for as more than is accounted for by transportation.
Why would such a misconception then? A book named “Livestock’s Long Shadow” was
published by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization 12 years ago. The book
attracted widespread attention globally (Ghahramani and Moore, 2016). Among the information
contained in the book was that the production of livestock accounted for to the tune of 18 per
cent of the greenhouse emissions in the world. The agency made an outstanding conclusion:
Livestock was responsible for more harm than good to the climate as compared all modes of
transport brought together.