Illustration: Shen Lan/GT

Ask a selection of random people what is the most effective way to slow global warming, and most will say stopping fossil fuel use and curbing emissions from industry and vehicles. It's easy to understand why - we can visibly see these in the form of pollution, especially in today's ever-enlarging urban areas.

Few would point to agriculture as a culprit, and fewer still to meat and dairy production. Yet a recent report from British think tank Chatham House says that unless the world as a whole is willing to reduce consumption of meat and dairy products, all the emissions-cutting from other sources will do little to keep planetary warning to the agreed 2°C above pre-industrial levels, especially as there is still a significant gap between what countries have proposed, and what is needed.

The figures are quite shocking. According to the report, "Changing Climate, Changing Diets: Pathways to Lower Meat Consumption," agriculture as a whole counts for 30 percent of all human-driven greenhouse gas emissions. But emissions from the livestock sector, mostly cattle and sheep, add up to 14.5 percent of the total, as much as tailpipe emissions from all the world's vehicles.

And that's not the only problem associated with big meat and big dairy. The animals themselves, especially ruminants like cows, sheep and goats, are also a source of emissions through their digestive processes and manure. Livestock is the biggest producer of methane gases, the same amount as 2.1 billion tons of carbon dioxide or 4 percent of human-related greenhouse gas emissions, Science magazine reported.

This doesn't include the emissions cost of growing animal feed, processing, transportation and all the other processes related to the meat business.

Global demand for meat is expected to soar by 76 percent by mid-century, the report found. Of course, developed nations disproportionately eat more meat than other nations, and much more meat than they should. A typical northern European or North American diet is often predicated around "meat and two veg," although it is changing.

Data from the OECD puts Indian per capita meat consumption for 2015 at only around 2.5 kilograms, but then India is known for vegetarianism and also and has a large population living in poverty. When income rises as more people become urbanized, demand for meat soars. Chinese people now consume 49.3 kilos of meat - this includes pork, poultry, sheep and beef and veal. This is still just above half of the US figure, but China's size makes it an even more potent carnivorous power.

This is not only bad for the planet, it's also bad for our health, it turns out. But this is not really a surprise - nutritionists have for years been extolling the benefits of healthy eating, such as the Mediterranean diet, which puts more emphasis on fish, vegetables, pulses and fruit as an ideal.

A recent report from the World Health Organization placed processed meat such as ham, sausages and bacon as a leading cause of cancer, akin to smoking. Processed meats had a causal link to bowel cancer, said the International Agency for Research on Cancer, making it a class 1 carcinogen. The bad news continued for meat lovers; red meat is also probably carcinogenic, according to the report, and if eaten to excess, could lead to other health risks, such as obesity, type 2 diabetes and heart problems.

Other associated problems include deforestation, growing food to feed livestock rather than humans, overuse of antibiotics in the food chain, pollution and run off from farms, overuse of water, not to mention the often cruel methods of industrial animal farming.

But the main problem with meat, says the think tank's report, is that not enough people know just how destructive the industry could potentially be. When the researchers asked people in four countries - China, Brazil, the US and UK - many respondents had knowledge of global warming, but most pointed to other industries as major causes. In China, people talked about air, soil and water pollution. Some pointed out that culturally it is hard to change diets, or that there is a lack of cheap alternatives to provide protein.

Some progress is being made on meat substitutes or even lab-grown meat. In 2013, Dutch researcher Mark Post made a "test-tube hamburger" grown from cells; it cost $325,000 at the time, but now the price has fallen. Some high-profile tech moguls have invested in companies providing meat substitutes; Twitter's founders have backed a US company called Beyond Meat and Bill Gates has backed a company called Hampton Creek Foods, which makes egg-free products like mayonnaise. Li Ka-shing also took a big stake in Hampton Creek, and invested in a US start-up that is exploring lab-made meat and leather, Quartz reported. Sales of other meat substitutes, such as Quorn, and dairy-free products made by companies like Alpro, are also soaring.

Nevertheless, it is going to be hard to change attitudes - people still smoke, despite the links between tobacco and cancer being known for decades.

The report writers are optimistic that once people know the real toll that the meat and dairy business takes on the planet, they will naturally adjust. And they are not recommending that people stop eating meat altogether, just less of it. Some kinds of meat, such as pork and chicken, is not so harmful to produce as beef or lamb. And technologies, such as an additive that prevents cows from emitting so much methane are promising. There is some room for hope: Sales of processed meats in the UK dropped by 3 million pounds just two weeks after the WHO's report, the Guardian reported, although it's too early to tell if this is a long-term trend.  

But one thing's for sure; if we eat too much meat, we might not only be harming ourselves, we could also be killing the planet.

The author is a freelancer based in Beijing. opinion@globaltimes.com.cn