A Change in Australian Diet May Improve Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Stephanie Adams
Oct. 7th. 2008
6:43 p.m.

Australia’s top climate change advisor Ross Garnaut, has voiced his support for a change in the Australian diet. The proposed change consists of replacing cow and other consumed farm animals with kangaroos. Apparently farm animal flatulence greatly adds to Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions and may drive up meat prices if farmers have to purchase permits for gas emissions. According to Professor Garnaut, the farm animals are responsible for 67% of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Kangaroos seem like a great alternative to Professor Ross Garnaut and other kangaroo eating advocates due to their fairly low methane gas emissions. kangaroos were once previously the main source of meat in the Australian diet. Many kangaroos are slaughtered each year to control their numbers in the wild and the meat is then put in dog food. Those who are health conscious meat-eaters in Australia already prefer to eat kangaroo because it is lean, has lots of protein and roams freely.
Garnaut’s proposal to the Australian government projects that if kangaroos replaced a large amount of cattle, the number of kangaroo would be great enough to replace the loss of beef and sheep meat production. Garnaut mentions that this would be a large change on Australia’s part because of the change in food taste for the consumers or those who simply don’t agree with eating kangaroo. There would also have to be a change in farm and livestock maintenance, which would take plenty of time to reorganize.

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