Quezon City Mayor Herbert Bautista is supporting a city council resolution urging restaurants in QC to join QC Hall’s promotion of Meatless Mondays or consumption of vegetables and other meatless options every Monday.
The council resolution calls for a “Luntiang Lunes, QC’s version of a Meatless Monday advocacy in the United States , in a bid to improve the nutritional requirements of city residents.
The resolution, principally authored by Councilor Jessica Castelo Daza, who is a doctor by profession, noted that there’s a need to strengthen food security and minimize environmental problems attributed to livestock production.
For Councilor Daza, if every QC resident would leave out meat for one day a week in just one year, this could mean a significant reduction in one’s carbon footprint and in the saving of precious resources like trees, water and fossil fuel. “It is like taking 12,800 cars off the road or having 107 million trees planted and grown for 10 years,” said Councilor Daza.
The QC government started its advocacy of promoting Meatless Monday or “Luntiang Lunes” with the approval of Resolution SP-5596 in 2012, which enjoins all QC Hall employees, public schools and barangays to consume vegetables and other meatless options every Monday.
According to Councilor Daza, studies have already shown that Filipinos are one of the lowest per capita consumers of vegetables in the world with only 39 kgs per year.
Based on a report by the American Dietetic Association, reduced meat consumption decreases the risk of various health problems, thus, going meatless even for just one week may reduce one’s risk of chronic degenerative diseases and conditions, including obesity, hypertension, diabetes and some types of cancer.
Meatless Monday is a global health and environmental awareness campaign launched in John Hopkins University and Columbia University Schools of Public Health in 2003.(Maureen Quiñones, PAISO)
Posted By: Edrillan Pasion
