How green is your palate?

Mon, May 26 12:35 AM

Sir Paul McCartney endorses it passionately. So does Pamela Anderson.

Closer home, Amitabh Bachchan, Juhi Chawla, Shahid Kapur, Tabu, Milind Soman, Mahima Choudhary and Mandira Bedi are avid followers. As the World Vegetarian Week (May 19 to 25) was celebrated, we find out what makes going green a great option.

Earth-wise Did you know that eating meat leaves a higher ecological footprint than traffic and industry emissions combined? That's just one example of how our taste for flesh translates into pollution, greenhouse emissions and even land degradation. A 2006 report by the United Nations, Livestock's Long Shadow, says that the livestock sector is among the top "contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global.

" Turning vegetarian, then, is a great first step towards saving the planet. Keeps the doc away "It's said that you can digest meat.

well, you can even digest cardboard, says Ambika Shukla, trustee, People for Animals.

Studies show that non-vegetarians are at a higher risk for cancer, stroke, obesity, diabetes and heart diseases. Turning vegetarian is good for health.

Reduce the pain That could be done for the millions of animals whose necks are on the block, literally, to meet global demands. As Ingrid Newkirk, co-founder, PETA, said in an earlier interview, "We know for a fact that all animals feel the pain.

You burn them, you hit them and you know you're causing pain. All these things happen to create chicken tikka or lamb chops.

" Turning vegetarian can thus be an ethical decision. Solution to global hunger? Ecologists suggest that it requires 10 times as many crops to feed slaughter animals as compared to what the same number of vegetarians would require.

Now imagine the immense potential if that same agricultural land is used to grow crops for human consumption. With so many reasons to give up meat, going green seems, well, the intelligent way to live.

And with so many delicious alternatives available, making the seemingly difficult shift is not as tough as it was a few years ago. In short, as Shukla says, "There's just no logic to meat.

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