ABSTRACT
Meat is now becoming a ‘hot’ issue for the food industry, governments and consumers. Not without reason was an earlier era of US politics known as the triumph of ‘pork-barrel politics’. Besides there being much money in the meat trades, meat in itself has considerable symbolic power (Rogers, 2004). To reshape meat production and consumption and to bring them in line with the Earth’s capacities is a microcosm of challenges facing both the food system and the way humans live and relate with the biosphere. Because of its deep impact, meat is a test case for how and whether policy makers align the food system with sustainability goals. The evidence is strong for behaviour change, for a reorientation of production and for a refinement of supply chain management. Broadly the picture is this: first, rich societies need to eat less meat and dairy while poorer societies need to be wary about getting on to the treadmill and second, consumption is too high in developed countries and developing countries are following that lead, while all need to keep meat and dairy consumption low. As Barry Popkin and others have pointed out, there are multiple health benefits to reducing meat consumption (Popkin, 2009). And there seems to be agreement that the environmental benefits of constraining meat and dairy are high too (Sustainable Development Commission, 2009).
