Here’s a fresh idea from Down Under: Eating more kangaroos might help save the planet.
The math goes like this. Australia is trying to figure out how to cut its emissions of greenhouse gases without crippling the economy. Cattle and sheep, by grace of their bodily functions, emit a lot of greenhouse gases—about 11% of Australia’s total emissions, and about two-thirds as much as all the cars and trucks in Australia. Kangaroos don’t, because they have a different digestive system. So if kangaroos replaced part of the cattle herds as a food source, Australia could cut its emissions by 16 million tons, or 3%, ranchers could earn hundreds of millions of dollars—and there’d still be plenty of juicy steaks.
That’s the argument laid out in a new paper arguing for a massive increase in ‘roos—and a cultural shift so that Aussies would feel comfortable grilling their national symbol. Raising kangaroos—whose numbers have been dwindling in recent years—would offer an out for the agricultural sector, which doesn’t have many other ways to cut its emissions. Replacing hard-hoofed cattle and sheep with kangaroos would also help tackle some of Australia’s other environmental problems, like soil erosion, the paper argues. Critics say they’ve struggled for years to preserve kangaroo populations. The plan’s proposed five-fold increase in kangaroos is too ambitious a jump, they say.
But tackling livestock emissions isn’t such a far-out idea. Researchers from Wales to Japan have spent years trying to figure out how to make cows less flatulent, since methane is a lot more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. Now, thanks to the global food crisis and rising grain prices, livestock herds have come under increasing scrutiny for their environmental impact.
According to some anti-beef proponents, like Jeremy Rifkin of the D.C.- based Foundation on Economic Trends, global livestock ranching is the second-biggest source of greenhouse-gas emissions, behind only transportation. Rajendra Pachauri, the vegetarian head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, preaches a similar message. But with the developed world hooked on meat—and parts of the developing world, like China, rapidly acquiring a taste—it’s hard to see how livestock emissions can be tolerably cut.
Of course, the Australian solution presents another dilemma for some environmentalists, who recently battled plans to cull kangaroo populations. Is curbing emissions worth killing for?