climate change « A Compassionate World

Posts Tagged ‘climate change’

The Key to Success

Thursday, May 27th, 2010

I’m convinced the key to success in our campaign to end factory farming by 2050 is to involve as many people and as many organisations as possible. Because there are many good reasons why factory farming should be stopped (e.g. animal cruelty, unhealthy food, environmental damage, food security, economic inefficiency and world hunger), there is room for everyone to make a difference regardless of their reason why.

This is why I believe our role at Compassion is to empower people and facilitate progress for positive change for farmed animals. My job is to inspire others like you to act because, frankly, Compassion, on our own, will not achieve the objectives we all wish to see. We must build the broadest of coalitions and the most far-reaching of initiatives to put an end to our present wasteful food culture which has, at its rotten heart, factory faming.

This point was brought home to me recently when I read the report, Plea for Sustainable Livestock Farming, signed by more than 100 professors from Dutch Universities. I was particularly fascinated by the diversity of academic expertise they represented, from environmental science to rural sociology, from Christian philosophy to journalism. Such a broad range demonstrated the wide cross-section of interests united in opposing factory farming. Their recommendations complemented the conclusions we made in our report, Eating the Planet, co-produced with Friends of the Earth. We are now working with the Dutch scholars to take this important initiative to an international audience of academics.

I firmly believe factory farming cannot sustain itself economically. It consumes a far greater proportion of crops, water and other finite resources than it produces benefit – in the form of food for human consumption. Currently, one third of the world’s cereal crop goes to feed the 60 billion or more farm animals reared every year to produce meat, eggs and dairy products – the majority of them on factory farms. This grain drain together with the climate change consequences of the livestock sector – producing one in five tonnes of total human-induced greenhouse gas emissions – is why leading commentators are increasingly encouraging society to consider eating less meat, dairy and egg products. And why Compassion is advocating a less is more approach; less but higher quality, higher welfare meat consumption as a key factor in building a humane and sustainable food future.

To make sure the supply for higher welfare products meets the demand, our Good Egg Awards, for example, encourages public sector authorities and commercial companies to switch to higher welfare products – cage-free eggs. In the three years of the programme so far, we have celebrated such diverse enterprises as Shropshire County Council, Sainsbury’s, the Tate gallery and Hellmann’s for going cage-free on their eggs, and bringing real benefit to 20 million hens every year as a result. This helps increase demand for cage-free eggs and in turn helps support the EU-wide ban on battery cages due to take place in 2012. In my view, involving companies and local authorities in the trend toward a better food system without factory farming is key.

Encouraging evidence of this gathering trend in ethical consumerism was provided by a recent survey published by the food industry research group, Mintel. “The animal welfare factor,” Mintel states, “has been helped by campaigning by celebrity chefs, such as Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Jamie Oliver, who have raised awareness of poultry and pork farming practices.” Compassion is proud to work in partnership with Hugh on his Chicken Out! campaign.

Whether it’s because you oppose animal cruelty, don’t want to eat unwholesome food, care about environmental damage, concerned with food security, alarmed at economic inefficiency or outraged by world hunger – you have a vital and unique role to play to end factory farming by 2050. I promise you Compassion will be with you at every step of the way as we turn the key to success together.

Tags: climate change, factory farming, Good Egg Awards, sustainability. Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

We have a choice

Thursday, November 26th, 2009

The publication of our report, “Eating the Planet?,” is generating interest and contributing significantly to the debate about how we’re going to feed the world’s growing population without factory farming.

For example, Joanna Blythman, the investigative food journalist and author, Bad Food Britain and The Food We Eat, wrote in the Scottish Sunday Herald:

“Compassion In World Farming, the impeccably well-informed and thoughtful animal welfare organisation, and Friends Of The Earth, our foremost environmental group, argues that we don’t need to go veggie to feed a booming world population and save the planet from climate change and forest destruction. It says that we can indeed produce enough food for everyone in the world, but only if we are prepared to ditch factory farming for more natural and humane farming methods.”

As the year progresses and the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen approaches, I’m increasingly aware of a significant shift in thinking among policy makers, legislators and the public toward understanding why factory farming is cruel to animals, inefficient in food production and significantly contributes to global warming.

For example, in October Lord Stern, author of the British government’s 2006 review on the Economics of Climate Change, told The Times that “Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world’s resources. A vegetarian diet is better.”

Later that same month, Lester Brown, founder of the WorldWatch Institute and Earth Policy Institute, gave our annual Peter Roberts Memorial Lecture and called for a reduction in meat and dairy consumption to fight climate change. He reaffirmed last year’s speaker, Dr Rajendra Pachauri, Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, who said, “One kilo of beef is responsible for the equivalent of the amount of CO2 emitted by the average European car for every 250 kms.”

And then, in late November, one of the world’s leading medical journals, The Lancet, published a report highlighting the climate change and human health benefits of reducing meat production and consumption by 30%. Entitled The health benefits of tackling climate change, it said that reducing adult consumption of animal products by 30% would lead to a 15% reduction in heart disease in the UK alone. I blogged about the growing weight of evidence that less is more, particularly when it comes to livestock products and how this can have huge benefits to animal welfare as well as fighting climate change and public health issues.

Also, we shouldn’t forget that earlier this year Swedish authorities set out draft guidelines calling for people to reduce their carbon footprint by eating less meat and in Ghent, Belgium, residents are encouraged to have meat free Thursdays.

As Joanna Blythman noted:

“In other words, we have a choice. We can continue to breed high-yielding, “efficient”, fast-maturing livestock and fatten them up in no time with profligate quantities of grain that would be better fed to humans – just to produce unprecedented volumes of low-grade industrial meat, while trashing the planet in the process – or we can return to rearing livestock on a much smaller scale, using a traditional, extensive farming approach.”

Yes, we do have a choice. To help others make a choice, please download our new report, Eating the planet?

Tags: climate change, lancet, sustainability. Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Medical journal says reduce livestock

Wednesday, November 25th, 2009

One of the world’s leading medical journals, The Lancet, has published a new report that highlights the climate change and human health benefits of reducing meat production and consumption by 30%. The summary of the report, entitled The health benefits of tackling climate change says that reducing adult consumption of animal products by 30% would lead to a 15% reduction in heart disease in the UK alone.

The report, sponsored by the UK Government’s Department of Health and the World Health Organisation amongst others, is the latest to point to the need for a reduction in meat consumption in the rich world in order to combat climate change. One of its key messages states that “Achieving a substantial cut in greenhouse-gas emissions will depend on reducing the production of food from livestock and on technological improvements in farming”.

Globally, livestock production is escalating and is predicted to double to 120 billion farm animals a year by mid-Century. Factory farming is acting as the engine-room of the livestock explosion, enabling large numbers of animals to be reared in small spaces. Compassion recently hosted one of the world’s gurus on environmentalism, Lester Brown to discuss the links between global food security, climate change and factory farming. The take home message from the event was that business as usual is not an option; that sustainability centres as much around our plate as our car; and that a wise-use principle is needed in our food system.

The Lancet study adds to the growing weight of evidence that less is more, particularly when it comes to livestock products. That consuming less meat and dairy products will benefit public health as well as help combat climate change. In Compassion’s view, by eating less, but better quality animal products – higher welfare meat and dairy – we can not only help ourselves and the planet, but also reduce a huge amount of animal suffering too. Now that’s got to be good news.

Tags: climate change, factory farming, lancet, sustainability. Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Combating cruelty to farm animals

Thursday, November 5th, 2009

After last week’s seminal lecture by Lester Brown in memory of our late founder, it is perhaps an opportune moment to take stock of where we are going. Stating the obvious for a moment, Compassion in World Farming is, and always has been, about stopping cruelty to farm animals. In 1967, our founder, Peter Roberts, launched our organisation in response to the cages and crates that came to define modern intensive farming. Our track record is testimony to the success of his approach. Now as we approach the end of the first decade of the 21st Century, his rallying cry is needed more than ever. Today, factory farming is the biggest cause of animal suffering in the world. Globally we rear around 60 billion animals a year, mostly in factory farms.

Compassion recognises that ending such wide-scale cruelty to animals is a huge task -improving the plight of billions of animals will require the energy of many thousands of people. In order to mobilise maximum energy against factory farming, Compassion is working hard to bring to the world’s attention some of the other, less known impacts of factory farming. Until recently few realised that run-away factory farming and its consequent addictive diet of “cheap” meat has resulted in livestock production accounting for almost 20% of human greenhouse gas emissions.

If you tunnel to the very core, to the ‘essence’, of Compassion in World Farming, you’ll find a belief that farm animals should not, and need not, suffer. We want to end factory farming. Why? Because keeping animals caged, crammed and confined causes huge suffering to the animals involved. Suffering that could often be avoided if a different, more humane rearing system were used.

It is fair to say that climate change dominates the world’s attention at this time. It is also fair to say that the majority of nations around the world recognise the perils of allowing our planet to heat up in the years ahead. What is less commonly reported is that many within the powerful agribusiness lobby are arguing that further intensification of livestock farming could help combat climate change. Their argument is simple: the world’s growing population will need more “efficient” meat production to satisfy growing demand – so the answer to them seems obvious… more “modern”, “efficient”, “mechanised” farming. In other words, the spectre of climate change could lead policy makers to sleepwalk us into more, not less, factory farming in the years ahead.

We know that this would be a disaster on an unimaginable scale; for animals as well as people. It would cause even greater suffering and make our food system even further removed from environmental sustainability, bringing further serious consequences. Our recent high-profile lecture event explored some of the issues at stake here.

Alerting our policy-makers to the folly of factory farming on all fronts – animal cruelty, climate and social costs – will be vital if we are to overcome the huge vested interests that are behind the industrial agricultural model.

Compassion is not a ‘climate change’ or environmental organisation. We are an animal welfare organisation. However, we see the consequences of factory farming on our climate, our environment and our ability to feed the world’s people. There is a great onus on us to engage in the big debates of our time. It is essential to contribute to discussions on food, farming and the environment to help steer the world toward a better future, toward humane and sustainable farming. And therein lies great opportunity.

The climate change debate is a powerful example of where our message of compassion and respect for farm animals is both timely and relevant. Global deliberations on climate change (the next stage comes to a climax in December with the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen), presents us with an opportunity to stop and re-think our relationship with food and farming. Most experts agree that success in the battle against climate change will require a seismic re-appraisal of the way we do things on our planet – and this represents a golden chance to promote our vision. Not simply to combat the intensive agribusiness lobby and avoid further intensification but to re-assess the very way in which humanity treats the tens of billions of animals produced each year.

We know that factory farming is cruel. The current debate gives us an opportunity to point out how stupid it is too.

Tags: climate change, compassion, factory farming, lecture. Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

Climate change: what’s the beef?

Thursday, October 15th, 2009

October 15^th is blog action day, with this year’s theme being climate change. What better day, then, to touch on the profound impacts of factory farming and the global livestock industry on our planet.

The top-line is that the world’s livestock is responsible for a massive 18% of greenhouse gas emissions. That’s more than all of our planes, cars and other transport put together. And the bad news doesn’t end there. Currently, 60 billion farm animals are produced each year, the majority in factory farms. According to experts at the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), this figure could double by 2050 as demand surges for meat and dairy products, particularly in developing countries. 120 billion farm animals would bring big challenges to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. It would also increase the land, energy and water resources needed to grow the crops to feed them.

As we know from previous postings, factory farmed animals guzzle grain. A third of the global grain harvest goes to feed farm animals. And just like those big gas-guzzling ‘automobiles’, intensively reared farm animals can be incredibly wasteful; one kilogramme of intensively-reared beef requires around 20 kg of animal feed and nearly 16,000 litres – about a hundred bathtubs – of water to produce.

The projection of a doubling in animal production comes at a time when climate change may make large areas of the world’s current cropland unusable or seriously reduce crop yields due to coastal flooding or drought. A one metre rise in sea level is possible by the end of this century, perhaps even by mid-century. This would flood a fifth of Bangladesh and 2 million square kilometres of land globally. As many as 150-200 million people could be permanently displaced by 2050 due to rising sea levels, floods and droughts. These people might well need to settle on what was previously farmland. Water resources could become so stretched as to cause armed conflicts in some areas.

The huge resources of land, water and energy on which our current intensive livestock production is based, let alone a doubling, may simply not be available by 2050.

As demand for livestock products continues to surge, particularly in developing countries, the onus is surely on the rich world to take a lead on this issue. If we are to have a hope of stabilising the numbers of farm animals worldwide, and mitigating the effects on our climate and precious resources, the European Union and other high-income countries need to reduce meat and dairy consumption by 60% by 2050.

But less is more; instead of eating lots of ‘cheap’ meat from factory farmed animals reared in appalling conditions, the mid-century consumer could be eating less, but better quality meat and milk, preferably reared by local farmers. Under this scenario, farmers would be better able to earn a premium for their products, with higher prices being reflective of the carbon costs of consuming livestock products. This kind of move would not only have climate benefits, but would enable farmers to move toward more extensive, humane and sustainable farming methods, like free range or organic.

These issues and more will be up for discussion at our major lecture event in London on the evening of Thursday 29^th October. Lester Brown of the Washington-based Earth Policy Institute will be our special guest speaker and will no doubt have much to say on these important topics. To be there with us, click here for your tickets.

On the subject of lectures, yesterday, I heard Sir Richard Branson describe the battle against climate change as like fighting both world wars at the same time. Given the scale of the task, society surely has to dare to challenge, and make it stick. Reappraising the way we view products from our farm animals has got to be high on the list to address. With a fifth of greenhouse gas emissions from livestock, and factory farming representing the biggest issue of animal cruelty on the planet, the time is right to tackle both issues head-on at once. If we fail to do so, it could be more than beef getting a roasting on planet Earth.

Tags: climate change, factory farming, food. Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »