Protecting and restoring forests and urgently revamping the
global food system through dietary change are the key solutions
to the escalating land and climate crisis, an authoritative UN
report has found.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report
reveals that since the pre-industrial period the temperature over
land has already increased 1.53°C compared with the global
average of a 0.87°C increase, taking into account air above ocean
and land. The temperature rise is impacting food security and
driving desertification and land degradation.
Ahead of the report’s release, Greenpeace Switzerland activists
unveiled a banner outside the UN meeting saying: ‘Less Meat =
Less Heat. Climate Action NOW!’
“Defending and restoring our forests and changing our food system
by eating less meat will help turn the climate and biodiversity
crisis into new hope for nature and people. Our land and
biodiversity is under enormous pressure, as seen by the
devastating fires in Siberia. We need to make some hard choices
because we cannot use up our land twice and we’re already
over-using it,” said Dr Christoph Thies, Forests and Climate
Campaigner at Greenpeace Germany.
“To protect our climate and feed the world demands action now.
Governments are now compelled to update and enhance their climate
action targets in light of the IPCC’s report.”
The IPCC’s special report on Climate Change and Land warned that
more than a quarter of land is subject to “human-induced
degradation” but multiple solutions can boost both mitigation and
adaptation, while also supporting sustainable development goals.
The IPCC added that bioenergy, alone or with carbon capture and
storage (BECCS), poses high risks to food security and land
degradation. ‘No regret’ options to combat the climate crisis
involve forest and natural ecosystem protection and restoration
and reduced meat production and consumption.
“The challenge is great, but the solutions are many. Changing the
way we produce food and what we eat will protect our climate and
promote food security. We can free up vital land space being used
for animal feed and grazing through healthier plant-rich diets
and ecological farming practices that will help sequester carbon
in the soil and increase biodiversity,” said Dr Reyes Tirado,
Senior Scientist at the Greenpeace Research Laboratory,
University of Exeter.
"A drastic drive towards less meat and dairy in our diets is the
silver bullet for reducing the impacts of the food system on our
health and the health of the planet.”
In other findings, the IPCC report found:
- 23% of human greenhouse gas emissions stem from
deforestation, fires and agriculture but land can act as a
powerful carbon sink to help mitigate the worst of climate
change.
- Better land-use alone will not stop climate change. Delaying
the phase out of fossil fuels and shifting mitigation to the land
sector will increase the risk of climate impacts and food
insecurity.
- Emissions from the food system as a whole, including
production and consumption, represent up to 37% of total global
human-induced GHG emissions.
- The consumption of meat has more than doubled in the past 60
years as land was converted to agricultural use at an
unprecedented rate in human history.
- About 2 billion adults are overweight or obese, but 821
million people are still undernourished, highlighting the need to
reform the global food system.
