`Roo in the stew ... beef and lamb will become to expensive for many households as climate change takes hold, the Garnaut report predicts.
Climate change will force big changes in diet
Lamb, beef will be much more expensive
Fuel prices will soar
KANGAROO meat could become the staple diet for some households forced to give beef and lamb the chop to survive climate change.
And families will be shocked by a dramatic rise in electricity prices of up to $450 a year as the cost of climate change hits home.
That was the warning by the Rudd Government`s top climate change adviser Ross Garnaut, who in releasing his report yesterday said Australians needed to prepare for a substantial rise in electricity and gas, food and petrol costs.
If the Federal Government adopts Professor Garnaut`s proposal to start an emissions trading scheme in 2010 with ambitious emissions targets, households will feel the pinch.
Based on a carbon price of $30 a tonne, consumer and environment experts predict NSW and ACT households can expect:
* ELECTRICITY bills to rise by between 21 and 37 per cent, or between $240 and $444 a year;
* GAS prices to jump 11 per cent or $15 a year;
* PETROL prices to soar 8c a litre, adding an average $190 to the yearly fuel bill;
* DIESEL and LPG to rise $170 a year; and
* THE price of beef and lamb to soar to a point where only wealthy households can afford it.
With food prices to rise, Professor Garnaut predicts households will "move away" from beef and lamb, "towards less emissions-intensive meat, such as chicken and pork".
Citing research, he said kangaroo meat "could again become important".
He said that if a way to reduce methane emissions from livestock wasn`t found, seven million cattle and 36 million sheep could be replaced by 175 million farmed kangaroos.
It is now up to the Government to decide what emissions target to set.
Professor Garnaut said Australia should "express willingness" to reduce emissions from 2000 levels by 25 per cent by 2020, and by 90 per cent by 2050.
"It`s not an easy solution for Australia or the rest of the world," Professor Garnaut said.
"But there`s a chance, just a chance, that humanity will deal with this matter in a way that future generations judge to be satisfactory.
"If we fail ... the failure of our generation will haunt humanity until the end of time."
`Roo in the stew ... beef and lamb will become to expensive for many households as climate change takes hold, the Garnaut report predicts.
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Peter T of Brisbane that comment does nothing but advertise your ignorance on the issue. There is nothing natural about the way we farm cattle and sheep in Australia. First of all they should not even be on this continent and second of all your lovely fat steak that you eat has probably been grain or corn fed at some point to fatten the animal up. Believe it or not the digestive system of cows and sheep (ruminants) is designed to digest one thing only, can you guess what that is... say it with me G-R-A-S-S. Feeding anything but gives them, you guessed it, flatulence. The cost of meat in Australia is way too low to appropriately account for all the environmental damage wrought by grazing and BTW my grandparents graze about 500 head of cattle amd I've witnessed first hand the damage these animals do.
Posted by: shane of bris 8:01am today
Peter T, since when has cattle ranching and sheep farming been a natural process ?Truth is these large ruminant mammals produce large amounts of methane - and methane is 25 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than the CO2 that is emitted from burning fossil fuels.Levels of methane in the atmosphere have more than doubled compared to historic levels - your thesis that the world can look after itself seems to be wilting under the influence of over 6.5 billion people and rapidly industrialisation of china and india.FYI at the turn of the last century world population was only around 1.6 billion.Obviously the earth does not have an infinite carrying capacity.However your contention than "nature has always compensated for changes we have made" is true in a sense - proof that nature is "compensating" is being shown by altering climate patterns - people call it climate change, which the data suggests will be characterised by global warming.This is not a pie in the sky phenomenon - forget the fancy modelled predictions, look at the data already collected - glaciers melting, ice sheets retreating - its happening right now.
Posted by: Ben D of Brisbane 8:01am today
Nuclear power costs money, and as we can see the bad economic management of NSW and now the Fed Gov they'll need these increases for "carbon emissions" to help them fund the nuclear power.. people can't see they want to charge you more and when you are happy to pay it they will then introduce the cleaner nuclear power but keep the carbon prices!We need to stand up for our rights people, have a say..
Posted by: Bring on Nuclear of sydney 7:58am today
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