‘Hypocrisy’ of green billionaire in private jet targeting meat eaters to save planet
A WOMAN behind a global plan to almost eradicate meat from diets to save the planet is a globe-trotting billionaire with a taste for high living.
Gunhild Stordalen, 40, bankrolled the landmark EAT-Lancet study which has unveiled quotas such as no more than a quarter rasher of bacon a day, or a 2p sized beef burger patty.
Norway’s biggest celebrity wants ordinary people to replace red meat with beans, peas and nuts.
But the model-turned-doctor owns a private jet with her hotel mogul husband and critics have accused them of “breathtaking hypocrisy” over the environmentally-unfriendly impact of their flights.
And there were more than beans on the menu when she and Petter Stordalen, 56, married in a £4million champagne wedding, flying 237 guests 3,500 miles to the event in Morocco in 2010, where poverty campaigner Bob Geldof officiated.
In recent months she has posted photos of herself sunbathing in Mexico, relaxing in Greece, hugging a tree in Costa Rica, meditating in the Antibes, sipping drinks in Havana and posing by a hotel pool in St Tropez.
She also posed in front of New York skyscrapers in a post lecturing on why we should cut meat from our diets.
Mrs Stordalen was yesterday on stage again in the Norwegian capital Oslo plugging the food plan.
She said adopting the diet was “a matter of morals”, adding: “We all have a role to play. Whether we have power, knowledge, money, a voice, a piece of land or a piece of bread.”
The EAT-Lancet study called for better use of farming land to feed the global population – set to hit 10 billion by 2050 – and reduce methane greenhouse gas emissions from cattle.
But one of the biggest contributors to global warming is air travel. The Stordalens’ £20million Bombardier Challenger 350 plane was bought through the jet firm Jetfly, which is owned by one of his companies.
Her foundation set up the three -year commission recruiting 37 experts from 16 countries who were flown around the world to unveil the Stordalen delivers her green message
plan. Daily limits also include no more than two-thirds of a fish finger or a quarter of a chicken breast.
Christopher Snowdon, head of lifestyle economics at the Institute of Economic Affairs, said: “The hypocrisy of this is breathtaking.
“This is a campaign telling ordinary people they should be eating less than half a rasher of bacon per day for the sake of the environment, while the patron is flying people around the world in private jets.
“This is a classic case of do as I say, not as I do. Militant environmentalists can’t resist the chance to tell people how to live their lives.
“It’s a shame they don’t hold their financiers to the same standards.”
Mrs Stordalen’s EAT organisation made no comment yesterday.