Please help me bust a myth about cattle and global warming

The title I chose for my book about farm animals and the carbon cycle was purposely ambiguous - ‘Should meat be on the menu?’ In addition to the book’s natural constituency – the farmers and graziers directly affected by the publicity telling us that livestock emit new global warming gases - I wanted the book to be read by city-dwellers interested in the global warming issue.I have not yet gained the success I wanted in getting through to this second group. Can you help me?

The basic thesis of the book is that livestock are essentially a neutral factor in the atmospheric carbon cycle because they get all their carbon from the atmosphere in the first place. They get it by the natural organic processes of plant growth and photosynthesis. This, in turn, is powered by the sun. They do not get their carbon from the ground and they certainly don’t create new carbon atoms from nothing. All the carbon they emit, therefore, either in the form of carbon dioxide or methane is just a part of this closed atmospheric carbon cycle that has been repeating over-and-over for as long as life has existed on earth. My basic thesis is that a cow is different from a fossil fuel power station because the cow gets its carbon from the sky and returns it to the sky. A fossil fuel power station gets it carbon from the ground and dumps it in the sky. A fossil fuel power station therefore produces new carbon to the sky. Furthermore, a cow can recycle its own carbon dioxide waste product by eating the next mouthful of grass – a power station can’t.

The book is available for sale on my website at www.journalist.com.au

Since the book has been published I gained success at marketing the book to farmers and graziers in Australia and have made some sales to the same group overseas. This was probably to be expected as farmers and graziers have the most to lose in a poorly thought-out carbon tax and, being close to the land and nature, they already understand the process of photosynthesis and the balanced atmospheric carbon cycle in which livestock are a part.

However I have not yet been successful in any real measure at marketing the book to environmentally conscious city dwellers. I have enjoyed some success but not the level of success I want.

So here is where I am asking for some help. In need to get the messages contained in this book to the mainstream of environmentally conscious people living in our cities. These people include restaurant owners, celebrity chefs, food writers, environmental activists, green groups, landcare members, teachers, and the full range of consumers who are currently being influenced by the negative messages we are all hearing that livestock are warming the earth by the gases they produce.

Who can help me with suggestions about how to market my book more effectively to these groups of people. Any comments please.