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Chicken

This is because our love of cheap chicken has created a global industry where chickens are bred in energy hungry, air-conditioned, battery units and then flown all over the world to be consumed, usually in fast food products. Thailand is one of the worst offenders, with exports of poultry predicted to have grown to $25 billion by the end of this year.

But it is not just overseas chicken that has a carbon footprint. A report by Greenpeace has revealed that huge areas of virgin Amazonian rainforest are being cleared to make way for soya plantations. Between 2003 and 2004 more than 27,000 square kilometres of the Amazon was lost in this way, an area the size of Belgium. This soya is then shipped 7000 kilometres to the UK where it is used as high protein feed for chickens. Much of this goes to companies that supply the fast food industry in Britain.

The price of British meat is set to rise because the price of feed is increasing. Perhaps that’s not such a bad thing. If you’re buying meat try to get it from locally sourced farms, and organic if possible. Generally speaking the cheaper it is, the higher the environmental cost.