The quality of the meat in Berlin's canteens is low. The meals are more expensive and the serving sizes are smaller. Even before this move I saw no reason to eat anything with meat there. BTW: There is already a vegetarian/vegan canteen at the Freie Universität, it's called "Veggie No 1" [1].<p>[1] <a href="https://www.stw.berlin/en/dining-facilities/mensa-fu-veggie-i.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.stw.berlin/en/dining-facilities/mensa-fu-veggie-...</a>
Wait, what? "Almost meat-free" meaning "there's always meat on the menu"? At the same prices?<p>I'm asking because Swiss universities are getting flak for <i>gasp</i> charging more for dishes containing meat (compared to vegetarian dishes) [0] and going completely meat-free [1]<p>[0] <a href="https://www.watson.ch/schweiz/z%C3%BCrich/357579907-fleisch-menue-teurer-als-vegi-universitaet-zuerich-erhoeht-mensa-preise" rel="nofollow">https://www.watson.ch/schweiz/z%C3%BCrich/357579907-fleisch-...</a><p>[1] <a href="https://www.unilu.ch/news/der-zfv-betreibt-neu-die-uniph-mensa-6013/" rel="nofollow">https://www.unilu.ch/news/der-zfv-betreibt-neu-die-uniph-men...</a>
Dairy is almost as bad as beef & lamb in terms of carbon footprint [1][2] - see the charts. It'd make a lot more sense to use chicken or pork.<p>[1] <a href="https://ourworldindata.org/food-choice-vs-eating-local" rel="nofollow">https://ourworldindata.org/food-choice-vs-eating-local</a>
[2] <a href="https://ourworldindata.org/environmental-impacts-of-food?country=#carbon-footprint-of-food-products" rel="nofollow">https://ourworldindata.org/environmental-impacts-of-food?cou...</a>
In the long run, making meat less appealing to consumers and encouraging more vegetarian recipes is a good way to reduce emissions. A tax on meat wouldn't surprise me.<p>However, I see this as a clear sign that the next generation will bear the brunt of the environmental sacrifices as we keep indulging in our unsustainable habits.
The sorry state of the news business can be directly measured by articles about canteen food in Berlins universities.<p>As with a lot of things Berlin does, this might be about saving money. The UK did that too, they replaced meat with Quorn for the same reason. That is actually quite tasty if spiced up correctly. Sadly not available in Germany anymore, probably due to low demand.<p>Of course people understandably complained because they were led to believe they were served meat.