A primary reason for following a plant-based diet is the impact of meat, dairy and fishing production on wildlife.
In a 2015 research paper on biodiversity conservation [1], the authors show that livestock production is the single largest driver of habitat loss
In a 2020 article, UK on course to miss most biodiversity targets [2], Natalie Bennett says, “Not only are we running out of time to tackle the climate emergency, there is also increasingly little time left to reverse this catastrophic decline in nature and wildlife.”
In Meat of the Matter [3] George Monbiot notes that “Replacing the meat in our diets with soya spectacularly reduces the land area required per kilo of protein: by 70% in the case of chicken, 89% in the case of pork, and 97% in the case of beef. One study suggests that if we were all to switch to a plant-based diet, 15 million hectares of land in Britain currently used for farming could be returned to nature”
[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0048969715303697
[2] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/15/uk-miss-most-biodiversity-targets-conservation
[3] https://www.monbiot.com/2017/10/06/the-meat-of-the-matter
