Don’t preach about saving the planet when your soya milk has come halfway round the world
IT was Earth Day last week and lots of positive and not-so-positive things were done across the world as the powers that be grappled with ways to cut carbon emissions and adopt greener policies.
While thumbing through many of the gestures made by people on such an important day, I spotted quite a few well-meaning types on social media, proudly proclaiming they had gone meat-free.
One MP, for example, posted up a picture of a bowl of what looked a bit like porridge made with soya milk. By not eating animal-derived products, he proudly proclaimed, people could save the planet.
Except there’s a huge flaw in that logic. The brand of soya milk he used – bottled, incidentally, in a carton with a plastic lid – sources its most of its soya from mainland Europe and the rest from Canada.
In fairness, the raw product is responsibly grown, but there’s a good chance the main ingredient in the “milk” used in the pictured parliamentary porridge could have travelled more than 3,500 miles.
What in the world goes through people’s minds when they pick up a plastic container filled with imported almond or soya milk, turning their nose up at a bottle of cow’s milk?
If the environmental credentials of their breakfast really were that important to them, they should have gone to their local farm shop, corner shop, delicatessen or greengrocer and bought a pint of milk that was acquired from just a few miles away.
Even better than that, particularly in Derbyshire, we now have plenty of ways of going to the farm itself and using a vending machine to fill a reusable bottle. There’s loads of them about, look it up.
I realise the farming industry has an environmental impact, nobody’s hiding that fact, but are grass-fed cattle in a low-intensity dairyfarming system really causing more harm to the planet than shipping tonnes and tonnes of soya into the UK’S supermarket network?
Think about it, British dairy cows spend most of their days on fields that act as carbon sinks and these amazing animals continuously turn grass into milk, all the while enjoying one of the highest welfare standards in the world.
If you can’t bear the thought of animals being involved in your food production then, fine, go vegan, it makes no odds in the grand scheme of things. But don’t try to tell people it’ll save the planet, because it won’t.
The popular children’s programme Blue Peter found itself in hot water earlier this month for suggesting kids should go meat-free to cut their carbon footprint. I was furious.
What they and all other influencers should be telling youngsters is to urge their parents to shop local, eat seasonal, and always ensure you know where your food has come from.
Support your local meat, dairy and poultry farmers if you really want to go green. Because I bet they’re doing a lot more good for the planet than a huge conglomerate shipping mountains of soya halfway across the world to feed Instagrammers who think drinking plant-based milk is the right thing to do.