This word, or term, ‘DRAWDOWN’ is, I think going to become more and more used by people when they are talking about climate change.

You might not know what it is. Drawdown is what humans and animals need to happen if we are going to keep the world beautiful, with the right temperatures for a good life, and if we want to keep the air clean. Drawdown is the point in the future when the amount of horrible greenhouse gases in the atmosphere stops increasing and then starts to go down.

At the moment humans are sending up more and more greenhouse gases, all sorts of smelly gases and also gases that don’t smell but that are all not good for climate change. These gases join together to make a big heavy blanket of gas around the world. These gases make our world hotter. It may be cold where you live in the winter, but all over the world temperatures are rising. I don’t need to tell you this. You’ve heard about it.

But don’t panic. Things can be alright again if we all make an effort to help Drawdown happen.

Lots of people in the world see that what we have to do is a few very important things. We need to slow down the greenhouse gases that we send up, so send up much, much less of them. We also need to start sucking the bad gases out of the atmosphere too. We all want the world to have fresh air. From the birds and the bees and the bugs to the bears and the bean. The human beans. This butterfly agrees. Press him to see his answer. In butterfly language a spin means, ‘yes’.

So how do we get Drawdown?

The amazing thing is that you can help it happen. Every person in the world can do something to help it happen.

There are an impressive bunch of world class scientists who have concentrated their brilliant minds on what humans can do to get Drawdown.

These scientists have found that the TOP BAD CULPRIT that is bad for greenhouse gases is REFRIGERATION. I don’t think you or I can do much about this.

But in SECOND PLACE, the two joint BAD CULPRITS are FOOD WASTE and ANIMAL AGRICULTURE… the cow below is hopping mad about it (you need to click him to see)

Did you know that in America people waste almost half of all the food they buy because it goes off, because they’ve bought too much of it? British people (I come from Britain) waste a lot too. And this waste means that a whole load of gases that came out of making that food, go whizzing up into the air that didn’t need to go up at all because the food just went in the bin! So waste is a REALLY big thing every single person can get a grip on and make an effort with. If every family tried their best this would make a HUGE difference to greenhouse gases. And the world would have less gases going up into the air.

ANIMAL AGRICULTURE is the other joint SECOND PLACE baddie. And this is another thing that every family and person can do something about. Animal agriculture is all the farming to do with food that we eat that comes from animals. So, meat and dairy, that’s milk that makes cheese, cream and butter, oh, and eggs. The animal that puts most gases into the air is the cow. It is more damaging than chickens or pigs, because they don’t burp like these cows. There are 1.5 billion cows on the planet, sending up a very big bad gas called METHANE. It comes from their BURPS. And so it makes sense that humans should slow down or stop this METHANE going into the air. Humans will have to dramatically slow down how many cows they have on the earth. They can do this by slowing down how much cow meat they eat, how much milk they drink, how much butter or cream they have. Cows really are not good for the planet. A few are fine. But 1.5 BILLION?!?! No way.

The other exciting thing that can make DRAWDOWN happen is this. The animals that humans eat and use for food take up a HUGE amount of land. This land isn’t for them to live on. Oh no. Most of these animals don’t have a happy time living in lovely fields, no the land is used to grow the food that the animals eat.

IF, just say IF humans didn’t need animals to eat at all, and all this land was freed up, there would be an area as big as America and Brazil free to grow other things on. Now, of course not everyone is going to stop eating animal meat and dairy and milk, but if everyone made a bit of an effort we could certainly free up a lot of this land. And what would we use it for?

WELL, this is the really exciting bit. It could be used to grow forests again. You know those lovely forests that have been cut down over the years to clear the land to grow food for the animals to eat? Well, they could be planted up as forests again.

And forests, like the rainforests are, as you know, really REALLY good because they suck the bad gases out of the air, and lock them up in the soil. They put them in prison in the good soil. The soil doesn’t mind. The forests and the soil are going to help save us. But we need to plant trees and plants.

The idea is, stop eating meat, and foods that are made from animals, or at least SLOW DOWN, then we can stop using land for growing food for the animals that humans eat. Then all those empty fields can have the forests and lovely big green gas hoovering plants put in them. And BINGO, we will be on our way to getting DRAWDOWN!

It’s actually very easy. It just needs human beings to change their habits.