EYE OPENER:CSPI

CSPI stands for the Center of Science in the Public Interest. This organization was founded by Michael Jacobson and its mission is to educate the public on nutrition, food safety, health, alcohol policy, and the environment. The CSPI website provides three different activities for the public to do to see how much their diet impacts the environment. I decided to do the Eating Green Calculator for this eye opener. Here are the results!

My Current Diet

After entering in all the information needed about my diet, the results showed a few different things that caught my eye. First of all, the biggest number by far was the pounds of manure created by the animals I eat (5,704 lbs.!) I didn't know that 3 servings of beef, and 1 serving of chicken and pork a week would amount to that much manure?!

 Otherwise, all the other numbers were relatively low so I was happy about that. Another thing that concerned me was my intake of cholesterol. The percentage of my daily values in cholesterol was 87%. That, I felt, was pretty high. I'm guessing it's probably because whenever I make eggs, I use pretty much the whole carton (since eggs are so small and not filling!). I think my diet is healthier than average but after using this calculator, I definitely see things I can improve on.

Should I Improve My Diet?

After calculating your diet, this activity gives you the chance to improve your diet by clicking on a button and re-typing/lowering the amount of servings you take in every week. So the question is, is my diet bad enough for me (and the environment) that I want to make changes? 

The answer is YES! My cholesterol was really high, so I especially want to lower that part. After re-entering some information about my diet (especially the amount of eggs I eat), the results showed much more comforting numbers. 

Just by decreasing a couple servings of meat, eggs, and milk, I reduced the amount of manure produced by the animals I eat by over 2,000 lbs.!! I also decreased the amount of eggs I eat a week, and believe it or not, my cholesterol dropped by 29%! 

Should I Pledge?

The last thing this activity asks from you is to "pledge to eat less meat and dairy." If you click this button (on the lower left corner), it has a written pledge for you to read. It's basically a promise to yourself to try harder to protect the environment and yourself by eating more fruits, vegetables and whole grains, while eating less meat, and dairy products. I decided to take the pledge because I believe helping the environment and my health at the same time is like killing two birds with one stone (not literally). I don't see why anyone wouldn't want to do this.

Well I hope all of you guys learned more about yourself and the amount of impact eating meat and dairy have on the environment! I sure did. See ya'll in class!