Mark Bittman has this to say in his new piece in the New York Times with guest scientist researcher Robert Goodland
Conversely, replacing at least a quarter of today’s livestock products with better alternatives would both reduce emissions and allow forest to regenerate on a vast amount of land, which could then absorb excess atmospheric carbon to reduce it to a safe level. This may be the only pragmatic way to reverse climate change in the next five years as needed. Sufficient renewable energy infrastructure is projected to take at least 20 years and $18 trillion to develop.
Substitutes for livestock products require no subsidies or offsets. Consumers can buy more of them tomorrow.
my emphasis
Those who don't have their heads in the sands of denial are starting to understand that climate change is real and is here now. There's nothing like witnessing extreme weather first hand or watching the destruction on TV in real time that makes it impossible for rational people to deny that we are living in challenging times. And the scientific community is verifying what we are feeling and seeing with our own eyes. The climate is having dangerous extreme events and human activity is responsible.
It gets worse. The extreme weather is just a taste of what we are in for. The intense heat and drought conditions in the US midwest are starting to affect crop yields and has a university plant biologist stating that farming in such conditions "is like farming in hell". Nothing like having food prices skyrocket or food become unavailable to make one recognize that things are bad indeed.
We can not let ourselves be acclimated to absorbing the extreme weather punches like a punch drunk boxer staggering toward collapse. Those of us who recognize the urgency need to pivot to a position of implementing solutions.
As Mark Bittman said above; we don't have much time. The scientists are saying we have to reverse greenhouse gases to a safe level of 350 ppm rapidly in order to mitigate the worst effects of climate change. If we do not accomplish that reduction we will be in unchartered territory of runaway and irreversible extreme weather.
Scientists started working to find a fast solution to reduce atmospheric greenhouse gases when it became apparent that we do not have time to focus on reducing C02 alone because it is now known that C02 remains in the atmosphere for hundreds of years. So the solution of reducing the short lived climate pollutants has passed the scientific threshold and is now being recognized as the only way to rapidly reduce greenhouse gas emissions to bring rapid cooling and to buy us the time necessary to reduce the long living C02.
The greatest contributor to the short lived climate pollutants (SLCP) is livestock production. Mark Bittman and I are in agreement that this is the only pragmatic solution available. Even if by some miracle there should be a global agreement to reduce greenhouse gases to safe levels the concentration needs to be on the short lived climate pollutants of methane, black carbon and tropospheric ozone. We don't have time for anything else.
We are fortunate to be given the simple and fast solution of reducing meat consumption to solve the the most challenging issue humanity has ever faced. I hope we take this opportunity.