The planet needs China to curb its appetite for meat

THE PLANET needs China to curb its appetite for meat. In the first three decades of the “reform and opening” era the number of farmed animals in the country tripled. Raising them polluted water supplies and gobbled up scarce arable land. Around the globe, China’s growing hunger for red meat, specifically, has seen its beef imports grow 40-fold between 2010 and 2018. The boom threatens Latin American forests and Arctic ice caps alike, as cattle-rearing prompts land-clearing and emits greenhouse gases.

To be fair, China’s 1.4bn people are being asked to show a self-restraint unknown in the gluttonous West. Even now, in a China where children yawn at dishes their grandparents once saw only at weddings and high holidays, meat consumption per person is only half of America’s. But China’s government, too, wants its people to eat less meat. Obesity, type-2 diabetes and high blood pressure are taking a growing toll. To curb such afflictions, guidelines issued in 2016 urge adults to eat just 40-75 grammes of meat a day, or about half the current national average. Market signals are also pushing shoppers to cut back. China’s most popular meat, pork, is nearly 70% costlier than a year ago because herds are being wiped out by African swine fever, a disease harmless to people but lethal to pigs.