Most employers in Germany provide free lunches in their office canteens, which ought to be meat-reducing “pioneers” , according to the Green party’s manifesto for the September 22 elections.
Speaking to the Bild newspaper, the chair of the Green parliamentary party, Renate Künast, said: “A veggie day is a wonderful day to try to find out how we can feed ourselves without meat and sausages, for once.”
The Greens’ manifesto states: “Per capita, per year, we Germans eat around 60kg of meat. This high meat consumption not only carries health risks, it requires factory farming that takes no account of man, animals [or] the environment.”
According to a survey by Die Welt newspaper, only 12 per cent of Germans are actively try to cut down on their meat intake.
While Spaniards top the polls for meat-eating (81.8kg of meat per person each year) Germans are not far behind on 60kg. Britons eat approximately 57kg of meat each a year.
The Greens are currently third in the polls but could form a coalition government with the other centre-left party, the Social Democrats.