For most of us, when we think about what we can do to fight the global warming climate crisis, we think about buying a hybrid car or putting solar panels up on our roof.  But our food choices can make an even bigger difference.   Agriculture in the United States accounts for nearly 20% of all U.S. fossil fuel consumption, not including food processing, transportation, and refrigeration in our homes.  Livestock production alone is estimated to account for about 18% of all greenhouse gas emissions -- more than transportation.  Reducing your family's consumption of meat by 20% is roughly equivalent to scrapping a full-size car and buying a new Prius.

Our food supply is dominated by "industrial food":  corn, soybeans and wheat grown with massive doses of fertilizer made from fossil fuels and processed into packaged foods and fed to livestock for meat production.   This industrial food system is not only contributing to climate change, it is polluting our land and water, and its largely empty calories are causing an epidemic of obesity. 

Web Links

The staggering cost of rising world meat production

Climate Change and Agriculture (wikipedia)

Eating Fossil Fuels