Emily Cunningham

It's driving me mad that #PrayforAmazonas is trending with no or little talk of drivers. It's pretty simple: Brazil's main export is soybeans. These go, in large part, to feed livestock around the world. The demand for beef & dairy is driving this. https://oec.world/en/profile/country/bra/ …

This is not moralistic vegan lecturing, this is cause & effect: stop eating beef, meat in general & dairy products, full stop, the end. Don't just #PrayforAmazonas, for crying out loud! Put a dent in global soy demand. Global trade agreements are key. https://mollymep.org.uk/2019/06/26/ft-letter-mercosur/ …

And don't come to me with "but drinking soy milk and eating tofu is just the same" - that's just crap. First of all, much more inefficient to go via animals instead of direct to humans. Second, soy milk & tofu most often has EU (or US) origin of soy crops.

Also true: Bolsonaro's policies are driving this. I'm guessing there was similar demand for beef & dairy under past presidents, yet we didn't see this. I say this as a vegan. He won on a ticket of racist, reactionary, right wing sentiments. So, we must also fight those things.

Very true, but there is pressure and profits to be made on international (and national - part of deforestation is for domestic beef grazing) markets. Important to acknowledge & reduce that pressure.

See chart in article linked (don't nec believe article that demand is decreasing): soy demand has more than doubled since 2000. https://www.deputter.ca/nwm-rising-production-and-declining-demand-a-bad-combination-for-soybeans/ …

I agree with you that stopping beef and dairy consumption would be very good. I'm struggling to articulate why I think it needs to be put in a bigger context though. It's also about fighting Big Meat and Dairy here. Maybe taxing meat and dairy.

This tweet kinda gets at what makes me uncomfortable about focusing on diet. Is it our biggest lever? I'm suspect that it is. I don't see massive people changing their diet without some kind of policy that helps them chose one over the other.https://twitter.com/emahlee/status/1081013433137414145 …