About Us
Sustainable Earth Eating
Sustainable Earth Eating »
What We Do
At Sustainable Earth Eating (SEE), we want to direct your attention to the often-overlooked climate change villain—animal agriculture. It is the second-largest producer of human-made greenhouse gas emissions and the leading cause of deforestation, pollution, and biodiversity loss. Though it is vital to find an environmental-friendly alternative to fossil fuels, it is equally important for humanity to choose a more sustainable diet.
Want to join our cause? Feel free to join our Meat Down Pledge or support our mission by donating to our non-profit!
Our Mission
We seek to raise awareness of how individual food choices can impact the planet’s climate. The effect of animal agriculture on the environment is extreme and unsustainable. It not only adversely affects the environment but also increases food insecurity across the globe. Join the SEE team and take action to halt further degradation of our climate and prevent future starvation today!
The Real Cost of Food
According to a 2018 study, 12.4 million acres of forest—the equivalent of more than five Yellowstone National Parks—are cut down each year for industrial agriculture.
“If diet-related disease prevalence rates were reduced to be comparable to countries such as Canada, health care costs could be reduced by $250 billion/year.”
– True Cost of Food, Rockefeller Foundation Study
The current global food system is the primary cause of diversity loss, with agriculture being the identified threat to 86% of species at risk of extinction.
“Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet.”
– Albert Einstein
SEE Board of Directors
Jane DeMarines
Jane DeMarines
Sustainable Earth Eating (SEE) Executive Director
20-year vegetarian, and award winning executive, fundraiser, advocate, builder of partnerships and memberships, Jane M. DeMarines is dedicated to advancing causes related to environmental conservation and green community development. As founding Executive Director of National Alliance of Community Economic Development Associations (NACEDA, Ms. DeMarines rewrote legislation and worked with key U.S. House and Senate staff to advance a “Green Policy” agenda.
She has eight years of federal agency experience, including with the Dept of Homeland Security, addressing climate change-related disasters. Her lengthy career includes managerial and executive positions for banking, housing, and community development. She has served on the boards of several advocacy and volunteer organizations. A resident of the Maryland suburbs of Washington D.C., she developed a Green Party for the Citizens’ Association, with an environmental platform; co-managed a conservation coalition focused on urban forest preservation; testified on tree legislation at Montgomery County Council hearing, certified by “Casey Trees,” and participated in Potomac River conservancy through two coalitions.
She continues her commitment to improving Planet Earth at SEE.
Edgar Ndjatou
President
Edgar Ndjatou is the Principal of Officium, LLC, a consulting firm based in Washington, DC. He is also the Executive Director of the non-profit, Workplace Fairness. Edgar is a reduced meat consumer.
Deborah McElroy
Secretary & Board Member
Deborah (Debby) McElroy currently assists Airports Council International-North America with special prjects, after retiring as Executive Vice President in December 2018 following 12 years of service with the association. She previously worked with the Regional Airline Association, the U.S> International Trade Associations and Department of Labor. A graduate of the University of Maryland, with a degree in economics, McElroy has more that 35 years of experience in aviation, regulatory and trade issues. She is a reduced meat consumer.
David Mied
Treasurer
David Mied, has a 30- year career spanning senior positions in the Federal government and the private sector in Pricing, Contracting and Cost Estimating. He is a reduced meat consumer and believes in intermittent fasting.
He is also an advocate and practitioner of low energy living which incorporates the fundamental principles of SEE.
While at Penn State University Dave enrolled in multiple low energy courses and after graduation applied these principles as a two year Peace Corps Volunteer in Kenya, Africa living without electricity/telephone or hot water.
He continues to be a trailblazer for sustainable living, more recently and in cooperation with Delta Ltd., he installed photovoltaic panels on a local school that powered the school’s radio – the first install of its kind. He installed solar panels on his roof and Tesla power walls in his garage and is waiting for production of the Rivian Pickup truck to complement his solar installation.
Deborah Strauss Lynch:
Board Member
Washington journalist covering environment and agriculture with a particular focus on global biodiversity.
She was the former Executive Director of Genetic Resources Communications, that published the award-winning international journal: DIVERSITY. Such eminent contributors included Nobel Peace Prize winner Norman Borlaug and Pulitzer-prize winning Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson. DIVERSITY was awarded the Vavilov Medal from the Russian government. She continued her career as a consultant to the World Bank and the Council for Science and the Environment.
SEE Board
Larry Frank
Board Member
Currently a Writer and Editor with the Bloomberg News Company, L.A. Frank has a degree in communications/journalism from the University of Maryland, Mr. Frank has more than 25 years of experience in publications and online written materials focusing on a variety of issues including tax and related federal developments as well as Native American housing advocacy. He is a reduced meat consumer who now enjoys the impossible (burgers).
Nick Rudd
Board Member
Erin DeMarines
Board Member
Fabricio Zambranoick
Board Member
Lisa DeCrescente
Board Member
SEE Advisory Board
Eric C. Lindstrom
Advisory Board Member
GlenMerzer
Board Member
Glen Merzer is a playwright, screenwriter, and author. He has authored or co-authored twelve books with a vegan message. His latest book, Food Is Climate: A Response to Al Gore, Bill Gates, Paul Hawken, & The Conventional Narrative on Climate Change, argues that the only way to reverse climate change is to eliminate animal agriculture, rewild grazing land, and protect the oceans.
Glen is also the author of Own Your Health (The Book Publishing Company, 2021), an examination of role of nutrition in health, told with humor and with personal anecdotes. Chef AJ contributed more than 75 recipes to the book.
Glen began his career in non-fiction as co-author, with Howard Lyman, of Mad Cowboy (Simon & Schuster, 1998). Glen is also co-author of The Secrets to Ultimate Weight Loss (2018) and Unprocessed (2011) by Chef AJ, as well as other books advocating plant-based eating. The Tenth Anniversary New Edition of Unprocessed has just been released.
Glen’s one novel is Off the Reservation, a political satire about a vegan congressman from the Midwest who runs for president. Off the Reservation was selected as one of the “Best Books of 2015–Indie” by Kirkus Reviews and one of “Our Favorite Books of 2015” by Progressive Magazine. Glen grew up in Bellmore, N.Y., and attended New College of Florida in Sarasota. You can find him at www.glenmerzer.com.
Dr. Sailesh Rao
Advisory Board Member
Dr. Sailesh Rao has over three decades of professional experience and is the Founder and Executive Director of Climate Healers, a non-profit dedicated towards healing the Earth’s climate. A systems specialist with a Ph. D. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University, Dr. Rao worked on the internet communications infrastructure for twenty years after graduation. During this period, he blazed the trail for high speed signal processing chips and technologies for High Definition Television, real-time video communications and the transformation of early analog internet connections to more robust digital connections, while accelerating their speeds ten-fold. Today, over a billion internet connections deploy the communications protocol that he designed. He received five Exceptional Contribution Awards from AT&T Bell Laboratories between 1985 and 1991, a Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff award in 1990, the Intel Principal Engineer Award in 2003, and the IIT Madras Distinguished Alumnus Award in 2013 for his technical contributions. He is the author of 22 peer-reviewed technical papers, 50 standards contributions, 10 US patents and 3 Canadian patents. He was the co-founder of Silicon Design Experts in 1991 which was acquired by Level One Communications in 1996 and which was later acquired by Intel Corporation in 1999 for $2.2 billion.
In 2006, he switched careers and became deeply immersed, full time, in solving the environmental crises affecting humanity. Dr. Rao is the author of two books, Carbon Dharma: The Occupation of Butterflies and Carbon Yoga: The Vegan Metamorphosis, and an Executive Producer of several documentaries, The Human Experiment (2013), Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret (2014), What The Health (2017), A Prayer for Compassion (2019), They’re Trying to Kill Us (2021), The End of Medicine (est. 2022), The Land of Ahimsa (est. 2022), Animals – A Parallel History (est. 2022) and Milked (2022). His work is featured in the award winning film, Countdown to Year Zero produced by Jane Velez-Mitchell and Unchained TV.
Dr. Rao is a Human, Earth and Animal Liberation (HEAL) activist, husband, dad and since 2010, a star-struck grandfather. He has promised his granddaughter, Kimaya Rainy Rao, that the world will be largely Vegan before she turns 16 in 2026, so that people will stop eating her relatives, the animals. He has faith that humanity will transform to keep his pinky promise to Kimaya, not just for ethical reasons, but also out of sheer ecological necessity. Along with Kimaya, Dr. Rao was the co-recipient of the inaugural Homo Ahimsa award from the Interfaith Vegan Coalition in 2021. He has formally taken the Ubuntu pledge to become Homo Ahimsa and the Liberation Pledge to accelerate the adoption of Veganism.
Dr. Rao’s Curriculum Vitae can be found here. To book him for podcasts and shows, please contact him here.
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