How to save our world, one plant based meal at a time.

April is Earth month. It’s a time to reflect on the world by becoming conscious of taking care of the world we live in. Earth month is the time that I transitioned to a vegan and the main reason I did, was for the environment. Climate change is real and it’s why there are extremely hot days in october, a time when it should be cooling down. Or the fires in the west, that just seem to come out of nowhere and the catastrophic hurricanes that leave our islands partially destroyed. So in this post we are going to talk about how going vegan helps our planet, because now more than ever we need to think about how we impact the earth we live on.

You Waste less Water

In animal production it takes 2,400 gallons of water to produce 1 pound of meat. This is compared to the fact that it only takes 25 gallons of water to produce 1 pound of wheat.

Save the Oceans

Also you save the oceans by helping reduce overfishing, which contributes to the extinction of many aquatic animals. Plus many fish are just used to feed other animals that are then used for our consumption, this includes the farmed fish. By eating a meatless diet, we preserve these fish giving future generations a chance to see theses animals in their lifetimes.

It helps our soil

Animals are given many different drugs before they are put into production. These drugs get excreted into our soil that runs off into our water. We also get a lot of our nutrients from the soil such as vitamin D and vitamin B12, by going vegan you can reduce this factor by making our soil healthier thus making our plants and animals healthier.

It helps clean our air

Livestock farming accounts for 51% of greenhouse gases and 50-60% of those emissions are from methane and nitrous oxide. Methane is the major cause of our greenhouse gas emissions and it is produced 7 million pounds per minute. These gases believe it or not are more harmful than our fuel transportation. In comparison being a vegan saves 1.5 billion tons of emission every year by eliminating the consumption of meat.

You help save paper

Instead of using valuable pieces of paper to wrap up meat and store meat products, you can now save some trees. Now we aren’t off the hook all the way now so remember to use both sides of your paper and recycle. If you don’t have a recycling service in your area try to recycle at just restaurants and stores or in your city. Help the earth by also using both sides of your paper. Consider using recycled bags when you go grocery shopping. For me it helps me buy only what I need, and keeps me from wasting money and food on what I pick up sporadically. Also by bringing my own bags I eliminate throwing away so many plastic bags that just end up in landfills or oceans. So, yes that .99 to $1.99 bag at the grocery store will last you, and get creative, if you don’t want to buy one at your supermarket. For example, I like to sometimes bring those canvas bags they give you from clothing stores for a promotion, to me it's trendy and unique.

It saves Energy

So without a doubt by switching to a meatless diet you save more energy. How is this? Well by not eating meat you aren’t contributing to the production of meat products. Also you are eliminating greenhouses by not contributing to the transportation of these products. Instead of contributing to some of this energy, try to shop for your food locally, at farmers markets.This will eliminate a majority of the travel time between moving products from place to place.

I hope this post shed some light on how we can help save our planet. Remember every little bit helps. If you aren’t ready to go vegan, being a vegetarian is also radically helpful for our earth. Likewise if you aren’t ready to be a meatless eater, think about just changing one meal a day or a week, you will notice the difference in your health, and the earth will thank you.

#VeganEarth