IPCC Report III - Core elements & critical review
The last part of the IPCC report, which was presented on 04/04/22, was about the causes of climate change and how we can still mitigate the disaster.
Dieser Bericht ist hochpolitisch und stand im vorangegangen, politischen Review unter heftigtem Beschuss. Bezeichnend dafür ist, dass die heutige Präsentation des „Summary for Policymakers“ um mehrere Stunden verschoben wurde, da gemäß der Zeitschrift „The Guardian“ Regierungen in letzter Minute das Wording an vielen Stellen verändern wollten und offensichtlich auch haben.
A previous leak of the report 6 months ago revealed, among other things, that the scientists called for a change in the capitalist growth paradigm and strongly recommended reducing animal agriculture as a key measure.
1. Status assessment of the UN Secretary General
Im Vorwort der Präsentation betonte der UN- Generalsekretär António Guterres, dass der Report, so wörtlich, „eine Auflistung gebrochener Klimaversprechen und Lügnereien von Politikern und Wirtschaftsführern“ sei.

According to this, we are on the way to 3.2 °C warming by the end of the century. This does not even include tipping points and many feedback loops. Emissions should actually fall by 45% in 8 years, but according to current government pledges we will increase them by 14% in this period.
2. Our points of criticism of the presentation and the summary for politicians
- In his address, the UN Secretary General speaks exclusively about fossil industries and the need to switch to renewable energy.
- In the subsequent slide presentation, land use is repeatedly and forcefully identified as the core problem, but its main cause, namely animal agriculture, is not named. Reforestation is presented as an absolutely necessary key solution, but it is not explained where the land for this should come from.
- In the entire presentation, animal agriculture is not mentioned with a single word.
- Also not mentioned are (i) the carbon opportunity costs of animal agriculture, (ii) the issue of short-lived climate forcers, and (iii) methane emissions from animal agriculture (those from fossil industries are explicitly named).
- In the area of individual change, "walking" and "bicycling" are seen as having the greatest potential! A plant-based diet is only mentioned verbally as an additional option.
- Nutrition appears once in the slides, but only the shift to a "balanced, sustainable, healthy" diet. Words like "plant-based," "reduction of animal products," and the like are not used.
- Animal agriculture as a problem and the plant-based food system as a solution are similarly ignored in the crucial written summary for policymakers ("Summary for Policymakers").
3. Our evaluation
From our point of view, lobbying was clearly involved here, because the 2900-page long version explicitly mentions a plant-based diet. This is also seen as having the greatest potential at the demand level (see the following examples).
Example 1: In the following diagram, the report (page SPM-50) compares the annual savings potentials of the energy and agricultural sectors. According to this, a total of approx. 14 Gt CO2e can be saved in the energy sector (top) and approx. 15 Gt CO2e in the agricultural sector (bottom), even without carbon opportunity costs. The sectors are thus at least equally important in a reduction strategy.
Example 2: In the overall report, the change to a plant-based diet is considered to have the greatest disruptive potential (page TS-98).
Example 3: The overall report shows on page 5-98 that governments can force and accelerate a change to a plant-based diet through appropriate measures.
4. Further points of criticism
Wachstumskritik, Kritik am Kapitalismus und Post-Wachstums-Ökonomie wurden in der Präsentation nicht erwähnt und finden sich ebenfalls nicht in der Zusammenfassung für Politiker. Vielmehr werden dort zahlreiche Verweise auf „Opportunities“ gegeben und neue Technologien als Lösungen dargestellt.
In the 2900-page report, however, there are some passages criticizing capitalism, including "degrowth" (page 3-86):
“Conversely, several studies find that only a GDP non-growth/degrowth or post-growth approach allow to reach climate stabilization below 2°C (Hardt and O’Neill 2017; D’Alessandro et al. 2020; Hickel and Kallis 2020; Nieto et al. 2020), or to minimize the risks of reliance on high energy-GDP decoupling, large-scale CDR and large-scale renewable energy deployment (Keyßer and Lenzen 2021).”
5. Bottom line
The scientific facts about the current situation are well known and were merely repeated. A surprise was the clear statements of the UN Secretary General, who called politicians and business leaders deceivers and liars.
Scandalous from our point of view and probably fatal is the obvious lobby pressure on the summary and presentation of the findings. Even if the knowledge exists and has been written down in the 2900-page report, only adequate, uncompromising communication will ultimately lead to the necessary political, economic, systemic and individual changes.
landwirtschaft.jetzt will not be discouraged by this, however, and will continue to provide lobby-free information regarding the immediate need for a plant-based agricultural and food system.