PETA Suggests Meat-Free Menu on Snorkelling Charter to Save the Reef
Cairns—As the newly launched Great Barrier Reef tour company Pure Tourism sets sail, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has written to the company urging it to make the vessel’s onboard menu vegan. In the letter, PETA points out that land clearing for animal agriculture, as well as the potent greenhouse gas emissions it creates, are killing the reef. The letter comes after PETA erected billboards bearing the same warning in Cairns and Townsville earlier this year.
PETA billboard in Cairns on the meat industry’s damage to the reef
“Queensland’s intense beef industry contributes to the destruction of the reef in several ways. The government cites climate catastrophe— of which animal agriculture is a leading driver— as the biggest threat to the reef . This is partly due to greenhouse gas emissions: Queensland’s production of 1.1 million tonnes of beef annually produces huge amounts of methane and nitrogen,” writes PETA Senior Campaigns Advisor Mimi Bekhechi. “In terms of warming potential, these gases are far more potent than CO2 in the short term.”
As well as being cruel, trapping millions of animals in filthy factory farms, PETA notes that “Clearing bushland to make room for grazing cattle is also a problem. A report from The Wilderness Society found that beef production is responsible for 73% of all land clearing in Queensland and more than 94% in the Great Barrier Reef Catchment Area[ER4] ”.
Even a half-degree increase in water temperature can stress corals, leading to their starvation and death . But it’s not just meat production: the faeces of meat eaters are loaded with nitrogen, which, in excess, causes deadly algal blooms . The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) suggests an urgent shift towards plant-rich diets and alternative protein sources.
PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat” – opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.au and follow PETA on Facebook and Instagram.
Contact:
Sascha Camilli [email protected]
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