Reasons to eat vegatables over meat that you may not have thought about.

–information source: Being Vegetarian for Dummies by Suzanne Havala, MS. RD.

It curbs forest depletion.

Because the worldwide demand for meat is so great– trees and forests all over the world are being felled to make way for cattle grazing.  It takes far more land to provide a given volume of meat than the same volume of plant food.  Trees produce oxygen humans need to breath.  The more trees we fell to produce meat the less trees and oxygen to breathe we will have on this earth.

It curbs fresh water depletion.

Cattle farms suck up tremendous volumes of the world’s under ground water aquifers in order to irrigate grazing lands for livestock.  Pesticides and fertilizers used to grow foods for cattle and fecal matter from the cattle contaminate our water supplies.

It curbs fossil fuel depletion.

Fossil fuels such as petroleum are used extensively to transport animal feed and animals and to run the farms where animals are raised.

It conserves resources to better feed the world.

Fewer resources are required to produce vegetables than an equal volume of meat.  Because of this there would be more food to feed the world if our population ate more vegetables and less meat.

It’s the smart thing to do, per many noted smart thinkers.

Some of the greatest minds throughout history have been persons who chose to be vegetarians, including: Charles Darwin, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, Benjamin Franklin, Mahatma Gandhi, Sir Isaac Newton and Plato.

The high fiber content fills you up.

Dietary fiber found in vegetables is only partially digested by our bodies. The part not digested is flushed out so that you tend to get a full feeling without taking in so many calories.  This enables you to lose weight without feeling hungry.