Environmental degradation
December, 2020 in Issue 4 - 2020, Markets
Despite increasing environmental concerns, European Union (EU) consumers still eat large amounts of meat and dairy products. Beef, pork and dairy production have significant implications for the environment in the EU and in third countries, notably in South America.
Cattle farming and the cultivation of feed crops like soybean are big contributors to tropical deforestation, environmental degradation, methane emissions and pollution. Yet, this has been largely neglected by EU policy makers and the media, even as commodities like palm oil are scapegoated for alleged negative effects.
In western Europe, an increasing number of people are turning vegetarian or vegan and initiatives like ‘meat-free Mondays’ are gaining popularity, but this does not mean that Europeans consume less meat. The average European currently consumes almost 80kg of meat per year.
On a global scale, the average per capita meat consumption has increased by about 20kg since 1961, with the average person consuming around 43kg of meat in 2014, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). Meat consumption is highest across high-income countries, with the largest number of meat-eaters in Australia – consuming around 121kg per person in 2017.
Europeans and North Americans consume considerably more meat than the average, at nearly 80kg and 110kg a year respectively. In certain countries of eastern Europe, such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, there is a much lower annual consumption per person (36kg) compared to western Europeans; this can be attributed to lower average incomes.
In France, the average annual meat consumption per capita has declined consistently from 91kg per person in 2008 to 83kg in 2017, but is still higher than the EU average. In the UK, annual meat consumption over the last few years has fluctuated, remaining at around 80kg, about 10kg higher than the annual average in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
While public opinion towards meat may be changing, Europeans are still consuming much more meat than they were a few decades ago, particularly in western European countries (Figure 1). In comparison, in 2017, the average Malaysian consumed 52.9kg of meat and the average Indonesian a mere 11.7kg.
In addition, approximately 37 million tonnes of fresh dairy products are consumed annually in the EU and the UK combined.
Beef production and deforestation
Agriculture is responsible for 10.3% of the EU’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, of which nearly 70% come from the animal sector. They consist of mainly non-CO2 GHG (methane and nitrous oxide). In addition, 68% of the total agricultural land was used for animal production in 2019, according to Eurostat data for the 27 EU member-states.
Researchers have found that farming GHG emissions have been increasing again after 2012 and that the European Commission (EC) calculation that agriculture contributes 10% of the EU’s GHG should be at least doubled if not tripled, once land-use changes outside the EU, mainly due to imported beef, are included.
Worldwide, 26% of the ice-free land is used for livestock grazing, according to a 2012 study by the FAO. Brazil, the country with the second-largest cattle inventory in the world, uses 168 million ha for cattle farming. This is a vast area compared to the mere 5.8 million ha used for oil palm cultivation in Malaysia. On a global scale, more than 70% of around 5 billion ha of the available agricultural land are used by the cattle industry, while oil palm cultivation covers 0.3%. The clearing of land continues for cattle farming, especially in South America and mostly in Brazil.
Closely linked to livestock farming, the area dedicated to feed crop production amounts to 33% of the total arable land. The expansion of livestock production has been and remains a key factor in global deforestation. This is particularly the case in Latin America, where most deforestation is occurring; 70% of previously forested land in the Amazon region are now occupied by pastures. Feed crops, such as soybean, cover a large part of the remaining 30%.
Around 20% of the world’s pastures and rangelands (i.e. grasslands, shrublands, woodlands and wetlands that are grazed by domestic livestock or wild animals) have been fully or partially degraded, mostly through overgrazing, compaction and erosion created by livestock action.
Overall, beef production is considered the Number One driver of tropical deforestation worldwide. Recent studies have shown that the proportion of deforestation caused by beef production is more than twice as large as that caused by the production of soybean, palm oil and wood products combined. Additionally, deforestation has severe effects on biodiversity. However, for large parts of the public (including many EU policy makers), it is only palm oil that should be banned or phased out, not the beef or dairy that they regularly enjoy.
‘Farm to Fork Strategy’
On May 20, 2020, as part of the European Green Deal initiative, the EC presented the Communication on a Farm to Fork (F2F) Strategy for a fair, healthy and environmentally-friendly food system. It aims at making ‘the entire food chain from production to consumption more sustainable and neutral in its impact on the environment’.
In terms of food consumption, the EC announced in the F2F Strategy that it would seek commitments from food companies and organisations to take concrete actions on health and sustainability, focusing on:
In terms of meat consumption, the EC notes, for example, that ‘marketing campaigns advertising meat at very low prices must be avoided’. It announced that it would monitor these commitments and consider legislative measures if progress were to be insufficient.
The EC also plans to promote sustainable food consumption, facilitating the shift to healthy, sustainable diets. It notes that ‘current food consumption patterns are unsustainable from both health and environmental points of view. While in the EU, average intakes of energy, red meat (which in this context includes beef, pig meat, lamb, and goat meat and all processed meats), sugars, salt and fats continue to exceed recommendations, consumption of whole-grain cereals, fruit and vegetables, legumes and nuts is insufficient’.
The F2F Strategy has toned down its stance on the reduction of the consumption of meat for sustainability reasons. An earlier draft version had specified that the EC would propose to ‘stop stimulating production or consumption of meat’, but this sentence was not included in the final Strategy. However, the Strategy still lays out a commitment to ‘help reduce the environmental and climate impact of animal production’.
Specific measures on how this is supposed to be achieved are rather vague. To help reduce the environmental and climate impact of animal production, avoid carbon leakage through imports, and support the ongoing transition towards more sustainable livestock farming, the EC is planning to facilitate the placing on the market of sustainable and innovative feed additives.
It will examine EU rules to reduce the dependency on critical feed materials (e.g. soybean grown on deforested land) by fostering EU-grown plant proteins, as well as alternative feed materials such as insects, marine feed stocks (e.g. algae) and by-products from the bio-economy (e.g. fish waste).
The EC also states that it is undertaking a review of the EU promotion programme for agricultural products, with a view to enhancing its contribution to sustainable production and consumption, and in line with the evolving diets. In relation to meat, the EC notes that the review should focus on how the EU can use its promotion programme to support the most sustainable carbon-efficient methods of livestock production.
It remains to be seen whether such limited measures are sufficient to reduce meat consumption (and production, as well as the related deforestation and emissions) or at least to make it more sustainable.
Reducing meat consumption?
In the F2F Strategy, the changes needed as regards meat consumption appear to be more health-driven than based on environmental concerns over its production. The EC acknowledges that reversing the rise in overweight and obesity rates across the EU by 2030 is critical. In that regard is states that ‘moving to a more plant-based diet with less red and processed meat and with more fruits and vegetables will reduce not only risks of life‑threatening diseases, but also the environmental impact of the food system’.
The EC estimates that, in 2017, over 950,000 deaths (one out of five) and over 16 million lost healthy life years were attributable in the EU to unhealthy diets, mainly cardiovascular diseases and cancers. The EU includes the promotion of healthy diets as part of the actions for cancer prevention.
The reference to encouraging people to consume ‘less meat’, seen in an earlier draft of the F2F Strategy, was refined to ‘less red and processed meat’. Another reference to meat is found in the Strategy’s chapter on research and innovation, where the EC announces that a key area of research will relate to microbiome, food from the oceans, urban food systems, as well as increasing the availability and source of alternative proteins such as plant, microbial, marine and insect-based proteins and meat substitutes.
While softening its stance on meat consumption compared to leaked previous draft versions, the F2F Strategy still offers support for alternative proteins. Support for a move to a ‘more plant-based diet’ remains a key element of the F2F as part of efforts to reduce not only the risks of life-threatening non-communicable diseases, but also the environmental impact of the food system. However, the environmental impact appears rather ancillary to the health impact.
Campaigners for climate and animal health have noted that, while it is disappointing to see ambitious elements of the F2F Strategy removed at the last minute, there is hope that the EU would eventually push for the ‘much-needed food revolution’.
The European farmers’ association COPA-COGECA emphasised that it advocates for a ‘balanced diet’ in which the consumption of healthy food from animal and plant sources is essential, adding that the ‘European farming community supports any measure encouraging consumers to adopt a diet that ensures their good health’. The farming lobby appears to be happy with the vague initiatives of the F2F Strategy, which does not foresee concrete measures for a measurable reduction of the production of meat, particularly beef.
The F2F Strategy does not even set targets to reduce the overall consumption of meat in the EU which, in 2020, is 20kg per capita higher than at the time the European Communities were founded several decades ago.
Beef, not palm oil, is the Number One driver of deforestation in the world, but the EU is still turning a blind eye to this.
FratiniVergano
European Lawyers
