The Push to Cut Meat & Plant More Trees— Is This Really About Climate, or Something Else?

The UK’s Climate Change Committee (CCC) has once again set its sights on farming, calling for reduced meat production, more plant-based diets, and converting farmland into forests to reach net zero

On paper, it sounds like a reasonable plan—eat less meat, plant more trees, save the planet. But let’s take a step back and actually look at what’s happening here.

I’m not against planting more trees—I think that’s a great idea in the right places. But even in this report, they admit we can’t plant trees fast enough to offset emissions. So why is the focus on trees and reducing livestock instead of looking at the real problem: industrial farming, mono-cropping, and the destruction of natural ecosystems? We don’t live in harmony with nature anymore and that is part of the issue

Meat as the Scapegoat for Climate Change

It’s becoming more obvious that meat is being used as a scapegoat for the environmental damage caused by the entire industrial food system. The issue isn’t with cattle or sheep themselves—it’s with how we farm at scale.

Regenerative farming has proven that properly managed livestock can restore soil health and capture carbon.

Yet, this isn’t the model that’s being pushed. Instead, there’s a focus on Monocroping, high-yield plant farming, which destroys topsoil, relies on synthetic fertilisers, and contributes to biodiversity loss.

If the UK cuts meat production by 20%, what happens next?

We import more meat from countries with worse farming standards, while farmland here is converted into something else—whether that’s tree-planting projects, solar farms, or eventually, housing developments.

If the real goal was to reduce emissions, we’d be supporting small-scale, multi-species regenerative farming, not encouraging more dependency on imported food and industrial plant agriculture. The plant based idea seems all well and good, however they are not talking about high production market gardens, these will be monocrops or vertical/hydro farming.

The Plant-Based Narrative & My Own Health Experience

I used to believe in the plant-based diet narrative. I was fully vegan, I believed in every part of it and I did it properly looking daily at what we were eating making sure we were reaching our nutrient goals, working with professionals —whole foods, supplements, the works. And yet, my health declined. Arthritis, brain fog, muscle stiffness, anxiety—it wasn’t just me, but my husband and kids too.

Doctors told me nothing was medically wrong, just that I was getting older, stressed, or maybe needed to try something different. Eventually, we added meat back in, and the improvements were instant. And when we moved to a more carnivore-based diet, everything improved even more.

This isn’t just our experience—many people report similar improvements. But you don’t hear about that because it doesn’t fit the narrative. Instead, meat is vilified, and we’re told lab-grown protein and mass-produced vegetables are the future. Now I don’t believe we should be on one extreme or the other when it comes to diet, fully Carnivore isn’t true to our nature either but we should be meat and animal fat as a key aspect of our diets with fruits and vegetables as they are available seasonally and in lower quantity than the food guide would have you believe.

Are Humans Designed to Eat a Plant-Based Diet?

Humans are not herbivores. We don’t have the digestive system of cows, deer, or gorillas. Instead, we have digestive systems similar to omnivores and carnivores, with:

• A highly acidic stomach (pH of 1-2) designed for breaking down animal proteins and killing bacteria commonly found in meat
  

• A shorter digestive tract compared to herbivores, which helps us process
  meat more efficiently while avoiding plant toxins.
• Enzymes like pepsin and lipase which are specifically geared toward digesting meat and animal fats.

Historical and anthropological evidence suggests that meat consumption was a key factor in human evolution.

A Harvard study (2016) concluded that eating cooked meat and animal fats led to brain expansion in early humans. Meat provided a dense source of calories and essential nutrients like B12, iron, and DHA—nutrients that are hard to obtain in
meaningful amounts from plants alone.

This aligns with findings that vegan and vegetarian diets may lack key nutrients for brain function—potentially leading to cognitive decline over time.

Nutrient Deficiencies in Plant-Based Diets

• Vitamin B12 

  Found almost exclusively in animal foods.

  • B12 is crucial for nerve function and brain health.
  • Deficiency symptoms: Fatigue, memory issues, depression, nerve damage.
  • Studies show long-term vegans are at risk for irreversible neurological damage without supplementation.
    
    
• Choline 

  Essential for brain development and memory.

  • Primarily found in eggs, liver, and red meat.
  • Deficiency linked to cognitive decline and increased risk of neurological diseases
    
    
• Omega 3's 

  Critical for brain function.

  • Found in fish, eggs, and grass-fed meats—plant-based ALA (from flax or
    walnuts) is not easily converted into the necessary forms.
  • Low omega-3 levels are linked to depression, ADHD, and cognitive decline.
    
    
• Heme Iron 
  Only found in animal foods, far more absorbable than non-heme iron from
  plants.
  • Iron is critical for oxygen transport, energy, and cognitive function.
  • Studies show vegetarians & vegans are at higher risk of anemia due to poor iron absorption.

Bioavailability of Nutrients Even when plant-based diets provide some nutrients, our bodies absorb them less efficiently than those from animal products.

Example:

• Spinach has iron, but also oxalates, which block absorption.
• Lentils have protein, but also lectins, which impair digestion.

Compare that to beef, which provides highly absorbable heme iron, complete protein, and B12 with no anti-nutrients.

Now, don’t get me wrong—I know vegans can take supplements to replace the nutrients they miss out on. I took them myself, and my levels were always fine on paper.

But that’s the thing—just because something works in theory doesn’t mean it works the same way in practice.

The human body is incredibly complex, and we still don’t fully understand how it absorbs and utilizes nutrients. Supplements can provide what’s missing, but they’re not absorbed in the same way as real food. The body recognizes and processes nutrients from whole foods differently than isolated compounds in a pill.

This ties into a bigger issue—hydroponic farming. Sure, a plant can grow in water as long as you add the right nutrients to the system. It looks like a normal plant, it tastes
much the same, but studies have shown that hydroponically grown vegetables don’t have the same nutritional profile as those grown in soil. There’s something missing.

And that’s the problem—just because we can do something doesn’t mean we should.

• Just because a plant can grow in water doesn’t mean it should.
• Just because meat can be engineered in a lab doesn’t mean it should.
• Just because we can raise cattle in industrial feedlots or grow endless monocropped fields of lettuce doesn’t mean we should.

Nature has already given us the blueprint for how food is meant to grow, how animals are meant to live, and how humans are meant to eat. The further we move away from
that, the more problems we create.

Are We Being Pushed Into a More Controllable Food System?

One of my biggest concerns with this shift away from locally produced, whole animal foods is that it’s pushing us towards a highly centralised,
industrialised food system—one that isn’t controlled by small farmers, but by corporations and policymakers.

• Factory-farmed plant-based food is more profitable than regenerative farming, and that’s the real issue.

Historically, food control has always been a form of power. For example:

• Soviet Union (1932-33)

  The forced collectivisation of farms led to engineered famine, where millions starved due to government-controlled food
  systems. 

   

• World War II Rationing: 

  After the war ended, the UK continued food rationing, not because of
  shortages, but so we could send food to other countries in need. It was
  seen as an effort to help rebuild.

  But looking at where we are now, do you think we’d even have that
  ability today? The way our food system works now, we’d struggle to
  feed ourselves, let alone send food elsewhere.
  

• China’s Four Pests Campaign (1958) In an effort to "modernise" food production, this campaign which aimed to remove pests from crops led to mass starvation by disrupting the natural balance of farming

If history has shown us one thing, it’s that when governments and corporations control food, they control people. When we work against nature things
start to fail, however if done right it can be something that benefits everyone. 

What Happens to the Land?

The CCC’s recommendation to cut meat production and repurpose land raises another question: what happens to all that unused farmland?

Farmers might be encouraged to sell their land for tree-planting schemes, thinking they’re doing something positive for the environment.

But when the trees aren’t growing fast enough to offset emissions (which they admit in the report), what happens next?

Those lands suddenly become ideal for development. Maybe eco- housing estates, solar farms, or something else entirely.

Call me cynical, but it feels like a long-winded way to make farmland disappear under the guise of climate solutions.

The Real Answer: Regenerative Farming & Local Food Systems

Here's the thing, we don't need to convert farmland into forests to "fix" climate change we need to fix the way we farm (and live)

• Regenerative agriculture, with livestock integrated into the system, builds soil health, captures carbon, and increases biodiversity.
  
  
• Market gardens, rotational grazing, and multi-species farming can produce enough food to feed the UK while restoring the land.
  
  
• If we focused on nose-to-tail eating, reducing waste, and eating seasonally, we wouldn’t need as much land to produce food in the first place.

But instead of supporting these solutions, we’re being told to cut livestock numbers, import more food, and rely on highly processed, industrial-scale plant agriculture. Why? Because that’s where the money is. After all they are pushing meat alternatives more than eating a bowl of salad.

Final Thoughts: Is This Really About Climate, or Something Else?

I’m not saying climate change isn’t a real thing, or that we shouldn’t be making efforts to reduce environmental impact. But I don’t believe the answer is reducing livestock, importing more food, and further centralising the food system under the control of corporations.

The way I see it, this push is less about climate, and more about shifting power away from local farmers and food producers.

So where do we go from here?

• Eat local, eat seasonally, eat nose-to-tail.
  
  
• Support regenerative farms and butchers instead of supermarket meat.
  
  
• Question why these policies are being pushed and who actually benefits from them.

If we don’t start paying attention, we’re going to wake up one day and realize we no longer have a choice in how we eat.

💬 What do you think? Is the push to cut meat really about climate, or is there more to it?