Protesters turn attention from 4x4s to meat-eating

US activists are turning their fire from four-wheel drives and focusing on meat eating as the greater culprit in global warming.

To get the point across, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, Peta, are preparing a Hummer car with a driver wearing a chicken suit and banner proclaiming meat as the main cause of global warming. They plan to park it near a White House-sponsored climate forum in Washington in September.

As proof, they cite a 2006 UN report, which concluded that raising animals for food generates more greenhouse gases than all the cars, trucks, planes and ships in the world combined. The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation report concluded that the livestock business generates more greenhouse gas emissions – 18 per cent as measured in CO2 equivalent which is greater than that produced by all other forms of transportation.

Peta will then take the truck to the headquarters of various environmental groups to force them to accept that raising animals for meat causes more global warming than all the 4x4s that clog US roads.

The Humane Society is also running ads in the same vein. They show a car key and a fork and ask. "Which one of these contributes more to global warming?" "It's not the one that starts a car," they answer.