Providing plant based meals is Carbon offsetting

Europe has led the world in implementing carbon trading, renewable-energy subsidies and the other necessary legislation for getting the green industry moving. In the U.S a survey of 600 small business owners nationwide with a result of two thirds of businesses owners willing to go green and spend an additional amount to be environmentally friendly for services and goods.

A meatless meal can contribute drastically to the carbon footprint, businesses should take advantage of this as well. Considering that the process of an animal based food is highly carbon intensive, starting with the production to feed the animal, the slaughtering, the processing, refrigerating and transporting add up making it the highest green house gas emitting industry (33)(34)

Now, a business would not have a less of an incentive to spend on itself, even more so if it was favorable to the business and its employees.
For instance, Based on US Tax deductions business meals and entertainment are 50 percent deductible. Governments can encourage companies to provide a workplace wellness program with plant based meals for their employees, in turn providing an additional tax break based on a number of days green meals are provided ( may vary upon company).
A company would establish a simple but complete service for its employees, simultaneously relieving a significant financial concern for the employee, contributing to their better health, thus having a more productive worker and creating an additional green job in the food industry (by contracting a catering service).
(35)(36)

Vision of a sustainable plant based diet and its benefits|
The benefits for the world community sustaining itself on a plant based diet are numerous.

With current unstable climate change patterns and estimated predictions scientists and renowned experts tell us that a change in a meat free diet is important in reducing environmental problems. Experts like Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said, “In terms of immediacy of action and the feasibility of bringing about reductions in a short period of time, it clearly is the most attractive opportunity.” (37)Firstly, by reducing GHG emissions it would allow the directly affected Arctic marine ecology to stabilize. Some areas of the ecology are affected by the sea ice melting and other areas are affected by the warming temperatures. Marine life ranging seasonal phytoplankton and algae blooms which support the entire Arctic food web would have significant effects to the entire ecology. Additionally impacted would be large populations of Arctic marine birds, migratory whale species, seals, walruses and polar bears, some of which are entirely dependent upon and adapted to floating sea ice and ice edges. (38)

By lowering GHG emissions we may be possible to reduce the threat of the accelerated rate of sea level rising affecting millions of people on islands and cities around the world. Sea levels rise is due to thermal expansion(water warming) and melting of ice sheets and glaciers. Reports once predicted that the Arctic polar ice caps were thought to be completely free of ice by 2100. However, University of Manitoba Prof. David Barber, the lead investigator of the Circumpolar Flaw Lead System study accompanied by more than 300 scientist from around the world stayed last winter on the coast guard research vessel studying the impacts of climate change and estimate the melting to be at a much quicker rate, somewhere between 2013 and 2030. Recently,Prof. David Barber shared at a student symposium on climate change at FortWhyte Alive that,”It’s happening much faster than our most pessimistic models suggested.”(39)

• According to a study, led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR ) the report states that global warming is unavoidable during this century. (40) Unstable climate weather patterns are related to increased heat, and heat drives increased water and turbulence in the atmosphere. NCAR scientist Warren Washington, the paper’s lead author stated, “we could stabilize the threat of climate change.”
Georgia Tech City and Regional Planning Professor Brian Stone determined that reducing the rate of forest loss around the world and allowing forests to regenerate where they have been lost could significantly slow the rate of global warming.(41)

A complete natural Forest regeneration is a long term process taking years.
Therefore, immediate action is necessary and favorable. Given the opportunity of Forest regeneration it would continue to serve life on this planet in a multitude of ways. These tropical forests are absorbing large amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, approximately a massive 4.8 billion tons of CO2 emissions each year, never the less yet providing some stability to our changing climate. Regeneration of these forests for instance would divert the process of desertification, soil erosion, and much more. (42)(43) Nations rich in rainforest such as Brazil have been heavily stricken by floods, mudslides and droughts. Most of these occurrences would be prevented being that mudslides have often taken place in areas where hills have been stripped of vegetation. As for floods, excessive rain is pouring where it doesn’t rain but flourishing forests would serve to stabilize rainfalls and all the while other regions suffer from abnormal droughts, effects of degradation, as it too has been mainly destroyed by cattle farming . (44)
The world’s rainforests are home to about 50 percent of the world’s species, mutually aiding one another with animals serving in dispersing seeds.
Rainforests contain a botanical wealth and other resources, that if allowed to flourish once again, they will continue to serve humanity and their biodiversity.(45)

An organic plant based food system in our society would ensure that farming practices no longer contribute to expanding Dead zones. This invasive technique of farming would eliminate many of the contributing factors polluting our marine ecology, providing it with an opportunity to flourish once again. Organic crop farm lands would strive having no use of spreading toxic animal waste as fertilizer and other hazardous commonly used chemicals in today’s commercial farming. Rivers, streams and ground water which supply much of our drinking water would flow free of heavy metals, chemicals, pathogens and other pollutants produced by CAFOs or IFF intensive factory farms, therefore no harmful substances never reaching our vital oceans.(46)(47)

Consequently, a meat free diet (diet free of fish) would also prevent the devastating effects of commercial fishing and habitat loss in turn affecting the other areas of marine ecology. By abstaining from fishing immediately, some number of fish species may recover ,almost 90 percent have disappeared, while a fair amount may have partial recovery.(48)

(33) http://www.sustainability.govt.nz/forum/2008/who-has-lower-carbon-footprint-vegetarian-suv-driver-or-meat-eating-cyclist
(34) http://51percent.org/livestock-ghg-footprint/
(35) http://www.entrepreneur.com/money/taxcenter/taxpertisecolumnistbonnielee/article205654.html
(36) http://www.environmentalleader.com/2010/01/08/global-carbon-trading-volumes-grew-68-in-2009/
(37) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2699173/Eat-less-red-meat-to-help-the-environment-UN-climate-expert-says.html
(38) http://archive.greenpeace.org/climate/arctic99/reports/wildlife.html#fnB11
(39) http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/arctic-ice-melt-alarms-scientists-83704042.html
(40) http://esciencenews.com/articles/2009/04/14/decline.greenhouse.gas.emissions.would.reduce.sea.level.rise.save.arctic.sea.ice
(41) http://www.fao.org/docrep/u6850e/u6850e09.htm
(42) http://rainforests.mongabay.com/0801.htm
(43) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/forests/4690299/Trees-absorb-a-fifth-of-carbon-emissions-pumped-out-by-humans.html
(44) http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/01/03/2784418.htm
(45) http://rainforests.mongabay.com/0801.htm
(46) http://www.ers.usda.gov/amberwaves/november03/findings/deadzone.htm
(47) http://www.downtoearth.org/environment/organic-vs-conventional-farming/ocean-dead-zone-solution-buy-organic
(48) http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/science/05/14/coolsc.disappearingfish/