Veganism. How do people react to this trend?

You have most likely seen or heard someone make fun of vegans in the recent years. This is a topic we are going to dive a bit deeper into. The amount of people following a vegan diet is steadily increasing and it also seems that the amount of people making fun of vegans is decreasing. And this makes sense, because the amount of people transferring to a vegan diet is massive. Which also means that the mindset towards vegans is switching.

Veganism is at al all time high, but is it a fad or is it becoming the new norm?

Recent studies have shown that a vegan diet is an increasingly popular diet. One of the reasons why this diet is gaining popularity is because of the amount of information that now has become easier to access for people is now far greater then ever. This makes starting a vegan diet way more accessible for the majority of people. In the past there has already been a lot of information about the effects of a vegan diet, but it was not as easy to get to this information as it is now.

Because of the vegan trend a lot of individuals and companies started blogs, websites and books on how to follow a stable vegan diet. The amount of plant based entities rose 600% in the last decade in the US and 350% in the UK (Chiorando, 2019). This massive rise of the vegan industry (especially on social media) brought a lot of business opportunities for companies you would not expect this of. My research has shown that there is a tea company that boosts their website traffic by using #vegan to expose their product. Tea has never been marketed before as a vegan product. Because there was never a need for this.

But this is a smart way to profit from a growing market. Tea has always been vegan, but all of the sudden there is a need arising for producers and consumers that even obvious vegan products are starting to be labelled “vegan”. In conclusion: the growth of the vegan industry creates a lot of business opportunities both in the vegan industry as well as outside of the industry. But what are people’s motivation to start a vegan diet? check it out in the image below!

Why are there still people with negative attitudes towards veganism?

Unfortunately it is not possible for the whole world to turn vegan , because this would save the world a lot of food resources and would decrease the amount of pollution that is now being emitted. But the majority of people that are not eating vegan have multiple reasons. The taste of meat for example. They don’t want to cut meat out of their diet because it tastes too good. Another reason that is used a lot is preparation time. it takes longer to cook a vegan meal. (McCormick, 2020)

Why you should consider becoming vegan

Meat has a much higher “energy footprint” than any other food. It takes 75 times more energy to produce meat than corn. And it takes an area of vegetation 7 times the size of the EU to produce food for the cattle and other livestock animals in Europe (Theworldcounts, 2020).

This higher energy use also ensures more pollution. Livestock emissions make up anywhere between 14.5 and 18 percent of total global greenhouse gas emissions. The global transportation sector is responsible for 14 percent of emissions. By looking at these numbers it is very clear that livestock is a massive emitter of pollution. (Cormier, 2020)

References

Chiorando, m. (2019). Veganism Skyrockets by 600% In America To 6% Of Population, Claims Report. Retrieved 14 January 2020, from https://www.plantbasednews.org/culture/veganism-skyrockets-by-600-in-america-over-3-years-to-6-of-population

Theworldcounts. (2020). Retrieved 16 January 2020, from https://www.theworldcounts.com/counters/world_food_consumption_statistics/world_meat_consumption_statistics

McCormick, B. (2020). Top 5 Reasons People Don’t Stay Vegan for Life. Retrieved 16 January 2020, from https://vomadlife.com/blogs/news/top-5-reasons-people-dont-stay-vegan-for-life

Cormier, J. (2020). Which Is Worse for the Planet: Beef or Cars?. Retrieved 17 January 2020, from https://www.ecowatch.com/which-is-worse-for-the-planet-beef-or-cars-1919932136.html