Meat Ungreet

Over the past few months I’ve been asked why I don’t eat meat on a Monday quite a few times. As such I thought I’d write down my reasons in the hope of enlightening the masses.

“Meat Free Mondays is all about helping people to have one day a week free of meat, but this does not necessarily have to be a Monday!!

Meat Free Mondays website, September 2010

Started by well-known veggies Paul, Stella and Mary McCartney, Meat Free Mondays is all about cutting out one day’s worth of meat consumption each week. For most people this is Monday, hence the catchy title, but really it could be any day of your choosing. It’s main aim is to raise awareness of the impact that meat production and consumption has on climate change, but there are also inherent health benefits that come from reducing your meat intake.

Livestock production accounts for 18% of global greenhouse gas emissions, which is more than the entire transport sector according to UN figures. Naturally reducing this is a huge challenge in the face of a growing and increasingly affluent world population, with the number of hungry people in the world currently sitting at around one billion.

Yet Meat Free Mondays isn’t just about climate change. It encourages people to experiment with vegetables, and If you head over to the rather colourful website (link here) you will find a number of recipes designed to wean yourself away from dependance on meat. Eating less meat will also benefit your health in the long term, with studies finding that eating meat (in particular processed foods such as sausages and ham) is linked with weight gain.

For me, Meat Free Mondays are a good way of compromising my naturally carnivorous tendencies with a desire to reduce my carbon footprint. Naturally any rational person can pick out hypocrisies in my lifestyle (such as driving a car) but every little helps as the supermarket chain would say.