Animal Rebellion is standing in solidarity with UK Farmers against the new Agricultural Bill 2020.

You’re right, this is shocking. Why are we standing with the very farmers who keep the animal agricultural system going?

The Agricultural Bill 2020 is a HUGE step backward for our food system and food security.

What is the Agricultural Bill 2020?

• The Bill is replacing European Union (EU) Farming regulations and is setting new, lower standards for the future of British farming.
• The Bill allows cheaper, lower quality imports into the UK from countries like the US: including hormone-injected beef, chlorinated chicken and eggs. The meat allowed to be imported into the UK is currently illegal according to UK and EU legislation.

How does the Agricultural Bill 2020 impact a just and sustainable food system?

• The Bill threatens environmental sustainability. Intensive farming causes the destruction of soil, deforestation, annihilation of wildlife and poisons drinking water. Farmers can not manage the costs of pollution prevention, and serious pollution incidents are now reported weekly in the UK. Between 2010 and 2016, there were 5,300 instances of agricultural pollution cases, of which 536 were serious. The UK government announced a “climate emergency” in April 2019, yet the Bill is practically asking farmers to race towards the worst environmental practices.
• The Bill jeopardises animal welfare. It is unjust. Whilst animal welfare standards are low, with several undercover cameras having filmed poor standards and abuse; the Bill is forcing further negligence of the animals. Already, 70% of farm animals in the UK are kept in overcrowded, windowless factory farm buildings or cages. You can see how many animals are presently reared indoors here.
• The Bill compromises human health. Chlorinated chicken, eggs and hormone-injected cows will be the new standard. The chlorine is used to “clean off bacteria and other contaminants”. This is the equivalent of putting a plaster over an injury. It hides the problem. The conditions in which these animals are farmed are treacherous and infected with fecal matter and life-threatening germs, such as campylobacter and salmonella. The next virus threatening to cause a pandemic is already here.
• The Bill weakens economic sustainability for UK farmers. More and more small to medium-scale farmers have been forced into the dominant hands of large-scale intensive farmers. The Bill exacerbates this issue. Flooding the market with cheap, low quality food jeopardises British Farmers economically — a great position for large-scale factory farmers to increase their dominance in the industry. Inevitably, smaller farmers will get pushed out. Did you know in 2019 there were an estimated 800 American-style mega-farms in the UK? A 26% increase since 2011.

Farmers Vs Animal Justice

The Bill is driving farmers into economic strains, pushing them to commit environmental and cruelty crimes, and further create an unjust food system. The Government is not helping them to reverse environmental damage or shift agriculture towards fruit, vegetable, and protein crop production.

Whilst farmers and animal justice communities have long had a rocky relationship, this is an opportunity to build relationships. Farmers play a key role in our transition towards a just and sustainable plant-based food system. We need to work with them to address the animal and climate crisis.

Therefore, Animal Rebellion stands in solidarity with UK Farmers against the Agricultural Bill 2020 and to build relationships to move towards a just, sustainable plant-based food system.

The post Why Is Animal Rebellion Standing with UK Farmers first appeared on Animal Rebellion.

Have you ever wondered what a plant-based world looks like? Have your eyes gleamed at the possibility, but a little voice called Doubt savagely trespassed your dream?

You’re not alone. After knowing the undeniable benefits of a plant-based food system, it’s difficult to ignore. However, the scale of this mission is intimidating and can often leave you feeling worse off. That’s why we are so excited to bring to you Geraldine Starke from Refarm’d who is bringing us one step closer to a plant-based world.

Geraldine dreamt of making an animal sanctuary but struggled with the fact that sanctuaries rely heavily on donations to operate and are tough to scale up i.e. helping more and more animals out of their life as commodities, becomes difficult. After considering all the factors required to build, operate and maintain sanctuaries she realised that dairy farms met all of these needs right where they were operating from! She began creating her dream into a reality by developing an end-to-end method for dairy farmers to transition to plant-based milks and convert their farms into sanctuaries. She created Refarm’d.

Why is her work important?

In the UK alone, dairy farming produces over 40 million litres of milk per day and is the largest in the agricultural sector: accounting for 16.85%. Small-medium scale dairy farms have been struggling economically and are increasingly falling into the hands of a few, larger farmers. The intensification of dairy has several impacts: environmental, social (animal welfare and human health), economical. Our current system means that dairy system changes in the European Union have been focused consistently on productivity: increasing efficiency and revenue. This comes at a large cost:

Environmental

• Between 2005 and 2015 there was an increase of 18 per cent (256 million tonnes) of CO₂ eq.
• As countries become wealthier, populations adopt more dairy into their diet, increasing the demand for dairy overall — there are at least 270 million dairy cows being farmed globally. Dairy farming contributes to greenhouse gases, soil degradation and wildlife loss and polluting of waterways.

Animal Welfare

• Science shows that cows are social beings, need space to exercise and experience trauma. Focuses on productivity ignore these facts and health is measured as the absence of disease and infirmity. Increasingly, dairy cows suffer from more mental and physical illness
• Smaller farmers are often left with no choice but to hand over their farm or cows to larger farms where their inevitable fates will be little social interaction, less space and lack of autonomy over their own bodies.

Livelihoods and Human Health

• Current trading systems undermine small scale production; falling milk prices and a constant need to increase the output of milk are pushing small and medium-sized farms out of business having a knock on effect in the community.
• Dairy farming can contribute to poor human health “through acute and chronic soil, air and water pollution as well as by increasing exposure to zoonotic diseases, pathogens and exacerbating the risk of anti-microbial resistance”.

It is clear, with the current and projected dairy farming methods, human health, animal welfare, environmental and social impacts are going to worsen. What Refarm’d aim to achieve is important.

How is it possible for a single woman to change the minds of not one, but several dairy farmers across Europe?

When we spoke to Geraldine in January, she briefly touched upon how she builds her relationships with farmers and helps them to transition. However, in order that the relationship is productive and long-standing, she needs to take into consideration the needs of the farmers.

She said,

“for farmers, they are proud of what they do — they feed the country — it’s their identity and that’s something Refarm’d take into account. Refarm’d will not be a globalised product. The farmer will get to have their own unique product. The farmers can decide their own prices. They take pride in the changes they are making- making it as carbon neutral as possible: renewable energy, planting trees, taking care of the animals in the long term etc.”

On 8th May at 18:00 BST Animal Rebellion is holding a Facebook Live Q&A to find out more. Animal Rebellion will explore her story and her work with current farmers, why several farmers across Europe are turning to plant-based milk, the social, environmental and economical benefits of her work and what people can do to enact change.

To support Geraldine you can “spread the message, spread the project”. Itgives her more opportunities which allow her to speak to more people and farmers. You can help her with anything you are passionate about: “people help me with the legal side, making a documentary or on the social media side”. She also needs people to fill out the market research form on her website so she can collect data on consumer demand. The more support and attention Refarm’d get, the more she can demonstrate that there is support and demand for this transition.

Website: https://en.refarmd.com/

Instagram: refarmd_official

Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/refarmd/

The post Refarm’d: One Step Closer to a Plant-Based World first appeared on Animal Rebellion.

Walk through any British supermarket today and you will encounter a vast array of milks. It’s not just green, red, or blue top anymore. Aisles are overflowing with alternatives and people are buying them (a quarter of UK customers). These plant-based options have spilled into cafes and restaurants too. You may find them at your work canteen, at school, at conferences or on trains. Wherever there is tea, there is milk, and wherever there is milk, there is an alternative. With the demand for plant-based milk growing, the UK cannot get left behind. We must choose the right milk to invest in.

Although plant milks have been around for thousands of years (horchata and almond milk), the dairy industry has long enjoyed domination of the global market through mass industrialisation, vast subsidies, and powerful marketing schemes. In Britain, dairy has been part of our lives for generations: it is in our recipes, our traditions, and our stories. Milk flows through so many of our memories. And no wonder; we have been lapping it up since childhood.

It can be difficult to challenge an industry when it dominates our culture, especially when the product has been a source of comfort and shared heritage. But these comforts have depended on the mass exploitation of billions of animals. And now that its environmental impacts are being exposed, the prevalence of dairy no longer feels so reassuring. We cannot afford to live in the past when the future is under threat. We need to imagine and create a better food system that can support everyone.

There are approximately 278 million dairy cows in the world and more than 6 billion people drink their milk. In 2017, 909 million tons of milk was taken from these cows (along with their calves) and distributed to humans. At what cost? And what is the alternative?

Water

Animal agriculture is responsible for one quarter of the global water footprint, of which 19% is related to the dairy industry.

It takes 1050 litres of water to produce one litre of cow’s milk.

The Alternative is Oat Milk:

It takes 48 litres of water to produce one litre of oat milk.

Land

One person drinking a daily glass of cow’s milk uses 7,000 square feet of land each year.

The increasing usage of fertilisers and manure disposal issues can pollute soil and water, damaging ecosystems.

The Alternative is Oat Milk:

One glass of oat milk requires 10 times less land than a glass of cow’s milk.

According to Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education, “oats provide quick, weed-suppressing biomass, take up excess soil nutrients and can improve the productivity of legumes when planted in mixtures.”

Greenhouse Gases (GHG)

Animal agriculture is responsible for at least 14.5% of total anthropogenic GHG emissions. This is more than the direct emissions produced by the entire transport sector.

Farming cow’s milk accounts for 20% of the animal farming sector’s emissions. These include methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N20) and carbon dioxide (CO2). Nitrous oxide is 298 times more potent than CO2.

1 litre of dairy milk produces 3kg of GHG emissions. This is almost three times more than any plant-based milk.

The Alternative is Oat Milk:

1 litre of oat milk produces 0.9kg of GHG emissions.

Invest in the best

When we consider the environment, all plant milks come out better than dairy. But oat milk is the ultimate alternative once you take into consideration land use, water use, and greenhouse gas emissions.

Grow what you know

Having farmed arable land for 44 years, Gordon Rennie notes that Scotland is perfectly placed to produce its own oat milk and enjoy huge earnings. He states: “The trend away from animal to plant-based foods is unstoppable and it is only going to gain more momentum. This is good news for Scotland’s arable farmers. We have a vast new market to satisfy.”

Gordon is not the only one to notice this opportunity. Oatly is planning to open a factory here and their oat milk has already made a big splash. The Swedish brand’s UK turnover was £18 million in 2018, an 89% growth from the previous year.

Oats are the UK’s third-largest cereal crop. No other country in the world has had higher search interest in oat milk than the UK in the past 12 months. Vegan oat milk sales increased by 70% to £36 million in 2018.

The Brits are waking up to alternatives, farmers are waking up to opportunities. Refarm’d is helping farmerstransition to plant-based milk productions and convert their farms into sanctuaries. But we all need support from government and big industries. If the UK is going to benefit from this growth, companies like Arla must divest from dairy and invest in oats. In the words of Gordon Rennie, “the future is good, the future will be plant-based. We as farmers have a fantastic chance to take part”. Come on Arla. Wake up and smell the oat milk!

OCCUPY ARLA

On Saturday 7th March 2020, Animal Rebellion marched to Arla to shut down Europe’s largest dairy distributor. Read more about our past action here: https://rebellion.earth/event/occupy-arla/

On Tuesday 31st August 2021, amidst the Rebellion, Animal Rebellion is blockading Arla to demand them to go plant-based by 2025 in response to the climate and and animal crisis. Add your voice to our demand that Arla transition to a just and sustainable plant-based food system.

Follow us on Twitter for updates throughout the day.

Most importantly, join us. For all those who produce milk and all those who drink it. For the animals, for the environment, for everyone. Occupy Arla.

The post Wherever There Is Milk, There Is An Alternative. Arla Must Choose Plant-Based Milk. first appeared on Animal Rebellion.

*Updated 15 November 2021*

Mainstream media would have us believe that supporters of a plant-based food system and animal farmers are enemies. These two groups of people are often pitted against one another on opposite sides of the climate crisis, although, contrary to this belief, The Vegan Society states: “It is the system that is at fault, not individual farmers, who are just trying to make a living like everyone else”. Introducing the Grow Green campaign in 2015, The Vegan Society supports and collaborates with farmers and advocates for policies that will help them transition to a more sustainable system. Similarly, Animal Rebellion promotes a ‘no blame, no shame’ culture and campaigns for system change to benefit the planet and everyone on it. This article aims to highlight the opportunities available to farmers, many of whom are beginning to accept the inevitability of a plant-based food system within the near future and are readying themselves for the transition.

Animal farming is no easy business. Without receiving government subsidies, which amounted to £70 million between 2016–2017, the UK farming industry would collapse. Jennifer Betit Yen is from Animal to Plant-Based Protein Exchange (A2Px), an agritech exchange that enables small to midsize animal farmers to transition from low return, animal-exploitive farming to more lucrative, sustainable and cruelty-free plant-based farming. She explains that farmers, especially those in the dairy industry, have been affected by declining incomes in the last five years. The industry is reliant upon government subsidies to stay afloat,as cow’s milk is priced lower than the cost of production. Most economists agree that, as consumers move away from cow’s milk and towards plant-based options, this reliance on subsidies is unsustainable. Forecasters predict that plant-based dairy alternatives will increase to a “market value of €19bn by 2022”; oat milk consumption has grown particularly quickly, making it the milk of choice for 25% of Brits, with sales increasing by more than 70% in 2018.

We are now accessing more evidence on this topic through mainstream media, shedding light on a market which has been quietly declining for years. Despite receiving large government subsidies, the animal farming industry has still been forced to stockpile produce in an attempt to hold its market value. Betit Yen explains: “In recent years, around 350,000 tonnes of excess powdered milk were stockpiled by the European Commission, in a move to prevent a backlash from the industry”. Public money is spent to bail out the industry when “few sectors are afforded the ability to continue to produce products in a declining market…This is neither a sustainable solution nor an ethical use of public funds.”

The harmful impact that animal agriculture has on our planet can no longer be swept under the rug, acknowledged even by large corporations. The general public and farmers alike are able to make better informed decisions about how every day actions affect their futures and that of the planet. For Adam Arnesson, a farmer from Jannelunds Farm in Sweden, the need for a more sustainable agricultural system is pushing a transformation in his business: “We are transitioning towards more plant-based food because of the importance of the environment and climate change”. Arnesson is shifting away from goat’s milk and instead beginning to produce oat milk with support from Swedish oat milk manufacturer, Oatly. Researchers studying the environmental effect of Arnesson’s transition to plant-based farming found that the amount of greenhouse gasses emitted had halved in the first year alone, whilst calories produced for human consumption had doubled.

For many small-scale animal farmers, their livelihoods are ingrained within their family history, a business passed down through generations; the commitment to preserving the family legacy therefore makes it a difficult decision to leave the industry. When our children are at the centre of this emergency, however, with their generation being the one who will suffer the most drastic effects of climate change, our decisions become clearer. Young leaders, such as Greta Thunberg, are driving the fight against the climate crisis; calling for governments to make dramatic systemic changes to save the planet — for us and for non-human animals. As knowledge of animal agriculture’s detrimental environmental impact spreads, accompanied by improved support systems, an increasing number of farmers are making the transition away from animal farming.

In addition to the severe environmental impact, the decline in consumption of animal products comes as a response to growing awareness of animal farming practices. As video footage and exposés continue to be released, an increasing number of people can witness what happens behind closed doors within animal agricultural industries, leading to a growing percentage of the population to boycott on ethical grounds. The ‘Dismantle Dairy’ campaign, for example, which was created by animal rights group Surge, has exposed the horrific treatment of dairy cows that is common practice within the UK.

Whilst the public is becoming more aware of the exploitation of non-human animals, very little is heard about the suffering of those who are forced into doing the killing. A startling report recently published by the BBC highlights how working conditions can lead to exhaustion, suicide and social isolation. One former abattoir worker opened up about her job and the effect it had on her mental health: “One skill that you master while working at an abattoir is disassociation. You learn to become numb to death and to suffering. Instead of thinking about cows as entire beings, you separate them into their saleable, edible body parts. It doesn’t just make the job easier — it’s necessary for survival.”

In the Uk, 75,000 people are employed in ‘meat-processing’, of whom approximately 69% are from European Union member states. The abattoir worker also remarked that “nobody talked about their feelings; there was an overwhelming sense that you weren’t allowed to show weakness. Many were migrant workers, predominantly from Eastern Europe, whose English wasn’t good enough for them to seek help if they were struggling”. Thanks to the increase of supportive organisations, workers may now have better access and assistance to finding alternative employment, particularly in the growing plant-based food industry.

As a result of tight margins and unpredictable costs, such as vet bills, farm-related incomes can be unreliable, but by transitioning to plant-based industries farmers and landowners open up new opportunities. The Vegan Society suggests different ways land can be utilised to meet the needs of the UK population, such as being “repurposed for renewable energy production, natural reforestation to capture carbon, commercial forestry or [for] biodiversity benefits”, with subsidies to support these proposals and funding for market research and development. This is supported by Alexandra Clark, a sustainable food consultant, as she states: “It is imperative that governments support these efforts and aid this transition by allocating funds to grant initiatives that will assist farmers in acquiring new skills and equipment to meet these changing needs”.

Jay Wilde, from the BAFTA-winning documentary 73 Cows, is one example of how The Vegan Society has already helped farmers successfully transition away from animal agriculture. The former cattle farmer took his herd to an animal sanctuary rather than an abattoir and now produces organic vegetables on his land with plans to open a vegan bed and breakfast in the future. Similarly, Sivalingam Vasanthakumar, a UK sheep farmer, decided one day to take his flock of lambs to live out the rest of their lives at animal sanctuary — he has since transitioned to growing vegetables and selling home-cooked Indian food. Organisations give farmers the option to make these decisions, as their support will help them move forward. Farm Transformers, founded in 2017, aims to build sustainable plant-based business solutions for farmers transitioning out of animal farming. By working together, they can better understand farmers’ needs in order to offer sound practical, logistical and financial advice, as well as new farming methods.

Meanwhile, Refarm’d is an organisation which aims to transform all dairy farms into animal sanctuaries and to adopt plant-based milk production. During the transition, the farmed animals are kept as sanctuary animals, whilst the farmers are assisted with retraining and various types of support in their new ventures. Founder Geraldine Starke highlights the importance of farmers earning a good wage and improving their livelihoods in the process. Starke’s long term plan is to expand into plant-based cheese, yoghurt and cream production.

There are many opportunities for plant-based businesses to succeed in place of animal farming. Take Hodmedod, for example, a British quinoa company founded in 2012. It has since grown to work with over 20 farmers and is now sourcing over 100 tonnes of pulses and quinoa annually for supply to retailers, caterers and manufacturers across the UK. Hodmedod farmers began with Fava Beans production, which have been grown in Britain for hundreds of years, and are committed to sustainable plant-based food production, stating that “Fava Beans are delicious, nutritious and good for the soil and bees”.

Now is the time for government action; the animals and the planet cannot continue to suffer at the hands of humans and an out-dated system. It is time for employees in animal agricultural industries to choose other options — they no longer need to endure unhealthy working conditions. Success stories of farmers and factory workers transitioning away from the industry are not rare, but are, in fact, increasingly common. It is clear what the government must do to aid these industries during the transition: redirect subsidies, support organisations which will in turn support the workers, and most importantly transition to a plant-based food system.

Read more: Incentivising Plant-Based Businesses: A Necessary Step Towards a Just and Sustainable Future

How a just and sustainable food system could change the world

The post What is the Future of Animal Farmers? first appeared on Animal Rebellion.

How is it possible that while there is increasing scientific knowledge and public concern about the catastrophic impact of factory farming on the earth, animals, and human beings, DEFRA (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) is not reducing, as it should be, but is in fact increasing subsidies for factory farms?

A joint investigation by the Guardian and the Bureau of Investigation discovered that factory farm operators were granted approximately £70 million of public money between in 2016 and 2017. The types of operations that received subsidies include: “Feedlot-style beef units, rearing thousands of cattle in outdoor yards; so-called megadairies, with herds of up to 1,800 cows; Intensive egg producers using cage housing systems; poultry megafarms and pig units which keep thousands of animals permanently indoors” and “livestock units that have been found guilty of pollution and animal health breaches.” A 2017 report showed that intensive farming of pigs and poultry had grown by 26% since 2011, and another report indicated that in 2018 over 1400 permits for intensive poultry operations had been issued.

The number of these ethically indefensible and environmentally catastrophic megafarming operations continues to rise. According to Compassion in World Farming, as of today 70% of animals raised and killed for food in the UK are confined in factory farms. In addition to the horrific treatment of the billions of animals entangled in its vast infernal apparatus, factory farming is destroying the UK countryside and tearing apart the small rural communities that are forced to live alongside these giant houses of suffering. Among other impositions, the noxious stink of suffering and killing permeates the air and is often so pungent that residents remain holed up indoors.

In supporting the expansion of factory farms through subsidies, DEFRA has clearly lost touch with reality. The knowledge of the immeasurable suffering these massive industrial farming operations entail, and the terrible havoc they are wreaking on the fragile, burning earth and in the emptied and bleached out seas, has shaken our civilization’s once seemingly unshakable sense of entitlement to kill and consume animals and the earth’s resources at will. This growing consciousness has led to many people to adopt a plant-based diet, or to dramatically reduce their consumption of meat, fish, eggs, and dairy.

However, while changes in individual consumption patterns are important, they are not the solution. As many reports suggest, while veganism is on the rise in the UK and US, among other places, so is global meat consumption. In fact, in part due to DEFRA’s irresponsibility, individuals are left to carry the burden of (and indeed pay for!) a system that has profit, not their wellbeing or the wellbeing of the planet in mind. Single mothers and fathers, low-income families, students, and others are left scrambling to square the circle of their moral concern for other animals and the earth in a society that offers up cruelty on a plate at a much lower cost than kindness.

In the recently debated (October 2019) Agriculture Bill 2019–20, DEFRA outlined a commitment to “Replace the current subsidy system, which simply pays farmers based on the total amount of land farmed, and instead reward them for the work they do to enhance the environment and produce high quality food in a more sustainable way.” While this is an encouraging statement, it is unclear what concrete changes will be undertaken. The dramatic rise of factory farms in recent years also undermines the credibility of DEFRA’s purported goal. Is DEFRA speaking out of both sides of its mouth, or are we really to believe that it will truly offer farmers incentives invest in environmentally friendly farm infrastructure?

Whatever the case, the bill does nothing to address the grave injustice against animals raised and killed for food products, or the deleterious impact on small-scale farming and the harm to rural communities that factory farming entails. Even if factory farms are fitted with “green” technologies, they will still use up enormous amounts of very finite resources, they will still be a blight on the landscape, they will still destroy local ecosystems, and they will very likely still rely on soy and corn monocrops imported from other continents to feed the animals languishing in misery within their confines. Indeed, the violence against animals that is intrinsic to animal farming is set to intensify and worsen in kind and degree as biotechnology becomes the go-to solution to increase efficiency on one hand, and decrease the environmental impact of intensive animal production, on the other.

As indicated above, the average individual is caught between what they know is right, and what is affordable and available to them in the supermarket aisles. Driven by conscience to do the right thing — and eat local, organic, plant-based products — but with an understandable sense of powerlessness and/or a lack of economic means — the majority of the public finds itself adapting to and ultimately accepting a system — large-scale intensive animal agriculture — that it knows and feels is fundamentally unconscionable and unsustainable. Thus, individuals and the public as a whole find themselves living a lie: literally consuming the untruth that we can continue with business-as-usual. At best, as concessions to our ethical concerns, we are offered a few tweaks here and there to the system, mostly in the form of slick (and illusory) technological fixes to ecological and welfare issues, but the system itself remains firmly in place, destructive as it is.

System change is absolutely essential if we are to make a dent in the climate crisis. Civilizational change is up next — we must finally tackle human supremacism head on, if we are to avoid total and irreversible moral, social, and environmental breakdown. DEFRA can take steps in this direction by: redirecting farm subsidies to small, sustainable, plant-based agricultural food production operations (which, if supported, could provide a wide range of affordable plant-based products to the public); assisting intensive animal farmers with a transition to plant-based farming; incentivizing new farmers to set up plant-based farms from the get-go; and actively educating the public on the benefits of plant-based foods.

In one hundred years, does DEFRA want to look back with horror and shame at the great historical crime it committed against billions of sentient animals, local communities, local and global ecosystems, and the planet? Or does it want to reflect proudly on the fact that it made the right choice to genuinely commit to a plant-based agricultural revolution?

No one wants to see more bleak barrack-like structures housing tens of thousands of animals in perpetual agony — babies, most of them — popping up in their beautiful rural communities. The grey ugliness of these spaces inside and out reflects the cold profit-driven worldview from which they have sprung, and the mechanical, clockwork cruelty against innocent creatures being perpetuated within. Rolling green hills, lush forests full to the brim with wise old trees and countless insect, animal, and bird species, and bubbling brooks teeming with fish swimming in freedom and joy are existentially unfit for megafarms, as are the gentle beasts confined therein, and as is the human spirit itself.

The post Intensive Animal Farming Operations Are Rapidly Expanding around the UK and DEFRA’s Farm Subsidies Are Largely to Blame first appeared on Animal Rebellion.

At a ‘Women in Dairy’ conference earlier this year, Dr Jude Capper, an ‘independent livestock sustainability consultant’ who also runs the ‘Februdairy’ campaign which attempts to promote animal milk, showed a slide during her presentation which featured two young children drinking what appears to be cows’ milk products. The message on the slide read, ‘Our biggest challenge is to keep dairy in the diets of future food purchasers’.

This targeting of children by the dairy industry is not new, even if, evolutionarily speaking, drinking the bodily secretions of another species is. Set against the 300,000 year history of our species, drinking milk is a relatively new habit. Before about 10,000 years ago, hardly anybody drank milk, and then only on rare occasions.

It was in 1924 that local education authorities in the UK were permitted to provide children with free milk. In 2005, in a paper published in the Economic History Review, Dr Peter Atkins of Durham University reviewed the motivations behind the introduction of cow’s milk in schools during the first half of the twentieth century (Atkins, 2005). He stated that the nutritional benefits of school milk were debatable, possibly even negative in those areas where it replaced other foods, but noted that the dairy industry did well, creating new markets at a time of depression.

Many may not realise that, even today, when childhood obesity is one of the greatest challenges facing us, the government still subsidises milk for children. According to the government website, the scheme ‘subsidises the cost of milk, certain milk products and yoghurts for school children in England, Scotland and Wales. This means that the products can be sold to school children at a lower price. Schools must offer drinking milk before they can supply other eligible milk products or yoghurts. Schools, local authorities, suppliers or other organisations can claim for the subsidy’. The Nursery Milk Scheme allows early years settings and schools to claim back the cost of providing one drink of milk per day to all children under the age of five. I have been unable to find evidence for the total cost of the scheme to taxpayers, but according to Viva, ‘In the academic year 2003 to 2004, around one million school children in England drank 34.9 million litres of subsidised milk at a cost of around £7 million’.

However, the true cost of dairy produced by commodifying sentient animals is harder still to calculate. According to Compassion in World Farming, ‘We have devised a distorting economics which takes account of some costs such as housing and feeding animals but ignores others including the detrimental impact of industrial agriculture on human health and natural resources.

Industrial livestock production contributes to impaired human health, overuse of antimicrobials, environmental degradation, greenhouse gas emissions, loss of biodiversity and wildlife and very poor animal welfare.’

Professor Dieter Helm, chair of the Natural Capital Committee which advises the UK Government points out: “the private costs of farming do not reflect the full social costs”. He continues: “Farmers can avoid costs, by passing on their wastes to others to clean up. Thus fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides can flow into the water supply, for water companies to clean up — and for the water companies to charge their customers accordingly. Slurry and agricultural effluents can leach into the water systems. Land is drained to force off flood waters for others to cope with. Carbon is emitted from the soils without paying a carbon price. Overuse of antibiotics drives up the costs to health care as antibiotic resistance builds up … biodiversity has been reduced without consequences to the farmers who have caused it.” We are all paying the price for animal agriculture, whether directly or indirectly.

Similarly, a report by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has said: “In many countries there is a worrying disconnect between the retail price of food and the true cost of its production. As a consequence, food produced at great environmental cost in the form of greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution, air pollution, and habitat destruction, can appear to be cheaper than more sustainably produced alternatives”. The dairy industry is huge, with around 264 million dairy cows currently in the system. In order to provide milk, like all mammals, a cow has to be pregnant and to give birth. The usual method uses forced impregnation of restrained cows via artificial insemination. Calves born as a result are separated from their mother, usually within 36 hours, to prevent calves drinking their mothers’ valuable milk. This process is usually highly traumatic for such maternal mammals. Most male calves are killed at or soon after birth, or raised for a short time before being killed in order to produce veal. The females usually face the same bleak lives as their mothers-until they are unable to produce enough milk to be profitable to the industry, when they too will be sent to slaughter.

Numerous scandals of truly barbaric treatment of animals on dairy farms have been regularly exposed-the most recent being the undercover filming of dairy farms throughout the UK over an 18 month period by the campaign group Surge. The footage shows scenes of appalling cruelty towards newborn calves and their mothers. The campaign is #DismantleDairy and the shocking abuse, which was documented on every single farm where cameras were placed, can be viewed online.

The cost to us all of allowing the commodification of sentient beings and the downward market pressures on meat and dairy imposing increasingly abhorrent conditions for these gentle creatures isn’t the only cost though. We are in a climate emergency. The environmental impacts of dairy farming are horrendous. According to the US Department of Agriculture Natural Resource Conservation Services, dairy operations can use upwards of 150 gallons of water per day per cow in total, including the water used for drinking and cleaning, and whilst this may be lower on less intensive systems, the efficiency costs are shocking. A University of Minnesota paper quoted in Compassion in World Farming’s report concludes that for every 100 calories of grain fed to animals, we get only about 40 new calories of milk and for every 100 grams of grain protein fed to animals, we get only about 43 new grams of protein in milk. Each cow produces on average 37 kilos of waste every single day. Conventional dairy farming depletes nutrients in the ground and uses huge quantities of fertilisers — which account for roughly 1% of the world’s total energy consumption, whilst methane and nitrous oxide, a climate-warming pollutant 298 times more powerful than carbon dioxide are produced by the industry in huge quantities on every system through the very nature of a cow’s digestive system.

Every nutrient found in milk is available from plants, and the targeting of children and their parents is a particularly odious tactic used by the dairy industry to secure their own profits and future. The organisation ‘Cool Milk’, which runs a scheme for schools and parents to provide milk in schools, has a page called ‘Why milk is great’ on their website which illustrates the way in which parental concerns are used to promote milk. Infographics feature unlabelled graphs and colourful pictures spreading positive messages about milk on children’s health, yet each one features in the small print-very easily missed tucked away at the bottom-admissions that dampen down the hype somewhat. “There appears to be a need to assess this in controlled studies’, ‘the infographic is based on evidence from three available studies…a causal relationship cannot be concluded…more research is certainly needed’. But hey, when they’re offering a free fridge to schools who sign up, who cares? None of the health risks of milk are mentioned, nor the cholesterol, saturated fat, somatic cell counts (pus) limits allowed in milk. Nor is there any mention made of concerns by medical professionals that the bioactive molecules in cow’s milk may direct undesirable regulation, growth and differentiation of various tissues in humans. Of particular concern for example is the insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) which occurs naturally in milk and has been linked to several cancers in humans.

Dairy farming costs us all in one way or another, even if you personally eschew dairy in your diet. The environment, the health costs both to individuals and the state, the subsidies we all pay to this industry through the tax system. Children in the two-thirds of the world that can’t drink milk aren’t suffering from osteoporosis or rickets; in fact, China and Japan, where dairy is not traditionally a staple food source have lower rates of these conditions than Europe. It is frankly unbelievable that the government subsidises an environmentally damaging, unnecessary product and aids the dairy industry in seeking to secure its future profits using children.

The cost to us all is far too high to continue with this archaic system which targets the most vulnerable.

The post Are We All Being Milked? first appeared on Animal Rebellion.