In support of a plant-based diet

Sir, - On Saturday David Lawrie reported on his attendance at the 2018 Oxford Farming Conference.

He was concerned about the fact that the number of people becoming vegan has been increasing in recent years.

This is clearly of concern to the farming industry and he suggested that in order to counteract the trend it would be necessary to educate ‘young people about how food from the UK is among the safest, most humanely produced food on the planet’.

However, he fails to mention that one of the reasons why many people are becoming vegan is a result of the recognition that production of meat is often not seen as an environmentally friendly way to produce protein for human consumption.

In 2017 the Food Climate Research Network produced a well researched and detailed report entitled ‘Grazed and confused?’ which involved over two years of investigative work and which looked at the effects of grazing, what it means for greenhouse gas emissions and hence climate change.

One of the conclusions was that it would be necessary to reduce meat consumption by at least half if we are serious about reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Switching to a plant-based diet would release land which could

help safeguard the world’s wildlife and potentially feed more people than can be supported through animal meat production. Isla Browning. 23 Braehead Avenue, Edinburgh.