Planet Forward Joins Meatless Monday – An Eco-friendly Campaign for Change
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We here at Planet Forward are thrilled to announce that we are officially registered to participate in the Meatless Monday campaign. For this first post, we will delve into exactly what that means and why you might want to consider joining us. In future blogs, our Monday post will be meat/dairy facts, the progression of the campaign, vegetarian tips and recipes for you to try out.
As with our previous post on eco-vegetarianism, we will not focus on the meat is murder argument (even though 98% of all meat is factory farmed where conditions are so horrific, they are forced to feed animals antibiotics so they can survive the process only to wind up as a Mc-something) but rather try to stay on an eco-friendly track.
Meatless Monday is a non-profit initiative in association with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. It’s part of an eco-friendly worldwide movement to reduce consumption of animal products in favour of more plant-based meals to fight global warming and improve our personal health. The idea stemmed from when Presidents Wilson, Truman and Roosevelt encouraged voluntary meatless days during both world wars. By implementing simple changes like this we can improve our health and the health of the planet. Participating countries include U.S.A., Britain, Brazil, Canada, Finland, Holland and Taiwan. It is also in the initial planning stages in Australia and is in Ghent, Belgium and Tel Aviv, Israel.
According to Earthsave Canada, some (startling) reasons meat eaters are being targeted are:
- if they avoid eating meat only one day a week, it will have a greater environmental impact than someone who eats only locally grown food seven days a week
- eating meat has a bigger [negative] impact on the world than all the automobiles combined
- meat and dairy, produced as intensively as they are today, use large amounts of land and fresh water, produce significant amounts of greenhouse gases and are a major factor in water pollution worldwide
- large-scale consumption of animal products has contributed to increased incidents of heart disease, stroke, cancer, diabetes and obesity
To join the movement, participants sign an online petition and encourage those around them (including local restaurants) to go vegetarian on Mondays. Go to the Meatless Monday site in your country or you can go to meatlessmonday.com.
Monday is the day of new beginnings. It’s the start of a new week and is the day that most diets are started so this is just an extension of that. Monday is like the call to action built in to every calendar each week. Join us in the fight to combat climate change. If this Monday passed you by, next week is another chance to go meatless for an eco-friendly cause. Join us.
