UNEP's International Panel for Sustainable Resource Management released a report on June 2nd, 2010 titled, "Assessing the Environmental Impacts of Consumption and Production: Priority, Products and Materials." This report stated that a global shift toward a vegan diet is vital to save the world from hunger, fuel poverty and the worst impacts of global climate change. Western tastes for diets rich in meat and dairy products are unsustainable in a world with populations moving towards 9.1 billion people by 2050. It says: "Impacts from agriculture are expected to increase substantially due to population growth increasing consumption of animal products. Unlike fossil fuels, it is difficult to look for alternatives: people have to eat. A substantial reduction of impacts would only be possible with a substantial worldwide diet change, away from animal products." Professor Edgar Hertwich, the lead author of the report, said: "Animal products cause more damage than [producing] construction minerals such as sand or cement, plastics or metals. Biomass and crops for animals are as damaging as [burning] fossil fuels." Ernst von Weizsaecker, an environmental scientist who co-chaired the panel, said: "Rising affluence is triggering a shift in diets towards meat and dairy products - livestock now consumes much of the world's crops and by inference a great deal of freshwater, fertilisers and pesticides."
