Moving to a plant-based diet can mitigate climate change, research suggests 

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With 2024 being the hottest year on record to date, researchers across the globe are addressing the temperature rise by rethinking our food systems and encouraging the switch to a plant-based diet.For the first time in history, the average global temperature rose to 1.6°C above preindustrial levels, exceeding the 1.5°C vital to preventing accelerating climate change. The effects of climate change are now more visible than ever on every continent.A team of researchers have found that up to a third of global greenhouse gas production to date can be attributed to animal agriculture and food systems. Yet, most climate change solutions neglect the impact of food systems.Their study, “Solving climate change requires changing our food systems,” which appears in Oxford Open Climate Change, proposes that the pressing nature of irreversible climate change effects requires rethinking our food systems.Professor Andrew Knight, co-author and Adjust Professor at Murdoch University’s School of Veterinary Medicine, said climate change is a major threat to much of life on Earth, including ourselves.”Animal agriculture is a major emitter of greenhouse gases, and a major cause of deforestation and freshwater use. Yet—compared to smaller emitters, such as the transportation sector—it has received shockingly little attention,” he said.”Emissions from animal agriculture are so large that we cannot effectively slow climate change and environmental degradation by ignoring them. We simply must transition our societies towards more sustainable, plant-based diets,” says Professor Andrew Knight.The study explains how our growing demand for meat and animal products is unsustainable, with the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimating that demand for meat will double by 2050.”This demand will require approximately 80% of existing forests and shrubland to be converted into land devoted to raising animals. Such a trajectory would have devastating consequences for us and the planet,” Professor Knight said.According to their study, the increase in the world’s population will cause food insecurity and starvation. The current model of food production (i.e. animal factory farming) is “inefficient and resource intensive.”The study presented strategies to re-think current food systems, including the removal of government subsidies and higher taxation of animal products to account for externalized costs of animal agriculture.The research found significant health benefits and savings when adopting a fundamentally plant-based diet.According to the study, consumption of animal products contributes to the development of many chronic diseases and antibiotic-resistant infections in humans—antibiotic-resistant infections kill approximately 700,000 people worldwide annually.”The proliferation of industrialized animal farming has brought us closer than ever before to the outbreaks of lethal human zoonoses such as avian