Slowing Climate Change Should've Been Easy
But world leaders failed to take the #1 driver seriously
SOS #137 -- J. Morris Hicks -- (12-21-21)

We have known about the #1 driver of climate change for fifteen years, when the UNFAO reported that 18% of greenhouse gases were driven by animal agriculture -- a number that was 50% larger than ALL sectors of global transportation combined.

Subsequent studies in 2009 and 2019 have put the real number much higher than 18%. No matter whose numbers you believe, it remains a huge driver of climate change that is not being addressed by world leaders.

Due to a host of issues that you can read about in these S.O.S. Memos -- world leaders have tragically failed to take the #1 driver of climate change seriously.

I think that their unforgivable failure must be due to of a combination of two misinformed conclusions:

  • That their constituents would rather die than give up burgers, steaks, chicken and cheese.

  • That human beings must eat lots of animal protein to be healthy.

I sincerely believe that this is why John Kerry, Joe Biden, UN Secretary Guterres, Angela Merkel and practically all world leaders have failed us. Ignorance is also a real possibility.
A little background. Nineteen years ago, between November of 2002 and May of 2003, I learned that animal-based foods were the leading drivers of chronic disease and that they were absolutely terrible for the environment for a host of reasons.

To me, it was like a blinding flash of the obvious that we humans were eating the wrong food for our species. And it has only gotten worse since then -- much worse.

Even after we learned that animal agriculture was the leading driver of climate change, the demand for it all over the world kept growing at a torrid pace. And the topic was hardly even mentioned at COP26.
Back to my saga. Shortly after learning that whole, plant-based foods had the power to reverse most chronic diseases, I sought to leverage my process-improvement consulting skills in helping a few large corporate clients lower their annual cost of healthcare by ten to thirty percent or more.

We're talking about annual savings of hundreds of millions of dollars per year -- simply by coaching their management team in the process of providing financial incentives for moving steadily toward a health-promoting, disease reversing, whole-food, plant-based way of eating among their entire workforce.
Sadly, we never did engage a single client, although we did make it to the #2 guy at one Fortune 100 company. Later, in 2016, we created a "system" for promoting health in corporations. We called it the ARCH system.
You can read about that ARCH system in this one-page document that I prepared about five years ago.
Although we never engaged a corporate client for that system -- in the past three years, we have signed a few dozen healthcare companies as 4Leaf licensees in several countries.

Those clients, such as Doctors for Nutrition in Australia are using our 4Leaf tools to promote better eating habits among their patients. Our newest licensee is a national organization based in Chicago, VillageMD.
Along the way, in my quest to help people everywhere move quickly in the direction of whole food, plant-based eating -- I have authored four books and published over 1500 articles and SOS Memos at: hpjmh.com

And, I am not alone. There are literally thousands of medical doctors, health coaches and organizations like the American College of Lifestyle Medicine who have been promoting disease-reversing, plant-based eating for several decades.

But the tonnage of meat, dairy, eggs and fish consumed by people all over the world -- just keeps on rising.

Although, there are more vegans in the world now than ever before -- there are also more ex-vegans. Clearly, humanity's love affair with animal-based foods is not over and will not likely go away until Mother Nature steps in.

Despite the best efforts of legions of professionals like Campbell, Esselstyn, Ornish, McDougall, Fuhrman and Barnard -- the tide is not turning. The animal-based food production numbers just keep steadily rising.

That, of course, drives more deforestation, more CO2 in the atmosphere, more biodiversity loss and a steadily eroding opportunity to preserve the biosphere that gives us life.
Going forward, slowing climate change will not be easy. It may be impossible!
Assuming that the worldwide consumption of animal-based foods will continue to rise -- that leaves us with just three possibilities as I see it.
The first is that the international media quickly grows a spine and starts telling the world the horrible truth about animal-based foods and their devastating impact on our health and future as a species.

On that front, we're in the process of assembling an International Climate Collaboration and Leadership Coalition to nudge the 4th Estate into action.

The other two possibilities are geo-engineering efforts that seem to offer a fading ray of hope. To have a chance, we must jump on these opportunities quckly:



Both of their presentations at COP26 got favorable responses. Sadly, each of their Glasgow videos have been viewed less than 1,000 times worldwide.

Since COP26, I have reached out to both of them. Here is an excerpt from my:

December 13 note to Dr. Tao who is in Brussels
Good morning Dr. Tao, It’s 6 a.m. here in Vermont, so I guess it is still morning in Brussels.

As an introduction to the general topic I would like to discuss with you, I have provided a link to my latest SOS Memo published last week. Your work is mentioned several times in this SOS — along with links to one or two of your videos.


Dr. Tao and I had our call on December 15 and we talked about the idea of an "International Climate Collaboration and Leadership Coalition" -- aimed at sparking extensive media coverage of this crucial topic.
My December 19 note to Dr. Salter who lives in Scotland.
I sent the message below to Dr. Stephen Salter.

Hello Dr. Salter, Since watching your excellent presentation at the COP26, I have become one of your fans. Just today, I sent Dr. Wadhams the following remarks in an email that was all about our overall dilemma and impending doom. And I asked him a question:

Peter, with the first ice-free Arctic a near certainty within five years, what should we be doing now? Would a massive, fast-track cloud brightening deployment around the world be able to lessen the chances of our demise? Or, at least buy us enough time to get serious about things like reducing animal agriculture?

Peter's response was: "I'd agree that a flat-out marine cloud brightening effort might be the quickest way of slowing the loss of Arctic sea ice."

I forwarded those remarks to Dr. Salter. Sir, could you kindly provide your vision of how that “flat-out" marine cloud brightening effort” might look? 

Less than one hour later, on Sunday afternoon, he sent me a warm note along with seven attachments, all of which are beyond this industrial engineer's ability to fully understand. He wrote:

Dear James, Thank you for your encouraging note. You asked for estimates of the number of spray vessels needed to save the Arctic ice. The attached papers show a way that calculations could be done based on the measured rate of ice loss, the density and its latent heat. 

All the heat for ice melting has come from lower latitudes and could be intercepted from places further south if we can accept some delay and avoid annoying more people. From what I read about reindeer, some cooling would be very welcome.

Naturally, I thanked Dr. Salter and forwarded all of his files to my colleague, Dr. Sailesh Rao, a Stanford PhD, who has the rigorous scientific background necessary to fully understand the extensive set of materials.
So where does that leave us? At the same place we were last week, as we contemplate how we might build a fire under the international media -- on this most crucial of all topics.

I will end this SOS Memo similarly to the way I ended my SOS last week.
The Bottom Line
We have all failed! Those of us who are fully aware of the crises we face -- have failed to make those crises newsworthy enough to be covered constantly by the international media.

We who know the truth about this most important topic, are simply not getting it done when it comes to spreading this urgent message around the world.

While we know that the primary driver of climate change is animal agriculture, no one knows how quickly, and to what extent, it can be dismantled and replaced.
Sadly, I doubt that we will see any urgent attempt to replace the leading driver of climate change -- at least, not until there is a steady stream of international horrors -- after which, the starving masses will be thrilled to eat just about anything.

Hopefully, various geo-engineering solutions like the ones described herein, will be able to provide us with a little more time. Ultimately, animal agriculture will be replaced.

It's just a question of whether we will make the choice on our own -- or Mother Nature will force the issue when she is ready.
Speaking of her, this might be a good time for you to review the Foreword by Mother Nature in our 2020 book, OUTCRY.

Click image>>

Besides what we eat, there are a host of changes we will need to make if we wish to remain permanent residents of this planet.

To our knowledge, this is the only book in the world that covers them all -- in a manner that can be easily understood by most high school students.
Back to the coalition. Believing that there is strength in numbers -- along with more newsworthy stories to tell -- we are still discussing how our coalition might do a better job of telling those stories to the world.

As that coalition comes together, we would hope that all of our geo-engineering team members -- and their colleagues would join the rest of us with regard to promoting the essential shift away from animal agriculture. The sooner that happens, the better.

That shift will be necessary to buy the time needed for the various geo-engineering initiatives to be developed, funded and deployed. The working title of that evolving group is the:

International Climate Collaboration
and Leadership Coalition

Maybe we can get Greta to join our coalition. Stated simply, our mission is to make all of our collective efforts newsworthy enough to attract the rabid attention of the world's Fourth Estate. Let's not keep our crucial work a secret any longer.

Like the old adage, Build it and they will come, we say:

Make it newsworthy and they will cover it!
We owe it to ALL the children of the world to give it our best shot. And we're going to need a ton of never-ending global media to get that done.
*****************************
Want to send a link of this memo to a friend? It is #137 on this list of SOS Memos. Finally, contact me directly at the email address below with any questions you may have. 



J. Morris (Jim) Hicks

*********************
Happy Holidays!!
This super plant-based cookbook is not just for the holidays, it's a jewel that you can use every day of the year as you care for your family's and your plant's health.
The "Big Picture" Data and Info Section
Focusing on what matters. People everywhere are constantly talking about mostly trivial things.

But not my professional colleagues, like Dr. Sailesh Rao and Dr. Peter Wadhams. They are mostly engaged in the never-ending process of figuring out how we can possibly survive as a species on the only planet in the universe capable of keeping us alive.

In order to do that, we must first grasp the all-important "big picture" regarding how we got to where we are in the first place. The various links below will help you do that.

This first one, I just discovered recently, a free YouTube video by Michael Dowd, a non-scientific researcher like me who does a very fine job of explaining the many facets of the obstacles standing between us and survival as a species.

Dowd has a pretty good handle on most things, but he seems to be unaware of the simple weapon that we can all use to fight the leading driver of climate change. Our forks.

That said, he does a terrific job of describing our ever-worsening dilemma. Click the link below to view this very informative 33-minute video, entitled:

This next item is a free 83-minute documentary film that is all about the findings that were documented in Dr. Stephen Emmott's 2013 book. TEN BILLION.
This powerful film will certainly help more people grasp that all-important "big picture." I will continue sharing this link in my weekly SOS Memos >>>>>>
More Data re Leading Driver of Climate Change.

Beginning in September of 2021, I have been including links to world-changing scientific information that thought leaders everywhere should read and and share with others.

What can you do? For starters, you can buy the new documentary -- Eating our way to Extinction for $6 on Netflix -- and watch it often with your friends and family.

Also, you can:

  • Share this SOS Memo with everyone you know.
  • Get an e-copy of OUTCRY. Visit Outcry page on Amazon and get a much bigger understanding of the situation in which all humans find ourselves.
  • Inform all the young people in your world that you are deadly serious about this topic. Urge them to read these SOS Memos and our latest book, OUTCRY.
  • Completely stop eating meat, dairy, eggs and fish today and tell everyone why you are taking such a "radical" step. You're doing it for the innocent children of the world.

  • As noted above, do yourself a favor and make sure that your plant-based meals of the future consist of whole plants -- the kinds of foods that prevent or reverse most chronic diseases AND enable your body to effortlessly seek its optimal weight.
A final word. Hopefully, the kind of crucially serious situations expressed in these SOS Memos will soon replace the trivial topics that dominate a ridiculously large percentage of all of the conversations in the world.

We must all start talking much more about what's really important. That is , we must start doing everything possible to maximize the chances of a meaningful and pleasant life ahead for the young people of the world.

I volunteer to help you do that. For Free. Invite me to collaborate with you and your group via Zoom. To help you jump-start that all-important conversation, I will be happy to present and discuss this topic at length. Here's an advance link to my standard presentation: 62 slides.

“Food, protein, pandemics and the future of humanity” This is the latest title slide that I am currently using for those kinds of sessions:
The image above is a clue regarding the essence of my "family game plan" that is revealed only in my talks. I do not put that in writing.

Want to share some of my SOS Memos with others? Visit my SOS Memos page where the most recent ones are listed first.

Finally, I am confident that if a few million people carefully read and digested OUTCRY, that there might at least be a more robust conversation taking place about our grossly unsustainable way of living in the developed world -- and what it will take to get us focused on maximizing our chances of survival as a species.

To be sure, we must do a lot more than change what we eat -- and OUTCRY helps explain the "why" and the "how" of that proposition. 

To my knowledge, OUTCRY remains the only book ever published that features an envisioned, totally-green, ultra-sustainable, super-desirable, future way of living for humans -- along with ideas for how we might get there as quickly as possible.


Regarding the free Zoom conferences with your group, Send me an email and let's get started.
Our book, for a host of environmental reasons, is only available as an e-book on Amazon. As such, it contains hyperlinks to hundreds of references and videos, is less expensive, does not kill any trees and does not have to be manufactured and delivered. 

The links below to earlier SOS Memos will help you understand how these ideas unfolded since 2018.
You can join my mailing list and/or find all of my previous postings by visiting the SOS Memos page on my website. 
As always, I am just trying to help spark the all-important "conversation" about what is needed. By sharing a vision of what I believe is possible, I hope to influence others to think bigger, faster, better and bolder. 

You will find that there aren't many books that cover both the health of your body and the health of your planet. This is one of them -- a book that my son Jason assisted me in writing. It was published ten years ago this month.
Order e-book on Amazon
What else can you do to help? Two things:

1. Live as greenly as possible while doing all that you can to raise the awareness of "big picture" solutions that are crucially necessary for saving our civilization.

2. Share this BSB and my "Mama Ain't Happy" BSB with prominent journalists, thought leaders and/or elected officials whom you respect. They need to learn a lot more about the many reasons why Mama ain't happy.

Promoting health, hope and harmony on planet Earth
Want to see earlier SOS Memos? Click here
If you got this blog from a friend or found it on our website and want to receive more of these Bite-Size Blogs? Join Our Mailing List

Want to get started nurturing your own health and the health of our planet? Take our survey at 4leafsurvey.com
Click here to learn more about this free online dietary assessment tool.