In article one, We Produce Too Much Food. The Green New Deal Can Stop This, Eric Holt-Gimenez claims that too much food is being produced and farmers and people in the agricultural field are not paid accordingly. This for overproduction of food worsens climate change because of greenhouse gases and it worsens the economy due to wage fluctuation. Gimenez says “The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that agriculture emits 9 percent of the country’s greenhouse gases…reducing emissions and increasing productivity on existing plantations”. He believes that producing a set amount of food would tremendously help diminish and slow the impact of climate change.
Gimenez centers his argument on the idea that the overproduction of food is a big factor of climate change and in the bad economy. On the other hand, Cook believes that the overproduction of food is not necessarily the problem but rather the production of products such as meat.
In article two, To Address the Climate Crisis, We Must Completely Rethink How We Produce and Consume Food, Christopher D. Cook claims that a potential solution to climate change is rather not to diminish the amount of food produced, but instead to eliminate the specific foods produced that worsen climate change. “with nations dependent on trade, exports and economic development to maintain economic growth—and that growth invariably spurring greater meat consumption”. Cook also believes that it’s important to produce food efficiently, but is leaning on the idea of eliminating certain types of food.
Both Gimenez and Cook make great arguments regarding ways to reduce pollution and slow down climate change. Although Gimenez and Cook do not have the exact same solution to this issue, they both agree that the overproduction of food does have an effect on climate change. It is great that they both agree on the good of producing proficiently will definitely improve the issues climate change brings. I believe Gimenez makes a better point because there clearly is an overproduction of food and it is crucial to diminish those numbers, especially due to the bad economy in which farmers make no profit. It is a great way to fix the economy while improving climate change. Although Cook also makes a great point, he provides an abstract idea that will probably could help alleviate the effects of climate while also worsening the economy because the loss of meat and other food will lead to loss of consumers even if an alternate form of food is found(takes a while for others to adapt).
Source citation
Holt-Giménez, Eric. “We Produce Too Much Food. The Green New Deal Can Stop This.” Gale Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2019. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/XJVRDI242502752/OVIC?u=onlinelibrary&sid=OVIC&xid=4699b3a6. Accessed 25 Oct. 2019. Originally published as “We Produce Too Much Food. The Green New Deal Can Stop This,” In These Times, 22 Apr. 2019.
Cook, Christopher D. “To Address the Climate Crisis, We Must Completely Rethink How We Produce and Consume Food.” Gale Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2019. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/XKQTVR138337196/OVIC?u=onlinelibrary&sid=OVIC&xid=cb75ad00. Accessed 25 Oct. 2019. Originally published as “To Address the Climate Crisis, We Must Completely Rethink How We Produce and Consume Food,” In These Times, 15 Oct. 2018.
Gedeon,
I think your analysis on the effects of overproduced products on the climate is very fascinating! I didn’t even realize that, from what I picked up from your article, restricting agriculture production could be a way to lower carbon emissions. I noticed that you mentioned that Gimenez’s solution is better than Cook’s because having consumers adapt to a life without meat is more difficult, but I gave it some thought and would actually argue that by Cook’s solution is better because Gimenez’s solution of restricting agriculture could be applied as a domino effect.
The way I see it, applying meat reduction programs (such as Meatless Mondays or switching to Beyond Meat) to schools and businesses is a cheap and more socially acceptable way to lower the consumption of meat. Yes, I agree it’s hard for consumers to adapt to a meatless lifestyle, but this method is a lot simpler and financially capable rather than forcing an entire industry to lower their production. If the demand for meat lowered, then a whole chain of events would start: Meat industries would need to compensate this lower demand by decreasing their production of livestock, and this lowered number of livestock would mean that the demand for crops used to feed them would dropped, and this drop of crop demand would mean the agriculture industry would need to reduce their production of crops. This chain of cause and effect has Cook’s solution eventually leading to Gimenez’s, which is why I prefer Cook’s method.
I’m super curious to your thoughts about my breakdown though! I’m aware that Gimenez’s solution can be a lot more efficient than Cook’s, and that the chain can happen the other way around, but my concern is the cost and reaction of the consumers. I fear that if the chain were to happen the other way and consumers sudden lose their easy access to meat, there may be some angry people. Let me know what you think!
Dear Gedeon this article closely relates to the article I wrote. In my article I focused more on the greenhouse gases coming from cars and factory pollution. I found an article with a graph that shows how Co2 is the highest levels ever recorded. Thanks for your post it was very interesting.
Hi, Gedeon. I am really interested in climate change these days and lots of things, especially greenhouse gases, cause serious climate change. Greenhouse effect is the main cause of climate change and this link would serve short summary of the facts about greenhouse effect: https://interestingengineering.com/4-important-facts-about-climate-change-everyone-must-know