what if we all stopped eating meat.?

What If Everyone Stopped Eating Meat Tomorrow?

Let's embark on a thought experiment together. Picture a scenario where a mystical entity, the harbinger of meatless dining, waves its wand, and just like that, all meat vanishes from our shelves, along with any inclination to consume it. Farm animals destined for food are whisked away to another dimension. What unfolds in the days, years, and millennia that follow?

Immediately, food-related greenhouse gas emissions drop by a staggering 63%. We no longer derive our protein and essential nutrients from the roughly 70 billion chickens, 1.5 billion pigs, 300 million cattle, and 200 million tons of fish and shellfish processed for consumption annually.

To compensate for this nutritional gap, our demand for fruits, vegetables, and legumes skyrockets—a dietary shift that most dietitians acknowledge as providing all the nutrients necessary for a healthy life. However, initially, there's a shortage of these foods, causing prices to soar. In regions like Mongolia, where growing vegetables is challenging due to harsh environments, the sudden lack of meat leaves people with limited food options. Cultures built around meat consumption lose their foundations, and some tribes, such as salmon-eating communities in the Pacific Northwest of the United States, lose not only sustenance and livelihoods but also an integral component of their religion.

Furthermore, millions of anglers lose their livelihoods due to dwindling fish populations. As the meat industry crumbles, many households in developing countries scramble for income once generated by livestock farming. Some meat producers transition to growing crops, which reduces the risk of respiratory diseases associated with livestock production for both workers and neighboring communities. As crop agriculture expands, prices gradually decrease, making vegetarianism more affordable than meat-eating in most countries.

Fortunately, we don't need to clear new farmland to accommodate this dietary shift. With no animals raised for meat, the land once used for feed production becomes available. All things considered, our new diets require less land and water resources. Millions of lives are saved each year, thanks to reduced rates of heart disease, cancer, and other conditions linked to red meat consumption. We no longer contract new pathogens from wild animals hunted for food, novel influenza viruses from farmed pigs, or drug-resistant superbugs originating in beef cattle preemptively fed antibiotics.

As years pass, global biodiversity flourishes as habitat loss, pesticide use, and other agricultural pressures diminish. Amazonian birds have more forest to soar over, fewer cheetahs are hunted for encroaching on livestock, and bee, wasp, and butterfly communities thrive as natural areas expand. In turn, insect-pollinated crops yield higher yields, and many ocean species recover from overfishing.

Throughout history, humans in traditionally vegetarian regions have evolved genetic mutations that enable more efficient processing of plant-based fats. Over thousands of years, our bodies may continue to adapt to optimize plant-based diets. Simultaneously, we might lose some adaptations, such as the ability to extract iron from meat.

However, it's important to note that the transformation into a meatless world won't be accomplished by a wizard's magic wand. While many individuals are choosing vegetarianism, global meat consumption continues to rise, posing significant challenges for our climate. Even if we were to suddenly halt fossil fuel consumption, coupled with the current trajectory of food systems and a growing population, global temperatures could still surpass the critical 1.5°C threshold by the end of the century.

Cattle, in particular, are significant contributors to this dilemma. Beef and dairy production are responsible for over 60% of all food-based emissions, despite providing only around 18% of the world's calories. Interestingly, diets featuring modest portions of meats like chicken often produce fewer greenhouse gases than vegetarian diets rich in dairy products. Thus, reducing beef, cheese, and milk consumption could achieve many of the benefits associated with a meatless world—no magical intervention required.