How Far Does Your Thanksgiving Turkey Travel?

November 2013

How Far Does Your Thanksgiving Turkey Travel?

Link: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/imageo/2013/11/26/winter-storm-boreas/#.UpkxB8RDtsJ

     Each year millions of American families come together and feast upon the traditional dinner - a roasted turkey. From an environmental standpoint, it takes 14 units of fossil fuel to produce a serving of turkey compared to the 4:1 ratio for chicken and a 26:1 ratio for eggs (Cornell University).
     "The environmental impact of a turkey or any animal can be calculated two ways: the resources that went into raising it and the resources used to transport it to market." The production of the turkey makes up about 83 percent of the bird’s impact according to Columbia University’s Earth Institute. You can reduce the number of miles the turkey travels to the platter by purchasing from a local vendor, but this only reduces a small portion of emissions associated with the turkey. Therefore, what the individual farmer does in raising the bird has a greater impact than the buyer's decision to purchase locally.