Dear Editor,
I am writing to ask you and your staff to help spread the word to UCSD students and many other Americans of the environmental benefits of going vegetarian for at least one day out of the week.
Because of the current climate-change crisis, I believe that going vegetarian will not only benefit the environment greatly, but will also benefit individuals’ health.
Currently, the Earth is going through tremendous abuse because of greenhouse-gas emissions. As a result, there will be an increase in the spread of diseases as northern countries becoming warmer and disease-carrying insects migrate north. Also, greenhouse-gas emissions will produce warmer waters, more hurricanes, droughts, heat waves and economic consequences, while polar ice melting will increase sea levels.
The main cause of greenhouse-gas emissions and global warming is the meat industry. And because the United States produces the most carbon dioxide per capita into the atmosphere, we have the civic duty to help save Earth.
You can experience greater mental and spiritual clarity by adopting a vegetarian diet. Vegetarianism can be seen as a solution to the destruction of rainforests as well as world hunger. According to Vegetarians International Voice for Animals, ‘while 750 million people go to bed hungry every night, one third of the world’s grain is fed to farmed animals. A typical Western-based diet can only feed 2.5 million people; a plant-based diet will feed every one of us.’
Hence, because of our current crisis on climate change, the positive effects of going vegetarian for at least one day a week is tremendously beneficial to the environment. Therefore, I wish all of UCSD and other Americans to unite together and create a pact to go vegetarian for at least one day a week to save our world.