Food production is responsible for one-quarter of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Eating locally would only have a significant impact if transport was responsible for a large share of food’s final carbon footprint. For most foods, this is not the case.
Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from transportation make up a very small amount of the emissions from food, and what you eat is far more important than where your food traveled from.
For most foods — and particularly the largest emitters — most GHG emissions result from land use change (shown in green) and from processes at the farm stage (brown). Farm-stage emissions include processes such as the application of fertilizers — both organic (“manure management”) and synthetic; and enteric fermentation (the production of methane in the stomachs of cattle). Combined, land use and farm-stage emissions account for more than 80% of the footprint for most foods.
Transport is a small contributor to emissions. For most food products, it accounts for less than 10%, and it’s much smaller for the largest GHG emitters. In beef from beef herds, it’s 0.5%.
Why is every meat called by it's food name (beef, mutton, poultry etc) except for pork... Which is "pig meat"?
Is beef a name for cows used outside of food?
Yep. Growing up in cattle country, you'd hear ranches brag about how many beef cattle they're raising, and it gets shortened to "I've got 30k heads of beef this season".
Maybe to differentiate from pork in general and products made with pork (Bacon, sausages...).
Just a thought, no source
What about manflesh? Would this be rated high CO2 content, or low because eating the emitter is probably one of the best ways to get emissions down.
That's just long pig.
A connoisseur, I see.