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Along with a couple of old schoolfriends, I made my first visit to China in 1997, backpacking through the spellbinding karst landscapes of Guangxi. For one reason or another it took me 10 years to return to China, this time to become a business English teacher in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province.
As a teacher, one of my favorite ways to introduce myself to new students is to get them to guess facts about me. After some easy starters to get the ball rolling–“Guess how old I am,” or“Which country do you think I’m from?”–I usually throw in a tougher one:“What did I stop doing in 1995?” Normally this is met with 15 or so blank faces, but then, gradually, I tend to get some responses: “Stop living at home?” “Stop smoking?”or, if there’s a joker in the back row, “Stop learning English?” Occasionally a student might guess the right answer, which is this: In 1995 I stopped eating meat.
My students usually respond to this in one of two ways. Either they think that I must be a Buddhist, or that I’m a little bit strange. One or two have even thought that I must be a strange Buddhist. When I tell them that renouncing meat has nothing to do with religion, but more a concern for the welfare of animals, and of the planet, they begin to look a little confused.
Let’s be honest–being a vegetarian in China is tough. On a recent company dinner at Grandma’s Kitchen, a popular local chain of Western-style restaurants, I was slightly dismayed (but not altogether surprised) to find that the first 11 dishes brought to our table were meat, fish or seafood. I’ve also lost count of the number of times I’ve had to pass on a succulent looking plate of eggplant or green beans simply because it’s been mixed with tiny pieces of beef or pork. And, of course, I have yet to sample any of Hangzhou’s legendary dishes–no dong po rou, beggar’s chicken or West Lake vinegar fish for me.
And yet I’m proud to be a vegetarian, and wish there wasn’t such a stigma about it here. One useful barometer of China’s growing affluence is the per-capita meat consumption. In 1980, just two years after China’s reform and opening-up policy be- gan, the average Chinese person ate 20kg of meat annually. In 2008 that figure had almost tripled to 54kg. And with a burgeoning middle-class in the mega-cities of the east coast this figure is sure to keep increasing.
So why does this matter? Well, firstly it will put an even greater strain on Chinese(and world) grain supplies. It is estimated that over 700 million tons of feed is needed to fatten animals for our consumption each year. Secondly is the welfare of the animals themselves. In my time in Hangzhou I have found that most of my students and Chinese friends have a deep and abiding affection for their country’s natural landscapes, for the mountains, rivers, and bamboo forests one finds away from the teeming metropolises.
So why is there not a similar veneration for the creatures that inhabit these landscapes? Do they really exist only to provide us with a cheap source of protein? Last, and by no means least, is the effect our meat-addiction is having on the Earth’s atmosphere. Can you guess the greatest contributor to worldwide greenhouse gas emissions? It’s not transport, or industry, as you might expect, but livestock production. Yes, livestock production. According to a recent report by the United Nations the nitrous oxide emitted by cows and pigs (as manure) is 296 times more powerful than carbon dioxide. And yet we keep breeding them, and eating them.
So the choice is yours. I realize this is a hard sell, especially in a country that seems to have a branch of KFC on every street corner. If you can still order a table full of meat with a clear conscience, then I take my hat off to you. If, on the other hand, you’re starting to have second thoughts, then my job is done. Why not take the leap?
As a teacher, one of my favorite ways to introduce myself to new students is to get them to guess facts about me. After some easy starters to get the ball rolling–“Guess how old I am,” or“Which country do you think I’m from?”–I usually throw in a tougher one:“What did I stop doing in 1995?” Normally this is met with 15 or so blank faces, but then, gradually, I tend to get some responses: “Stop living at home?” “Stop smoking?”or, if there’s a joker in the back row, “Stop learning English?” Occasionally a student might guess the right answer, which is this: In 1995 I stopped eating meat.
My students usually respond to this in one of two ways. Either they think that I must be a Buddhist, or that I’m a little bit strange. One or two have even thought that I must be a strange Buddhist. When I tell them that renouncing meat has nothing to do with religion, but more a concern for the welfare of animals, and of the planet, they begin to look a little confused.
Let’s be honest–being a vegetarian in China is tough. On a recent company dinner at Grandma’s Kitchen, a popular local chain of Western-style restaurants, I was slightly dismayed (but not altogether surprised) to find that the first 11 dishes brought to our table were meat, fish or seafood. I’ve also lost count of the number of times I’ve had to pass on a succulent looking plate of eggplant or green beans simply because it’s been mixed with tiny pieces of beef or pork. And, of course, I have yet to sample any of Hangzhou’s legendary dishes–no dong po rou, beggar’s chicken or West Lake vinegar fish for me.
And yet I’m proud to be a vegetarian, and wish there wasn’t such a stigma about it here. One useful barometer of China’s growing affluence is the per-capita meat consumption. In 1980, just two years after China’s reform and opening-up policy be- gan, the average Chinese person ate 20kg of meat annually. In 2008 that figure had almost tripled to 54kg. And with a burgeoning middle-class in the mega-cities of the east coast this figure is sure to keep increasing.
So why does this matter? Well, firstly it will put an even greater strain on Chinese(and world) grain supplies. It is estimated that over 700 million tons of feed is needed to fatten animals for our consumption each year. Secondly is the welfare of the animals themselves. In my time in Hangzhou I have found that most of my students and Chinese friends have a deep and abiding affection for their country’s natural landscapes, for the mountains, rivers, and bamboo forests one finds away from the teeming metropolises.
So why is there not a similar veneration for the creatures that inhabit these landscapes? Do they really exist only to provide us with a cheap source of protein? Last, and by no means least, is the effect our meat-addiction is having on the Earth’s atmosphere. Can you guess the greatest contributor to worldwide greenhouse gas emissions? It’s not transport, or industry, as you might expect, but livestock production. Yes, livestock production. According to a recent report by the United Nations the nitrous oxide emitted by cows and pigs (as manure) is 296 times more powerful than carbon dioxide. And yet we keep breeding them, and eating them.
So the choice is yours. I realize this is a hard sell, especially in a country that seems to have a branch of KFC on every street corner. If you can still order a table full of meat with a clear conscience, then I take my hat off to you. If, on the other hand, you’re starting to have second thoughts, then my job is done. Why not take the leap?