Meatless Mondays: I’m in, how about you?

Meatless Mondays is an international movement whose goal is to cut personal meat consumption by 15% in an effort to improve our overall health and the health of our planet. Meatless Mondays is a non-profit initiative, in association with Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, the largest school of public health in the world.

The campaign was relaunched in 2003 as a public health campaign to help individuals reduce their saturated fat intake. According to the Meatless Monday website, there are many health benefits of reducing meat consumption. They range from reducing heart disease, limiting our risk of cancer, fighting diabetes and obesity and improving our diet and overall mortality. Whew – that’s a pretty impressive list of benefits for giving up meat for just one day of the week.

And there’s more. Meatless Mondays promises to be good to our pockets as well by cutting our weekly food budget. (yes, meat in general and organic meat in particular is an expensive form of protein) Meatless Mondays also links the reduction in meat consumption to a reduction in health care spending as well.

And let’s not forget the benefits to our environment and our planet that a meager 15% reduction in meat consumption boasts; like reducing our carbon footprint. “The UN estimates that the meat industry generates one fifth of man-made greenhouse gas emissions that accelerate climate change.” The meat industry is also reported to be a heavy consumer of water and fossil fuel energy.”

So whose already on board with this initiative? Quite a few. Recently, San Francisco city’s Board of Supervisors passed a resolution urging restaurants, stores and schools to offer vegetarian options on Mondays. Now the resolution is non-binding, but it’s a great way to get the Meatless Monday message out there to the general public.

In addition, over 30 US college campuses have embraced Meatless Mondays. And on the international front, groups supporting Meatless Mondays have sprung up in Britain, Holland, Canada, Finland, Taiwan, Brazil and Australia. On April 26th, Japan became the latest country to embrace Meatless Monday. Celebrities have also been adding their support to the movement.

So not wanting to be left out – my family and I are officially on board. And why not? Why not support Meatless Mondays, a cause that is good for our health, good for our planet and saves us money.

Check out the Meatless Mondays website for more information and for some yummy recipes that I will be incorporating in my Cooking for Life Series.