Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Lifestyle changes can curb climate change: IPCC chief

15 January 2008

PARIS (AFP) — Don't eat meat, ride a bike, and be a frugal shopper -- that's how you can help brake global warming, the head of the United Nation's Nobel Prize-winning scientific panel on climate change (Rajendra Pachauri - above) said Tuesday.

The 2007 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), issued last year, highlights "the importance of lifestyle changes," said Rajendra Pachauri at a press conference in Paris.

"This is something that the IPCC was afraid to say earlier, but now we have said it."

A vegetarian, the Indian economist made a plea for people around the world to tame their carnivorous impulses. "Please eat less meat -- meat is a very carbon intensive commodity," he said, adding that consuming large quantities was also bad for one's health.

Studies have shown that producing one kilo (2.2 pounds) of meat causes the emissions equivalent of 36.4 kilos of carbon dioxide. More >>>