[Music]
[Applause]
thank you very much good evening
tunas good evening cutlets sir I’m here
today to give you some tools and
knowledge which I think will be very
useful for you in changing the world for
the better on a range of issues now if
we were to look at the defining issue of
our a climate change and I asked you in
the audience what the most effective
ways to address climate change were I’m
sure that electric cars or solar power
would be on the top of your list but
what if I told you there was a solution
right in front of you
on your place in the food we eat so
today
did you know but 29% of global
greenhouse gas emissions comes from the
global food system off this half of it
comes from animal agriculture now that
is more than the entire transport sector
combined all of the cars trucks buses
planes and ships in the world combined
sounds like a pretty big problem right
well how big is this problem well in
2016 the three biggest meat companies in
the world jbs Cargill and Tyson Foods
had a greenhouse gas emmissions
footprint equal to the entire country of
France that puts them right up there
with climate villains like big oil like
BP Shell and Exxon Mobil if we want to
expand this a little bit and look at the
20 biggest meat and dairy companies in
the world they did as much damage as
it’s not just our climate that’s at risk
our oceans are as well the picture you
see behind me is one of the largest dead
zones in the ocean it’s off the coast of
Texas and the US and it’s been caused by
runoff from cattle and pig farms in the
southern states of the US
in addition our rainforests 91% of
Amazon rainforest destruction since 1970
has been linked to forests clearing to
create land for beef production and this
isn’t a problem that just is confined to
developing countries like Brazil in
Australia where I grew up in Australian
in eastern Australia we’re going to lose
3 million hectares of untouched forest
over the next 12 years simply to make
more land the cattle farming and beef
production now what gives us reasons to
be optimistic is that the solution is in
front of us if we as individuals switch
to a plant-based diet we could reduce
our personal individual climate
footprint by 40 percent and if you scale
this from the individual level to the
systemic level to the national and
international level this means that even
one of the most heavily industrialized
countries in the u.s. if everyone there
made one simple change to their diets if
they switched from eating beef to is the
same amount of proteins the same amount
of calories from beans that single
change would be enough according to
researchers to help the country reach up
to 74 percent of its Paris climate
target agreements for 2020 and that’s a
lot of impact
now how oh oh this is also backed up by
the UN for the UN climate change
Secretariat says eating vegetarian food
as often as you can is one of the most
effective ways of reaching our Paris
goals now how does this relate to
Tunisia well did you know that the
earliest references to vegetarian people
in European literature referred to
Tunisia I’m talking about ancient Greece
in Homer’s Odyssey Odysseus his ship
gets caught in a storm and ends up in
the north of Africa who does he meet
there he meets a tribe of people who
don’t eat any meat instead they plants
specifically the fruit of one the ticket
called the Lotus he called these people
the lotto faggy which means below
two-seaters and according to herodotus
star bow and Polybius the lotto Fergie’s
homeland was the island of Djerba and
modern tunisia and it’s not just food
almond milk in the last three to four
years almond milk is seen an explosion
commercially and people think it’s this
new high-tech hipster alternative to
milk
far from it it has a very long and rich
history here in the Mediterranean
almond milk has been known since times
of ancient Greece and Phoenicia and was
a very core ingredient in the medieval
Arab world in countries with hot
climates where you couldn’t keep cows
and without refrigeration you couldn’t
keep milk for very long without it going
bad this became a core ingredient to the
extent that in the 10th century and 13th
century 14th century you had cookbooks
from Andalusia to Baghdad which talked
about almond milk and how to cook with
it in fact classical Arabic even had a
word is Phillipa which meant making
plant milk in English today I can’t go
and say I’m going to go milk some
almonds but 700 years ago you could say
that in all of the Arab world
now what about today in Tunisia today
vegetarianism or veganism these are seen
as alien exotic concepts but forget the
label it vegetarians
simply eat the same food that people
have eaten for a long time staples of
our diets vegetables fruits not spread
couscous that’s all vegetarian and here
in Tunisia you have one of the most
sustainable dietary patterns I’ve seen
but the average Tunisian eats 2 kilos of
meat per month now that means if I were
to pick up any of you from the audience
and drop you in Germany or the US or in
Australia the locals there would
probably not even call you a carnivore
they would call you a flexitarian or a
reducer terian or maybe even a veggie
the label doesn’t matter what matters is
choosing healthy foods now in the West
today the average consumption of meat is
five times as much as it is in Tunisia
in some countries now why is that well
some people will tell you that this is
just an inherent part of Western culture
that since Neanderthal times it’s been
normal for people to eat meat at
breakfast lunch and dinner and to drink
milk well into adulthood but that’s not
entirely accurate in fact this is a very
recent phenomenon it’s happened in the
last 50 to 60 years and it’s been driven
by government subsidies governments in
Western Europe and North America and
Australia New Zealand have financed the
overproduction of meat and milk which
led to the growth of multinational
corporations making profits of this
subsidized input and then who built
lobbies to protect these subsidies and
by extension their profits as well as
marketing departments that pushed new
myths to build a new culture myths such
as eating high amounts of animal
products is natural normal and necessary
this has led to a 700 percent increase
in the number of animals killed over the
last 50 to 55 years and I and this is in
opposition to what most countries and
most cultures have that food from
agriculture has always been accessible
it’s always been available it’s always
been adaptable we’ve built entire
civilizations based on agriculture along
rivers so Greece which I mentioned as
the home of almond milk today has the
fifth highest dairy consumption in the
world three hundred three hundred liters
per person per year that is almost as
high as Switzerland we all associate
with saloon with cows but you associate
Greece or South the south of Italy or
Tunisia with cows and bring that much
milk no it shows that culture is
flexible it’s not static its dynamic it
changes over time as a reflection of
socio-economic context surrounded now
these Western lobbies are now looking
for new markets
and they’ve settled on the Middle East
and North Africa as a place where they
can make a lot of profits now you have
the pushing of what’s called live
exports we’re in an animal at the end of
its life let’s say in Ireland there’s a
cow she’s running oh she’s not giving as
much milk as before she’s not making
enough money anymore they put her on a
ship with the thousand of the cows send
her to be slaughtered in North Africa
now this is very bad for the cow
obviously it’s also bad for the ship
work as it’s bad for consumers here but
most of all it’s bad for local farmers
and pastoralists they can’t compete with
this sort of subsidized industrially
farmed meat now we’ve all heard experts
from the West come and say that or if if
only you acted more like us one day you
could be rich like us – that’s a lie if
they want you to aspire to a Western
level of consumption it’s not because
they’re your friend it’s not because
it’s in your benefit it’s because they
can make money off you because they make
the same products anyway the good news
is there’s a lot of tools in our hands
we for better or worse live in a system
where we are consumers first and
citizens second elections come once
every few years
in some countries they don’t come at all
and when they do people don’t
participate that’s okay because we vote
with our wallets with our pockets with
our money every time we leave the house
every time we eat every time we drink
every time we shop and this gives us
power every meal is a way to send a
message if you want to cut your climate
footprint the best way is to eat a
plant-based diet if you want to stop the
lobby’s the best way is to not give them
any of your money
now Tunisia can lead the way on this you
have a rich history of plant-based food
delicious healthy good for the planet
and it can be celebrated you can resist
these lobbies and be proud of your
kuelen airy heritage and we’re
surrounded by this amazing food every
day try to choose it it makes a big
difference for everyone thank you
[Applause]
[Music] you
[Applause]
thank you very much good evening
tunas good evening cutlets sir I’m here
today to give you some tools and
knowledge which I think will be very
useful for you in changing the world for
the better on a range of issues now if
we were to look at the defining issue of
our a climate change and I asked you in
the audience what the most effective
ways to address climate change were I’m
sure that electric cars or solar power
would be on the top of your list but
what if I told you there was a solution
right in front of you
on your place in the food we eat so
today
did you know but 29% of global
greenhouse gas emissions comes from the
global food system off this half of it
comes from animal agriculture now that
is more than the entire transport sector
combined all of the cars trucks buses
planes and ships in the world combined
sounds like a pretty big problem right
well how big is this problem well in
2016 the three biggest meat companies in
the world jbs Cargill and Tyson Foods
had a greenhouse gas emmissions
footprint equal to the entire country of
France that puts them right up there
with climate villains like big oil like
BP Shell and Exxon Mobil if we want to
expand this a little bit and look at the
20 biggest meat and dairy companies in
the world they did as much damage as
it’s not just our climate that’s at risk
our oceans are as well the picture you
see behind me is one of the largest dead
zones in the ocean it’s off the coast of
Texas and the US and it’s been caused by
runoff from cattle and pig farms in the
southern states of the US
in addition our rainforests 91% of
Amazon rainforest destruction since 1970
has been linked to forests clearing to
create land for beef production and this
isn’t a problem that just is confined to
developing countries like Brazil in
Australia where I grew up in Australian
in eastern Australia we’re going to lose
3 million hectares of untouched forest
over the next 12 years simply to make
more land the cattle farming and beef
production now what gives us reasons to
be optimistic is that the solution is in
front of us if we as individuals switch
to a plant-based diet we could reduce
our personal individual climate
footprint by 40 percent and if you scale
this from the individual level to the
systemic level to the national and
international level this means that even
one of the most heavily industrialized
countries in the u.s. if everyone there
made one simple change to their diets if
they switched from eating beef to is the
same amount of proteins the same amount
of calories from beans that single
change would be enough according to
researchers to help the country reach up
to 74 percent of its Paris climate
target agreements for 2020 and that’s a
lot of impact
now how oh oh this is also backed up by
the UN for the UN climate change
Secretariat says eating vegetarian food
as often as you can is one of the most
effective ways of reaching our Paris
goals now how does this relate to
Tunisia well did you know that the
earliest references to vegetarian people
in European literature referred to
Tunisia I’m talking about ancient Greece
in Homer’s Odyssey Odysseus his ship
gets caught in a storm and ends up in
the north of Africa who does he meet
there he meets a tribe of people who
don’t eat any meat instead they plants
specifically the fruit of one the ticket
called the Lotus he called these people
the lotto faggy which means below
two-seaters and according to herodotus
star bow and Polybius the lotto Fergie’s
homeland was the island of Djerba and
modern tunisia and it’s not just food
almond milk in the last three to four
years almond milk is seen an explosion
commercially and people think it’s this
new high-tech hipster alternative to
milk
far from it it has a very long and rich
history here in the Mediterranean
almond milk has been known since times
of ancient Greece and Phoenicia and was
a very core ingredient in the medieval
Arab world in countries with hot
climates where you couldn’t keep cows
and without refrigeration you couldn’t
keep milk for very long without it going
bad this became a core ingredient to the
extent that in the 10th century and 13th
century 14th century you had cookbooks
from Andalusia to Baghdad which talked
about almond milk and how to cook with
it in fact classical Arabic even had a
word is Phillipa which meant making
plant milk in English today I can’t go
and say I’m going to go milk some
almonds but 700 years ago you could say
that in all of the Arab world
now what about today in Tunisia today
vegetarianism or veganism these are seen
as alien exotic concepts but forget the
label it vegetarians
simply eat the same food that people
have eaten for a long time staples of
our diets vegetables fruits not spread
couscous that’s all vegetarian and here
in Tunisia you have one of the most
sustainable dietary patterns I’ve seen
but the average Tunisian eats 2 kilos of
meat per month now that means if I were
to pick up any of you from the audience
and drop you in Germany or the US or in
Australia the locals there would
probably not even call you a carnivore
they would call you a flexitarian or a
reducer terian or maybe even a veggie
the label doesn’t matter what matters is
choosing healthy foods now in the West
today the average consumption of meat is
five times as much as it is in Tunisia
in some countries now why is that well
some people will tell you that this is
just an inherent part of Western culture
that since Neanderthal times it’s been
normal for people to eat meat at
breakfast lunch and dinner and to drink
milk well into adulthood but that’s not
entirely accurate in fact this is a very
recent phenomenon it’s happened in the
last 50 to 60 years and it’s been driven
by government subsidies governments in
Western Europe and North America and
Australia New Zealand have financed the
overproduction of meat and milk which
led to the growth of multinational
corporations making profits of this
subsidized input and then who built
lobbies to protect these subsidies and
by extension their profits as well as
marketing departments that pushed new
myths to build a new culture myths such
as eating high amounts of animal
products is natural normal and necessary
this has led to a 700 percent increase
in the number of animals killed over the
last 50 to 55 years and I and this is in
opposition to what most countries and
most cultures have that food from
agriculture has always been accessible
it’s always been available it’s always
been adaptable we’ve built entire
civilizations based on agriculture along
rivers so Greece which I mentioned as
the home of almond milk today has the
fifth highest dairy consumption in the
world three hundred three hundred liters
per person per year that is almost as
high as Switzerland we all associate
with saloon with cows but you associate
Greece or South the south of Italy or
Tunisia with cows and bring that much
milk no it shows that culture is
flexible it’s not static its dynamic it
changes over time as a reflection of
socio-economic context surrounded now
these Western lobbies are now looking
for new markets
and they’ve settled on the Middle East
and North Africa as a place where they
can make a lot of profits now you have
the pushing of what’s called live
exports we’re in an animal at the end of
its life let’s say in Ireland there’s a
cow she’s running oh she’s not giving as
much milk as before she’s not making
enough money anymore they put her on a
ship with the thousand of the cows send
her to be slaughtered in North Africa
now this is very bad for the cow
obviously it’s also bad for the ship
work as it’s bad for consumers here but
most of all it’s bad for local farmers
and pastoralists they can’t compete with
this sort of subsidized industrially
farmed meat now we’ve all heard experts
from the West come and say that or if if
only you acted more like us one day you
could be rich like us – that’s a lie if
they want you to aspire to a Western
level of consumption it’s not because
they’re your friend it’s not because
it’s in your benefit it’s because they
can make money off you because they make
the same products anyway the good news
is there’s a lot of tools in our hands
we for better or worse live in a system
where we are consumers first and
citizens second elections come once
every few years
in some countries they don’t come at all
and when they do people don’t
participate that’s okay because we vote
with our wallets with our pockets with
our money every time we leave the house
every time we eat every time we drink
every time we shop and this gives us
power every meal is a way to send a
message if you want to cut your climate
footprint the best way is to eat a
plant-based diet if you want to stop the
lobby’s the best way is to not give them
any of your money
now Tunisia can lead the way on this you
have a rich history of plant-based food
delicious healthy good for the planet
and it can be celebrated you can resist
these lobbies and be proud of your
kuelen airy heritage and we’re
surrounded by this amazing food every
day try to choose it it makes a big
difference for everyone thank you
[Applause]
[Music] you
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