THE comments in The issue (Oxford Mail, November 3) about vegetarianism by Rachel Foster, were a load of nonsense.

Animals do not contribute to global warming. Herbivores eat plants and their by-products are then taken up by those same plants to produce more foliage which, in turn, feeds more animals.

I would guess, that most of the nitrates found in river water comes from fertilisers used on farms to grow vegetables.

If herbivores did have any effect on the planet, we would have been in trouble in the days, long ago, when millions of animals roamed the world in far greater numbers than there are in Africa today.

There is no question that global warming is caused by the burning of fossil fuels (Coal, gas and oil). Global warming only started about 200 years ago and has accelerated ever since, as more and more fuel is burnt. And, it isn’t only in these past 200 years that we have started to eat meat.

The only way to stop global warming is to stop using fossil fuels from today – and who is going to do that?

Humans have been carnivores for millions of years – ever since we became hunter-gatherers, when meat would have been the basis of the diet plus what little could be gathered from nature – like fruits and nuts in season and perhaps some roots and leaves.

Meat is a high energy food which plant material is not. It is only recently that we have switched to eating cereals, which are not natural to us, and therefore don’t always agree with everyone.

There is no question that we eat far too much, resulting in huge quantities of food being carried around the world.

Getting people to eat sensibly and to cut waste would do a great deal to reduce this overuse of oil.

Derrick Holt Headington Oxford