The True Animal Protein Price (TAPP) Coalition gave comments at the 2024 U.N. Climate Change (COP29) Conference Monday urging countries to begin taxing meat.
The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) issued a report Friday weighing the pros and cons of a tax on certain foods, including meat. TAPP Coalition raised the topic at COP29 this week, suggesting that countries should tax meat and subsidize vegetables while describing the U.S. and some Western nations as a “laggard” relative to other U.N. countries when it comes to its food pricing policies.
“We believe that COP29 and UNFCCC [United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change] conferences thereafter can only be successful if the closing statement includes transitioning away from animal protein overconsumption according to national or global dietary guidelines by implementing greenhouse gas emission pricing mechanisms in agri-food systems,” Willem Branten, public affairs and policy officer at TAPP, said at the conference this week. “We urge the EU Commission, the OECD and China to lead the way towards these harmonized pricing mechanisms.”
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TAPP also urged member countries to subsidize vegetables and provided an “update” on the “UN Member State frontrunners and laggards of food pricing climate policies,” accusing the U.S., Australia, Canada and the UK of falling behind in their efforts to implement “dietary shifts,” while lauding Switzerland, Denmark and the EU Commission for their efforts.
COP29 kicked off Monday in Baku, Azerbaijan — a Caucasian petrostate that nonprofit Amnesty International accused of violating international humanitarian law by implementing a blockade in 2022 that created food shortages in Armenia. A study published in the journal Communications Earth and Environment discovered an increase in private jet usage associated with U.N. climate summits like COP.
President Joe Biden decided not to attend the event this year, instead sending a delegation of senior energy officials such as White House adviser John Podesta and Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm in his stead. Afghanistan, meanwhile, has sent representatives to the event for the first time since the Taliban returned to power in 2021.
When asked if TAPP, “believe[d] countries should interfere with their citizens’ dietary preferences,” the organization told the Daily Caller News Foundation, “yes we do. FAO and World Bank and scientists say this is the only way to realize Paris Climate Agreement goals in the agri-food sector.” The coalition also confirmed its support for the taxation of animal meat products and the subsidization of vegetables.
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