World needs to reach 'peak meat' by 2030 to avert an ecological disaster: scientists

In a letter published in the Lancet Planetary Health Journal this Wednesday, scientists are urging middle- and high-income countries to curb the meat industry’s growth in an effort the slow the effects of carbon pollution, Gizmodo reports.

According to studies, the meat industry is responsible for 14.5 percent of all greenhouse gas pollution globally. The letter calls for governments such as the US and China to set a timeline for “peak livestock" where production of certain livestock species will cease to increase.

“I think [individual actions] will help to shift the markets generally via signaling and is a positive action, but to achieve deep transformation of agriculture, we need system-level change, and that requires policymakers to act," letter author and environmental social scientist Helen Harwatt wrote.

You can read the letter in full here.