08 October 2025
The International Law of Meat Trade
The legal barriers erected by international trade law tend to stymie animal welfare policies. States might, in good faith, fear to violate international trade law. They also use the international trade regimes as a scapegoat for not promoting animal welfare domestically. This happened in Switzerland with foie gras, a cruelty meat product which, after discussion in Parliament, has not been prohibited. The argument was that a market ban might violate WTO law. Continue reading >>
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07 October 2025
Is Meat the New Oil?
For decades, the global community has grappled with the increasingly urgent need for an equitable transition away from fossil fuels – achieving some, but inadequate, progress. Today, there is growing recognition that meat and other animal products, particularly from the industrial systems that enable high levels of meat consumption, also have far-reaching environmental, public health, and social impacts. This industry will need to transform on a similar time frame in order to achieve climate and broader sustainable development goals. Continue reading >>
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07 October 2025
Exxon Knew. Did Big Beef, too?
Just like the fossil fuel industry, the meat industry teamed up with trade associations, public relations, and “merchants of doubt” to distribute disinformation, downplay their role in global warming, and influence climate policy. Our research showed that all of the 10 largest U.S. meat and dairy companies had directly contributed to efforts that minimized the link between animal agriculture and climate change. For eight of the 10 companies, we found evidence of lobbying on climate issues between 2000 and 2019.Just like the fossil fuel industry, the meat industry teamed up with trade associations, public relations, and “merchants of doubt” to distribute disinformation, downplay their role in global warming, and influence climate policy. Continue reading >>
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06 October 2025
How the Sausage Is Made, or Lobbying by the Meat Industry
Despite the negative externalities of meat production, be it for public health, the environment, and, of course, animals themselves, the consumption of meat is still on the rise in many countries in the world, and the regulation of meat production remains lax. One important reason for this lies in the influence that the meat industry has been exerting on lawmaking. Continue reading >>
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03 October 2025
Avian Flu Shows the Need for Transformative Meat Governance
Serious zoonotic risks are inherent in intensive animal production and also in non-intensive animal production. Production scale does not make one type more or less dangerous or immune. Zoonotic disease risk is one compelling justification, among many other reasons discussed in the other contributions to this debate, for transformative meat governance. The issues are urgent, and the time is now. We cannot wait for the next major crisis, the next pandemic, or the next headline news of another animal cruelty exposé in the animal agriculture industry. Continue reading >>
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02 October 2025
The Environmental and Health Impacts of Animal Source Foods
It is now well-established that our diets and the food systems underpinning them have substantial impacts on both our health and the environment. What is also clear is that without dietary changes towards more balanced and predominantly plant-based diets, there is little chance of limiting global warming, biodiversity loss, and environmental resource use and pollution more generally. This contribution summarises research on the environmental, health, and social aspects related to changes in diets and food systems with a particular focus on the role of animal source foods. Continue reading >>
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01 October 2025
Defund Meat: A Call for Transformative Meat Governance
“Defund Meat” may be an unusual and perhaps provocative title for a critical interdisciplinary discussion around meat in the Anthropocene. At first blush, it may sound like a crude activist slogan, or a hopelessly idealistic call for abolishing the meat system. Upon closer examination, however, it turns out to be a sheep in wolf’s clothing. As I shall argue, defunding meat is a much more commonsensical, pragmatic, and mainstream(able) proposition than its radical overtone might initially suggest. Continue reading >>
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13 March 2025
The Heidelberg Declaration on Transforming Global Meat Governance
Meat is at the center of interrelated environmental and public health crises: climate change, biodiversity loss, deforestation, pandemics, food insecurity, unhealthy and unsustainable diets, and institutionalized animal suffering. While eating or not eating meat has traditionally been seen as a private choice, it is increasingly becoming a public and political issue, as the social, ecological, and ethical costs of industrialized meat production are becoming more visible and prominent. Scientific evidence is piling indicating the need for a sustainable food system and dietary transitions away from animal-based foods. Continue reading >>
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