Several participants of the Boao Forum for Asia annual conference 2008 （BFA）Sunday called on the public to reduce meat consumption in order to cut down carbon dioxide emission.

Gerard Kleisterlee, chairman and chief executive officer of Royal Philips Electronics Group, urged the public to eat less meat and take part in the green action of environmental protection at a plenary session of BFA entitled “Climate change: change business, change us.”

According to statistics, he said, the amount of carbon dioxide emission of stock raising is far more than that of automobile industry. So he suggested people cut down meat consumption to reduce the carbon dioxide emission.

Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change of the United Nations and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate in 2007, agreed with him, adding that “l(fā)ess food , less meat, the healthier, the longer life span.”

At the session, Khalid Malik, UN Coordinator for China, expressed the same opinion. He said that eating less meat is not only a healthier living style, but also conducive to the protection of the environment.

Fresh research published in New Scientist last month suggested that the output of one kilogram of beef will result in 36-kilogram emission of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, which is equivalent to the amount of gases emission of 155-kilometer car-driving.

The BFA, established in 2001, served as a platform for high-level interaction between political, commercial and academic dignitaries from Asia and other parts of the world.

More than 1,700 influential politicians, business leaders, intellectuals and journalists from around the globe were currently in China's southern Hainan Province for the 2008 Boao Forum for Asia (BFA) annual conference. It runs from April 11 to 13.

(Xinhua News Agency April 14, 2008)