Friends of the Earth and Compassion in World Farming released a new report, Eating the Planet?, this week and celebrated that, according to their research “We can eat meat, ditch factory farming and save the planet”.

FoE have always been a little shy about telling people they need to change the way they live, preferring to ask them to sign a postcard to their MP instead. So I was happy to receive an email from FoE to tell me that they had at last tackled the issue of meat consumption with their latest report and that the “focus is on reducing daily meat and dairy consumption”.

However, the press release tells a different story. It seems the message they are desperate to tell people is that we can eat meat, not that we need to cut down. On their home page right now is the message “eat meat and save the planet - we don’t have to go vegetarian”. They’re actually telling people to eat meat. When Lorn Stern said people should consider going vegetarian for the environment, Friends of the Earth reacted very defensively and told him via the Times that “by leaping to the conclusion that we should all go vegetarian, your reports didn’t address the urgent need for it to clean up its act to be part of our low-carbon future”.

The other problem is that their report looked only at global production and consumption, not at what is feasible on a local level. I asked them if they thought people in the UK could eat meat 3 times per week (with humane, extensive, organic systems) and not have to import any meat, dairy or animal feeds from elsewhere, and they couldn’t answer that question; they said they hoped that would be the case but that they could only answer this question after more research had been conducted.

I don’t understand it, they talk about localisation of food systems and then use a report which analyses global food production to tell people in the UK what they should eat. They commission a report which shows that we need to reduce meat and dairy consumption but they seem to be actively against people going vegetarian. It makes no sense.

A new investigation again shows the damaging impact of cheap factory farmed meat sold in Europe because of it’s total reliance on soy from Latin America as animal feed. Soy plantations not only result in mass deforestation but also horrific human rights abuses as indigenous people are poisoned and forced from their land. From the Ecologist website:-

Cheap meat has become a way of life in much of Europe, but the full price is being paid across Latin America as vast soya plantations and their attendant chemicals lead to poisonings and violence.

Much of the cheap meat and dairy produce sold in supermarkets across Europe is arriving as a result of serious human rights abuses and environmental damage in one of Latin America’s most impoverished countries, according to a new film launched in conjunction with the Ecologist Film Unit.

An investigation in Paraguay has discovered that vast plantations of soy, principally grown for use in intensively-farmed animal feed, are responsible for a catalogue of social and ecological problems, including the forced eviction of rural communities, landlessness, poverty, excessive use of pesticides, deforestation and rising food insecurity.

The investigation is part of Friends of the Earth Europe’s Feeding and Fuelling Europe programme, in collaboration with other groups including Friends of the Earth members in the Netherlands, Paraguay, UK, Uruguay, the Ecologist magazine, Via Campesina and Food and Water Watch.

Friends of the Earth Food Campaigner Kirtana Chandrasekaran explains in the film that we need to stop factory farming for meat and dairy, use home grown feeds and more extensive methods of farming and direct subsidies for factory farming in to “better quality” farming.

The UK is a land-scarce country. As the population keeps growing and communities around the country fight to save the last of our wild areas from new road and housing developments, how will we find the land to be able to grow more food to feed animals? Consumption of meat and dairy has to be tackled but no-one seems to have the guts to say it.

See the 10 minute film and read the full article on the Ecologist website: www.theecologist.org/trial_investigations/336873/killing_fields_the_true_cost_of_europes_cheap_meat.html

Greenpeace activists boarded a cargo ship in New Zealand yesterday in protest against the damaging impacts of the palm industry. New Zealand farmers feed palm kernels to their dairy herds, which contributes to the demand for palm plantations in Indonesia and Malaysia which is fuelling the destruction of the forests.

New Zealand Prime Minister John Key said “it’s a waste product, in my opinion it’s not leading to deforestation and on that basis I have no intention of intervening.” Whilst the primary demand for palm is for palm oil, which is used in one in ten supermarket products, the use of palm kernels to feed animals is a major, and growing, factor in the continuing demand for palm planatations.

The protest followed a Greenpeace investigation in to the dairy giant Fonterra.

Last year New Zealand imported a whopping one quarter of the world’s Palm Kernel Expeller production - a figure confirmed by the United States Department of Agriculture. For such a small country it’s shocking to learn that we have such a major role in sourcing this destructively produced animal feed.

Figures also show that in the last decade our imports have grown 2700 per cent from 400 tonnes to over 1.1 million tonnes. The reason? To feed New Zealand’s growing dairy herd.

Read more about Greenpeace’s campaign on their website; www.greenpeace.org/new-zealand/news/fonterra-exposed

Today the Guardian published a useful guide on how to cut your carbon emissions by 10%; which is about 1.5 tonnes for the average person. It’s a long list of 51 different carbon cutting measures and right at the top of the list, beaten only by ‘never fly’, ’sell the second car’, and ‘cut your annual car mileage in half’ is ‘go vegan three days a week‘, which will result in a cut of 0.5 tonnes of carbon emissions per year. ‘Change to an almost entirely vegetarian diet, using mostly unprocessed wholefoods such as grains, seeds and nuts’ will also result in the same saving.

Going vegan for just 3 days a week will save five times more carbon emissions than regularly washing over the sink instead of taking showers or getting rid of your freezer, and over twice as much as installing a solar hot water system or buying a wood burning stove.

Asking people to change their eating habits is always a tough ask, by when you look at the huge impact reducing your meat and dairy consumption can achieve, how can anyone who cares about the future of our planet not at least give it a try?

To see the full list, in order of greatest CO2 saving first, go to;

How to cut your carbon footprint

WWF are about to release a report which urges people to cut down on meat and dairy for the sake of the environment.

According to a Daily Mail article, WWF want meat and dairy to be labelled with a warning; meat labels should read ‘1 of 3 a week max’ and milk and cheese labels should say ‘1 of 3 a day max’. According to WWF, we are over-consuming red meat by 70% and dairy by 40%.

The idea of warning labels on meat is not new. Organisations concerned about the health impacts of meat have proposed this many times. But with both health and environmental concerns becoming increasingly urgent, maybe now is the right time.

It’s also interesting to note that Environment Secretary, Hilary Benn is vegetarian. Also, Jane Kennedy resigned from her post as Minister for Food, Farming and the Environment last month and has now been replaced by another vegetarian, Jim Fitzpatrick, who also opposes hunting. This is brilliant news, especially since Kennedy refused to take any personal responsibility for her consumption habits. Read what she had to say in March about the impact of animal agriculture here.

With the most recognised and powerful international environmental groups; WWF, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth, all now adding their voice to the message that we must cut down on meat and dairy consumption, surely it’s time for change.

Friends of the Earth released a report today to expose the vast amounts of public money - over £700 million per year - used to support factory farming in England. In their report, Feeding the Beast, they say “Factory farming for meat and dairy is at the heart of a hidden chain that links the food on our plates to rainforest destruction in South America. To make them grow quickly and produce high yields, animals in factory farms are being pumped full of imported soy crops – creating demand for vast plantations that are wiping out forests and forcing communities off their lands in South America”.

A spokesperson from the National Farmers Union said, “We have nothing against small scale, low output, farming systems but to suppose this is a model which will feed the world’s growing population is disingenuous. Either Friends of the Earth is looking to use much more of the world’s land area for farming – which really would put wilderness and rainforest at risk – or it imagines that, in some way or other, the world’s population is going to be dramatically smaller.”

Of course, the NFU don’t want to consider the third option; that people switch to a plant-based diet. Simon Fairlie, co-editor of the Ecologist, made an analysis of different agricultural systems in his article ‘Can Britain Feed Itself?’, published in his magazine The Land. He calculated that with a vegan permaculture system, we could not only feed everyone but we’d also have 8.8 million hectares of land spare.

Everyone’s talking about cows this week. In the US, plans commenced to produce an environmentally friendly cow, which will produce less methane. If they are successful in creating this ‘cow of the future’, I’d be interested to hear what they’re going to do about the other impacts of the dairy industry, such as deforestation to grow soy feeds, water pollution and of course, the male dairy calves – the often forgotten rejects of the trade who end up in veal crates or killed at birth as their flesh in not good enough for human consumption.

Here in the UK, Blade Farming think they may have the solution to the male dairy calf problem. They have launched a breeding scheme with eight of their top Holstein bulls who produce cows suitable for the dairy industry but also bull calves which are suitable to be used for beef. Farmers can buy semen from specially chosen bulls and the offspring will be tagged with an orange tag to identify them. Blade have said they would ‘love to buy the calves’ to raise for beef and their main customers, Tesco and McDonalds, are supporting the scheme. Compassion in World Farming apparently are pleased since the scheme may reduce the number of calves shot at birth.

The whole problem is that we have selectively bred cows for years to create those which produce high quantities of milk and those which produce what we deem to be high quality beef. All our messing with nature has created suffering and waste. Blade Farming’s scheme will only make the unsustainable and environmentally damaging dairy and meat industries more profitable, driving prices down and fuelling higher consumption.

It seems we are always looking for ways we can maintain the status quo and we keep coming up with all these crazy ideas when the answer is staring us in the face; it’s all about consumption. We cannot maintain the status quo, we need to consume less if we are to create sustainable societies. According to a report released by Canadean Ltd, global milk consumption is down 0.5% from last year, so it looks like we’re heading in the right direction at last!

A new report from Bangor University suggests that intensive animal farming is better for the environment than extensive farming.

It is not the first time that researchers have claimed that intensive animal farming is more environmentally friendly than extensive methods. With intensive methods farmers can control the temperature of barns resulting in animals using less energy to keep warm or cool and thus having more energy to grow, and farmers can also better control manure and slurry. Intensive farming also uses substantially less land than organic methods.

On the other hand, environmental organisations, such as Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth, promote organic methods over intensive farming. Organic farming is much more in tune with nature and is thus better for biodiversity; it is less polluting as it does not result in massive amounts of waste which poison waterways with nitrogen and it also tends to use less energy than intensive methods. The energy efficiency of organic farming is due to the use of organic matter to put nutrients in to the soil rather than energy-intensive fertilisers.

Whilst farmers and environmental groups battle it out; the truth is clear. When it comes to animal agriculture there isn’t a sustainable, environmentally responsible solution. Both organic and intensive livestock farming methods are environmentally destructive in their own ways. For example, whilst organic milk requires less energy and eliminates pesticide use it also requires more land and results in higher emissions of greenhouse gases. Whilst organically raised chickens do not need high levels of anti-biotics to protect them from the diseases which spread like wildfire in broiler sheds, they also take longer to reach their slaughter weight, and thus consume more energy and produce more waste during their longer lives.

The best option for the environment is to eat a plant-based diet; no one can argue with that.

The EU adopted a new climate change resolution on 4 February. The report, titled 2050: The future begins today – Recommendations for the EU’s future integrated policy on climate change was drafted by the Temporary Committee on Climate Change and makes many recommendations regarding how to tackle climate change. The report recommended a reduction in meat consumption, however, the EU removed the recommendation before adopting the final text.

Considering the livestock industry is responsible for 18% of global greenhouse gas emissions, what does this decision to remove the call for a reduction in meat consumption tell us about the EU’s real committment to tackling climate change? It seems that in reality, it’s more important to keep the livestock industry happy than to make real progress in the fight against catastrophic climate change.

A comparision of the proposed text and the amended adopted text is very revealing. Some of the key points, some of which remain unchanged, are below.

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Agriculture and livestock breeding

Proposed
“…the increased consumption of meat and fish have had an impact on climate change as well as other environmental consequences, and may lead to conflicts about how best to use land and resources in order to reduce hunger in the world”

Adopted text
Statement removed.

Proposed
“…the widespread cultivation of feedstuffs for livestock production contributes substantially to the total greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture”

Adopted text
Unchanged.

Guiding political ideas - Agriculture and livestock breeding

Proposed
“Recognises that the cultivation of cereals and soya as feed for livestock is responsible for substantial greenhouse gas emissions; recalls the report entitled “Livestock’s Long Shadow” issued by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization in November 2006, which states that the livestock industry is responsible for 18% of the world’s total greenhouse gas emissions; considers that a switch from intensive livestock production to extensive sustainable systems should be encouraged while total meat consumption also needs to be reduced, in particular in industrialised countries”

Adopted
“Recognises that the cultivation of cereals and soya as feed for livestock is responsible for substantial greenhouse gas emissions; recalls the report entitled “Livestock’s Long Shadow” issued by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization in November 2006, which states that the livestock industry is responsible for 18% of the world’s total greenhouse gas emissions”

Guiding Political Ideas - Education, training, reporting, labelling and awareness-raising

Proposed
“Considers that citizens should be made more aware of the fact that a reduction in the production and consumption of meat and dairy products would decrease greenhouse gas emissions as well as reduce the risks of certain cancers, heart disease and obesity”

Adopted
Statement removed.

The tabled report closed with an Explanatory Statement covering the 22 topics of the final report, one of which is ‘agriculture and livestock breeding’, of which it states:-

“Climate change confronts agriculture in Europe and the world with several challenges of equal magnitude. Agriculture needs first of all to reduce its own emissions and develop adaptation strategies to changing climatic conditions. As a producer of biomass and materials for biofuels it supplies the essential raw materials for emerging sources of energy. At the same time sufficient food must be produced to feed the world’s still growing population. In this context, livestock production in particular plays a crucial role: the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) predicts an increase in meat production from 229 million tonnes at present to 465 million tonnes in 2050, and for milk production from 580 to 1043 million tonnes. This means that the livestock rearing sector will be growing faster than any other sector of the agriculture industry. At the same time, all along the value chain, livestock production is responsible for 18% of global greenhouse gas emissions and thus produces more greenhouse gases than the transport sector!”

The adopted text included important points regarding individual responsibility; the need for consumers to change their habits and lifestyles, and not merely by changing light bulbs and turning the tap off while brushing your teeth:-

“… it will not be possible to achieve genuinely sustainable consumption and use of raw materials in all areas of society without a change of thinking and behaviour, for which new models of consumption and lifestyles must be developed”

“… climate change is regarded as a very serious problem by a large majority of respondents in Europe, but whereas many complain of a lack of information and personal initiatives to counteract global warming tend to be confined to fairly simple measures such as waste sorting or lower energy and water consumption which do not call for any drastic changes in daily life”

“…a more sustainable lifestyle will not be possible without the contribution of the economy, science, the media, organised civil society and the citizens”

–

It’s easy to blame governments and corporations for the wrongs of this world, but the truth is that we can all make ethical choices ourselves, and change the world as individuals. If governments and corporations will not lead the pursuit of a better world at the pace at which it is needed, as decades of campaigning has showed, let us lead.

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Two new reports have been released to highlight the escalating number of starving people in the world - now estimated to be nearly a billion - a sixth of the world’s population.

Oxfam’s report ‘A Billion Hungry People’ and Chatham House’s report ‘The Feeding of the Nine Billion’ call for urgent action in the light of increasing food prices plus an increase in energy and water scarcity which are exacerbating and already devastating situation for the world’s poor.

Barbara Stocking, Oxfam Chief Executive, said: “This should be a wake-up call for all those who believe that the food crisis is over. World leaders have a window of opportunity to prevent a worse situation resulting from the triple crunch of the economic crisis, climate change, and energy and water scarcity. They must act urgently to turn their plans into coordinated action that addresses immediate needs and begins to implement long-term reforms. Failure to act will see millions more people falling into hunger.”

Oxfam recommends reform of the humanitarian aid system and calls for poor countries to invest more in agriculture, targeting women and small-scale producers. However, there is little mention of using the resources we already have more efficiently and fairly. The livestock industry wastes precious resources (such as land, water and energy) whilst causing climate change and other environmental damage. Hundreds of millions of tonnes of grain are fed to animals every year instead of to the hungry. A world free of hunger can only exist if we all choose to eat sustainably and equitably, and that does not include animal products.

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Read more about why a meat-free diet is better for the environment and human rights.