Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
savings from an austere diet. In fact, the average person's
carbon footprint is about 24 tons of carbon per year, and at
the CarbonFund.org website one can offset 24 tons for only
$240. This means that if you are truly concerned about global
warming but want to continue eating the same types of food,
and consume other goods in the same proportion as before,
for only $240 a year a person can shrink her carbon footprint
to zero!
This doesn't mean you should not pay attention to claims
made about a product's footprint. Nor are we suggesting that
you ignore a food's nutritional content, calories, or other envi-
ronmental impacts in addition to global warming. What we
are trying to stress is that, in addition to all the environmen-
tal and health claims associated with a food, you should also
incorporate information on the product's price in guessing its
carbon footprint.
These are guidelines you can extend to every good you buy,
not just food, and the goal is not just to reduce carbon emis-
sions but to achieve that reduction by giving up the goods you
value the least. Beef may have a larger footprint than chicken,
but for many it is the most delicious meat, and they would
rather reduce their carbon emissions by giving up anything
other than beef. Evidence suggests that maintaining attrac-
tive lawns by chemical applications and regular mowing can
cause the emission of more carbon per acre than land devoted
to corn. A  reader may decide to spend a lot less money on
lawn fertilizer and eat the same foods, or he may decide the
opposite.
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