More food for thought
Helen Porter’s letter (6 June), and Hilary Wilson’s (27 June), both on food production, make valid points. I’d like to clarify some of the issues associated with livestock farming as they relate to climate change, biodiversity loss, and our relationship with food.
The past thirty or so years have seen a massive increase in factory farming of livestock. Quantities of feed, largely soya and maize, are imported to feed animals in a meat/milk/egg production line – your locally produced meat may have been fed on crops grown in the Amazon Basin. The quantity of feed required demands intensive cultivation of a lot of land, sometimes referred to as ghost acres, growing monocultures, using fertilisers, biocides, and fossil fuels, resulting in soil degradation and biodiversity loss.
The waste from factory farms is spread on land and washes off into rivers, smothering their life. Furthermore, the animals produce quantities of the powerful greenhouse gas, methane, and nitrous oxide from their dung.
Grass-fed meat sounds like a good alternative but is probably worse, since it requires more land – land that would naturally support biodiverse woodland, a natural carbon sink. The slower animal growth-rate results in the release of more greenhouse gases.
Depending on methodology, scientists calculate that agriculture is responsible for between thirty-three per cent and sixty per cent of global warming, mostly from animal agriculture.
Globalisation has left us disconnected from the realities of food production. It has hidden the harm caused by over-consumption of meat, fish and animal products.
Wendy Pattinson
A choice for peace
Richard Romm (Letters, 20 June) contends that there is a disproportionate focus on Palestine within Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM), listing twenty other war-torn countries needing attention. However, few of these conflicts have lasted as long as the century of injustice suffered by Palestinians, for which British imperial policy is directly responsible.
Quakers have a particular relationship with Palestine – the Friends School in Ramallah was founded in 1869, and for twenty-three years we have managed the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel, directly witnessing the increasing oppression. Action for Palestine is part of our reparations work. Yearly Meeting has repeatedly asked us to challenge colonialism.
This is not about partiality, or choosing sides, it is a choice for peace and justice for Palestinians and Israelis. On the march on 21 June, the chanters called for justice not only in Palestine but in many of the countries on our Friend’s extensive list. The global South recognises ‘We are all Palestinians’ because they have faced similar horrors, and know what lies in store once Palestine is exterminated.
The discernment at Yearly Meeting came about through a long process of testing this concern. Any Friend is free to take up as a concern the case of human rights in other contexts. Our Friend calls for witness. In Gaza now they say this: ‘We are all dead now. We have no hope. All we can do is live in faith. We no longer ask, “How are you?”. We ask instead “What are you doing?”.’
What are you doing, Friends?
Donal Guerin
