Ruth Hawe's Blog
May 3, 2025
By Peter Stevenson
The International Finance Corporation’s (IFC) website brands many of the well-founded criticisms of industrial animal production as “myths.”
This reflects the regrettably polarized debate between those who believe that industrial agriculture is needed to feed the growing world population and those who, like me, argue that a far-reaching transformation of our food system is needed.
The IFC website states that it is a myth that industrial animal production is bad for food security. The truth, however, is that factory farming diverts food away from people; it is dependent on feeding grain — corn, wheat, barley — to animals who convert these crops very inefficiently into meat and milk.
For every 100 calories of human-edible cereals fed to animals, just 7-27 calories (depending on the species) enter the human food chain as meat. And for every 100 grams of protein in human-edible cereals fed to animals, only 13-37 grams of protein enter the human food chain as meat.
The scale of this is massive. International Grains Council data show that 45% of global grain production is used as animal feed, while 77% of world soy production is used to feed animals.
The inefficiency of doing this is recognized by the United Nations Environment Programme, which states that it is “essential to fight food insecurity and malnutrition … reducing the use of much of the world’s grain production to feed animals and producing more food for direct human consumption can significantly contribute to this objective.”
I calculate that if the use of cereals as animal feed were ended, an extra 2 billion people could be fed, even allowing for the fact that if we reared fewer animals, we would need to grow more crops for direct human consumption.
My figure is very cautious; other studies calculate that ending the use of grains as animal feed would enable an extra 3.5-4 billion people to be fed. Moreover, industrial livestock’s huge demand for these cereals pushes up their price, potentially placing them out of reach of poor populations in the Global South.
So, sorry IFC, but it really is not a myth to say that industrial animal production is bad for food security.
The IFC website dismisses as a myth the argument that industrial animal production is bad for the environment. However, factory farms disgorge large amounts of manure, slurry, and ammonia that pollute air and watercourses.
When ammonia mixes with other gases, it can form particulate matter; this is a key component of air pollution, which can lead to heart and pulmonary disease, respiratory problems, including asthma and lung cancer.
Industrial livestock’s huge demand for cereals as feed has been a key factor fuelling the intensification of crop production. This pivotal link between the livestock and arable sectors is often not recognized.
With its monocultures and high use of chemical pesticides and nitrogen fertilizers, intensive crop production leads to soil degradation, biodiversity loss and overuse and pollution of water.
In short, it erodes the key fundamentals — soils, water and biodiversity — on which our future ability to feed ourselves depends.
Arjem Hoekstra calculates that animals fed on cereals and soy (industrially farmed animals) use 43 times as much surface — and groundwater and are 61 times as polluting of water as animals fed on grass and other roughages.
Its adherents claim that factory farming saves land by cramming animals into crowded sheds. But in reality, it eats up huge amounts of cropland for feed.
European Union studies show that feed production accounts for 99% of the land use of the pig and broiler sectors. It is feed production — not the tiny amount of space given to animals on the farm — that makes factory farming so land-hungry.
The contention that industrial systems undermine the socioeconomic potential of small-scale farmers in the developing world is also branded a myth by the IFC.
The World Bank, however, takes a different view. Its 2024 report “Recipe for a Liveable Planet” states, “The global agrifood system disproportionately and detrimentally affects poor communities and smallholder farmers who cannot compete with industrial agriculture, thereby exacerbating rural poverty and increasing landlessness.”
Instead of funding industrial agriculture, the IFC should help small-scale farmers move to agroecology and regenerative farming which can boost yields, reduce the use of expensive inputs and improve livelihoods.
Also swatted aside as a myth is the mountain of scientific evidence that industrial livestock production results in poor animal welfare. To dismiss the harsh suffering endured by industrially farmed animals as a myth is extraordinary.
In its own Good Practice Note on animal welfare the IFC lists what are commonly recognized to be the key characteristics of factory farming — confinement in narrow stalls, overcrowding, barren environments, painful procedures, hunger and breeding for high yields leading to health disorders — and identifies them as “welfare risks” that need to be tackled.
But now, in a remarkable volte-face, the IFC airily dismisses these problems as a myth.
IFC’s position stands in sharp contrast to the United Nations Environment Programme, which states that “intensive systems deprive animals of some of their most basic physical and psychological needs.”
World Bank economist Berk Özler has written about the value of policies under which low-income countries can grow without causing massive increases in suffering among farmed animals.
He writes, “Perhaps many low-income countries can leapfrog the stage of industrial animal farming, towards something more sensible.”
I urge the IFC to recognize that industrial animal agriculture is destructive — destructive of food security, the environment, small-scale farmer livelihoods and the well-being of animals.
Originally published by Common Dreams.
Peter Stevenson is the chief policy adviser of Compassion in World Farming.
February 14, 2025
October 17, 2024
January 28, 2024
Platitudinosity and Pets
I wrote this piece in 2016 but wish to add an experience just lived through on an artist’s residency. As ever in the intro chat I described my prime directive and motivation as Vegan Artivist for human and non-human Animal Liberation. Hoping, as ever, that others might be inclined to talk to me. Nobody else mentioned the V word, until on the first group walk a lady siddled up to me and said like a quiet confession that she had been Vegan for 35 years. Wow, fantastic, but why keep it to yourself, Lovely? Not wanting to impose or be judgy or annoying, fear of putting people off, honouring the journey of each person… came back the platitudinous excuses for not standing up and being a Voice. This prompted a familiar examination of conscience along the lines of “maybe the ‘pushy averse’ vegans inspire as many as us overt ones do”. As usual I cannot take that chance, having been the sole vegan almost everywhere for decades from 1969, and feeling an absolutely obsessive imperative to raise the Vegan flag at every opportunity, regardless of any perceivedly alienating effect upon relationships, and in society.
Now that more people are coming on board with veganism, I find it necessary to push the envelope and challenge them about our relationship with animals, most especially pets. Simply redefining pets as rescued companions is not adequate…we must be honest about our attachments to and use of fellow Earthlings. I have come out about my compulsive horse rescuing past, and the pain of giving that up as I became more aware of the less than perfect dynamic operating. I made every excuse to carry on : no shoes/ no bits/ no riding/ no rugs/ no stables/ natural this and herd-led that. It was a journey and a process walked ahead of the human pack like most of my steps, in order to be free and translucent for the benefit of those to come.
It feels absolutely vital right now that vegan visionaries, co-creators of the new world we are willing into being, address the future for other beings. It is screaming out from me that they must be given their own land, water, space, free from human contamination. Our duty of care to them demands this. We have so much reparation to accomplish, so much restorative justice to complete, to all species. Because the domesecrated creatures have been engineered to be incapable of living a natural existence, this requires them to be prevented from breeding so that they are the last of their kind to suffer, and that when the last of them dies our collective shame and sorrow may start to heal. Of course they will be supplied with their proper food and essential veterinary care, but the future is not sanctuaries where people can go and interfere with them and feel good about being with them. Sanctuaries are at best a temporary regrettable necessity, a transition stage for them, not for us. The folks who say “My dream is to have a sanctuary” are really expressing a form of pet ownership only one notch above the mainstream abusive attachment issues. Animals need to be with their own kind, unmolested by us, and any future interaction between us and them can only be initiated by them on their terms, should they deem us worthy. All animals should be wild and free. Only then will our own freedom and wildness be liberated.
I welcome those ready to discuss these sorts of issues, because we have to be very clear about what is right and where we are aiming for. Please join me here and on my Vegantopia, Art, Activism FB page which I formed to focus upon these issues. They need not be difficult or divisive if we follow our hearts and hear what the animals have to say about their own lives and future, remembering it is about them, not us with our ludicrous dramas and egos.
May 23, 2022
The end of EXCUSITARIANISM
End of the age of excuses, people – responsibility for all your actions / inactions plus tiny window of reparation opening NOW! Don’t miss the last boat away from the eternal flames of self-damnation – this is not religious apocalyptic talk, but the way that which we have been giving out inevitably returns: magnified and multiplied. Even Pinnochio sang about it decades ago : “Always let your conscience be your guide” Trouble is most folks conscience is in OFF / SLEEP mode and they think that by staying within the centre of the sleeple around them they’re playing safe. WRONG!! Somewhere within that shut-down heart beats an incessant empathic conscience – it IS awakening, and it is very much requiring you to RADICAL CHANGE OF HEART. Embrace change with courage, honour and openness – suffering is optional but awareness of the pain you have caused is not…meaning : be empowered by your awakened conscience to evoke change in your own life and thereby inspire it in others, do not waste any more time feeling bad/overwhelmed and doing nothing = being part of the problem! BE THE LOVE that’s all this world needs – joined up, unequivocal, unstoppable force : then peace shall descend gloriously in serene delight into your life and radiate all around.
(I wrote this 11 years ago, on Facebook, and it popped into my memory feed so I’m sharing it here x)
Cancer research campaigner
My conversation in London yesterday after being stopped by a Cancer Research ‘campaigner’ 
Him: “Can you help donate to help us cure cancer?”
Me: “No, but I can tell you some cures….”
Him: “There are currently no cures for cancer.”
Me: “Have you heard of the 1939 cancer act?”
Him: “No”
Me: “Ah, that explains a lot. Well, there are actually a lot of cures for cancer, but scum bags like CRUK work with the government to make people believe that they can’t treat themselves naturally, because cancer is a £300m a year profitable business.”
Him: “That’s not true, we have been actively looking for a cure. CRUK care about people.”
Me: “Oh, is that why CRUK staff pensions are funded by B&H tobacco company? Or how in 20 years they’ve PROFITED over £4bn and still haven’t managed to find a ‘cure’? They get £635m a year in donations and that’s isn’t enough to tell you that there are hundreds of cures? THC, IV vitamin C, Essiac tea, LDN, mistletoe therapy, apricot kernels, vegan and alkaline diets….maybe – all the money isn’t being spent on researching a cure at all, maybe it’s about researching how to CAUSE cancer… maybe it’s going into the pocket of their CEO hence why he’s on Forbes rich list and holds a 4% share in Roche pharmaceuticals which makes $391.63m a year….and nearly all of that is on chemotherapy or cancer drugs.”
“Miss, if you’re not interested you can just walk on.”
Your blood is not safe to use…
I was lying awake, insomniac that I am, at 3am this morning, and the thought occurred to me that some may consider that my belief in and assertion of Vegantopia might be over romanticised idyllicism. As if freedom for all Earthlings could indicate an existence without suffering. No I don’t think that it is possible under current, grossly negatory vibrational density, for any being to enjoy a life of bliss. That is not the goal though is it. The immediate goal is to end the deliberately inflicted abuses and cruelties of animal enslavement. Nirvana for all is a bit further down the road.
It is yet another example of the twisted reasoning used by carnists to discredit, mock and undermine veganism’s efforts towards all species Liberation. From my earliest attempts to articulate my awareness that things were badly wrong in fharming, back in the late 60’s, I have had to endure the ignorant opinions of the elitest human supremacists denying that there was anything abusive about depriving animals of their right to a natural, self governed life. What could be more natural than to be corralled with a bunch of other castrated clones, with nothing else to do than eat slaughterhouse floor sweepings mixed with the discarded plant fibres from corn flakes and porridge held together with molasses. Foodstuff produced in the cheapest way possible, to get rid of the sinews, bones and gristle of previous occupants of the meat, dairy and egg prison systems.
How inconvenient that only 50% of the live body weight of creatures is palatable to humans. Of course it was clever to mulch up the byproducts and feed it back into the system. There’s only so much blood pudding humans can be induced to eat, so it was discovered to be a usefully proteinatious milk substitute for calves whose real food was stolen to put in tea. What could possibly go wrong in feeding obligate herbivores on the dead bodies of their own kind? CJD for one thing. My brother and his wife were regular blood donors before emigrating to Australia. CJD is known to be so ubiquitous an infection amongst Brits that their blood is too dangerous to be accepted. Have I not been saying for years that what we label as early onset Alzheimers / dementia and other terms for rampant brain mushing is disguised CJD?
When I had my hip replacement surgery I said I’d be willing to have a recycled artificial hip joint. Both because I’m a deep greeny and also because the earlier models used titanium and were well nigh indestructible. Nowadays titanium has been discarded and plastic is used instead. “Oh we don’t re-use hip joints”, I was told. “Well you used to didn’t you, because they cost so much it was a waste to throw them away when their first host passed away?” “Well yes, but then it was discovered that CJD prions lodge in the depths of our joints, so the practise was abandoned and cheaper components used”. Direct quote from my orthopaedic surgeon.
Have you noticed there’s mention of CJD on a lot of medical forms now? And we’re asked a lot to declare if we’ve been around farm animals recently. Mark my words its a hidden epidemic being concealed because there’s no way to kill it. Zombie apocalypse preparedness involves mass internment camps followed by mass graves. But giving up our MAD (MeatAndDairy) addictions is too extreme and controversial a step to consider??
October 20, 2021
Ascension Lessons From Extinction Rebellion and Animal Rebellion
WORD!
Wow this is the best piece of impassioned TRUTH TELLING, the shrillest wake up call I ever read. Read it, share it, speak about it. I will, with deepest gratitude
Is a climate change protester an anarchist criminal or a dangerous person for singing slogans or drumming samba once a year? Have the evil agents really found Morpheus, the terrorist, or Neo (the One) or the Next One?
Is someone who is against child abuse, a militant child rights activist, just because they took action and said it is wrong to abuse children?
Are those speaking or writing against female infanticide and rape being fundamentalistic? Are people speaking about the evils of racism fanatic anti-racism experts?
What do you think about non violent direct activism?
Also what do you think about bacon?
Are those eradicating homophobia and trans rights to be termed extremist gay activists or LGBT speakers?
Similarly are those protesting against climate change to be called criminals for merely standing on streets and singing or drumming once a year, or slightly more often?
Are vegan animal rights activists…
View original post 1,907 more words
April 4, 2021
Current Sensation
Even though we have been preparing for these times our whole lives,
Still the somatic shock is reverberating within each cell of being,
In echo of that chime of time passed,
Futures coalescing,
Opportunity crushed up against perpetuity.
The final 3 pieces of a multidimensional, trans-lifetime puzzle,
Held in the palm of humanity’s hands.
The pause,
Here, now,
Before leaning in, and placing them,
Slowly, deliberately, mindfully into place.
Aware that they are a final act,
A last commentary,
A terminal contribution.
Then comes :The relief of not having to struggle to remain
The grief of not being permitted to witness the closing scenes
Versus the sweet softness of a lost loved one’s lips On a forehead,
Pressing out the last exhalation
As they scoop our liberated spirit up to infinity
Imaginal dissolution
How difficult it is being a creature of light and love
in a world of maggots scrabbling to consume the decaying flesh of others.
I focus instead on their transmogrification potential, and inspire them to pupate.
Our collective challenge and opportunity is to surrender the illusions that keep us cocooned in assumptions and limitations.
And, like the caterpillar, dissolve into our imaginal selves and redefine the world:
envisioning a future that welcomes the butterfly.
