Diet and the environment: does what you eat matter?

A recent study shows that in the production of 11 food items for which consumption differs among vegetarians and non-vegetarians, the non-vegetarian diet required 2.9 times more water, 2.5 times more primary energy, 13 times more fertilizer, and 1.4 times more pesticides than did the vegetarian diet. The greatest contribution to the differences came from the consumption of beef in the diet. We found that a non-vegetarian diet exacts a higher cost on the environment relative to a vegetarian diet. Read More