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Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome back to Drilled. I'm Amy Westervelt. In

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Speaker 1: this season, we are going chapter by chapter of a

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Speaker 1: new but very readable academic book that has gathered together

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Speaker 1: all of the peer viewed research on climate obstruction globally,

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Speaker 1: so really digging into the research and everything we know

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Speaker 1: about how this works. Because as much as inaction on

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Speaker 1: climate often gets framed as lack of science or perhaps

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Speaker 1: the wrong messaging framework, this, that, and the other, it's

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Speaker 1: important to remember that we're here because of various acts

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Speaker 1: of sabotage, that certain industries and certain individuals spend a

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Speaker 1: lot of money and a lot of time to block

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Speaker 1: any kind of government policy, to warp the information ecosystem,

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Speaker 1: and to convince the eighty nine percent of people globally,

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Speaker 1: eighty nine percent who want to see action on climate change,

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Speaker 1: that nobody else cares and so they shouldn't talk about it.

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Speaker 1: This isn't just a thing that happened organically, and it's

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Speaker 1: also not a thing that just the fossil fuel industry did.

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Speaker 1: Lots of other industries see regulation of emissions as an

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Speaker 1: existential threat, and we're going to talk about a big

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Speaker 1: one today, the animal agriculture industry, the meat, gez and dairy.

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Speaker 1: They spend a lot of money and a lot of

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Speaker 1: time to convince people that excessive consumption of meat and

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Speaker 1: dairy are healthy, that they are part of various cultural identities,

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Speaker 1: all sorts of other things. I'm joined today by Catherine

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Speaker 1: Labber from the University of Edinburgh and Sylvia Seki from

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Speaker 1: the University of Iowa. They had a fascinating conversation. They

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Speaker 1: blew my mind multiple times throughout, so I hope you enjoy

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Speaker 1: it as much as I did. And for those of

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Speaker 1: you who prefer to consume your podcasts on YouTube, I

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Speaker 1: don't understand you, but we are trying to reach out.

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Speaker 1: So this is actually our first entire episode that also

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Speaker 1: has a video component. You can check that out on YouTube.

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Speaker 1: Just look for Drilled you'll find us. Actually, maybe don't

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Speaker 1: search drilled on too, Drilled podcast, drilled Media, try that

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Speaker 1: check it out. Let us know what you think. We

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Speaker 1: are trying to work on doing more video content, so

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Speaker 1: very open to suggestions there as well. Hope you enjoyed

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Speaker 1: this conversation, so very like basic kind of one on

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Speaker 1: one question to start, I would love to have you

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Speaker 1: just talk briefly about you know, what are the ways

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Speaker 1: that animal agriculture impacts climate change.

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Speaker 2: So briefly, one of the ways in which animal egg

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Speaker 2: influences climate change is through queenascas emissions. So food production

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Speaker 2: is responsible for but one third of anthropodonny queen as

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Speaker 2: gas emissions, and a huge amount of that is from

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Speaker 2: animal egg. So there's must really vary, but it's between

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Speaker 2: twelve and nineteen percent of all queen as gas emissions

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Speaker 2: come from animalag and that's methane, but also nitro oxide

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Speaker 2: doesn't see it.

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Speaker 1: Too, okay. So I know in conversations I've had with

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Speaker 1: various folks about animal egg that one of the recurring

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Speaker 1: themes is that for the fossil fuel guys, they love

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Speaker 1: the idea of individual responsibility and individual action, but the

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Speaker 1: animal egg guys really hate this. And I would love

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Speaker 1: to have you guys kind of explain why that is.

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Speaker 2: I think to me it's really interesting, And having worked

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Speaker 2: in other industries like soft drinks as well, I do

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Speaker 2: wonder if this is a kind of reflection of the

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Speaker 2: stage at which animal egg is obviously has been under

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Speaker 2: radia for climate scientists a little bit later, came under radia.

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Speaker 3: A little bit later than phossil fuels.

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Speaker 2: And so I do feel like we're still in quite

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Speaker 2: an early stage where public awareness isn't as high, and

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Speaker 2: one of the few things that is happening at the

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Speaker 2: moment is individual action and it does do something, obviously,

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Speaker 2: but we are never going to get, you know, get

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Speaker 2: to a point where we're addressing animal agadmissions in any

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Speaker 2: meaningful way without government action.

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Speaker 3: We do need policy. We need to.

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Speaker 2: Change the environments in which people make food decisions. And

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Speaker 2: I feel what we've seen with other industries is that

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Speaker 2: they kind of once regulation and policy came onto the

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Speaker 2: agenda and started happening, like taxes, for example, and marketing restrictions,

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Speaker 2: that's when they started pivoting to, oh, yeah, actually we're

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Speaker 2: quite happy with individual action, why don't we do that instead?

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Speaker 2: So I do wonder, if, you know, be really interested

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Speaker 2: to see if that happens as regulation becomes more of

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Speaker 2: a concrete option. But yeah, I do think individual action

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Speaker 2: is really important, but overall between legislation and I think

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Speaker 2: animal like does know that, and that's why they also

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Speaker 2: do push really hard against that.

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Speaker 4: I would also add that if you compare agriculture and

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Speaker 4: food production with fossil fuels, people have more agency when

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Speaker 4: it comes to the food we eat. Right, if you

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Speaker 4: live in rural Iowa and there is no public transport,

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Speaker 4: you can't really say, hey, I'm going to you know,

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Speaker 4: not use your agency in terms of what you eat,

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Speaker 4: what you buy, and what you eat. And so I

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Speaker 4: think the industry is running all these campaigns basically against

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Speaker 4: individual action, because individual action here has potentially more leverage

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Speaker 4: than it would in the case of fossil fuel and

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Speaker 4: transportation and things like that.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but as you kind of cover in this book chapter,

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Speaker 1: they are starting to campaign against any sort of systemic

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Speaker 1: efforts or the person of maybe the beginning of systemic efforts.

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Speaker 1: Even so, can you talk a little bit about what

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Speaker 1: are some of the more regulatory efforts that have been

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Speaker 1: made and how is industry responding to those?

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Speaker 4: Well, from the US perspective, I can tell you that

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Speaker 4: basically they've been extremely successful. So and I would say

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Speaker 4: that they've been extremely successful at curtailing activity against pollution

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Speaker 4: that they cause. It goes beyond greenhouse gas emissions and

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Speaker 4: think about water quality, think about air quality, right, and

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Speaker 4: so we have seen, for example, that there's been a

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Speaker 4: lot of activity regarding the reporting of where these facilities

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Speaker 4: are because I'm going to try not to use the

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Speaker 4: term confined animal feeding operation or KEFO, which was what

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Speaker 4: we use in the United States. But basically, we have

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Speaker 4: these very very large entities that I hesitate to call

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Speaker 4: farms where you have millions of chickens, you know, thousands

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Speaker 4: of pigs or thousands of dairy cows, for example, and

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Speaker 4: so we know where they are. But the EPA in

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Speaker 4: twenty seventeen basically said, but we're not going to disclose

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Speaker 4: it right to anybody. And in twenty twenty three there

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Speaker 4: was this draft Strategy for Monitoring, measurement, monitoring, reporting, and

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Speaker 4: verification that also kind of like didn't even talk about

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Speaker 4: combined animal feeding operations. It was all about soil organic carbon.

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Speaker 4: So they're being very successful. The industry has been very

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Speaker 4: successful at kind of like diverting attention away from their contribution.

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Speaker 4: It's almost like, oh, look, there's all these other things

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Speaker 4: we can do, don't look here. And the regulatory environment

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Speaker 4: has been very favorable to them in this respect. Across

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Speaker 4: both parties in the United States, this is a bipartisan issue.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And just kind of add to that to zoom

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Speaker 2: out from the United States, I can't over stress how

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Speaker 2: the most important success that they've had is actually to

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Speaker 2: keep proper legislative action of the agenda. Even so in

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Speaker 2: a lot of countries, even speaking about saying meat taxes

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Speaker 2: or anything to regulate herd sizes or to regulate consumption

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Speaker 2: is really really controversial, and I think that that's why

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Speaker 2: we actually haven't observed a lot of concrete pushback against

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Speaker 2: policy measures. But what example would be what happened in

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Speaker 2: New Zealand a couple of years ago. They proposed the

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Speaker 2: first tax on cattle emissions in two thousand and two,

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Speaker 2: and then first the delayed and then after the changing government,

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Speaker 2: the tax has been completely scrapped. So that's kind of

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Speaker 2: one really concrete example of something they've managed to off

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Speaker 2: the agenda and it gets scrapped. But generally kind of

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Speaker 2: keeping things quiet and keeping the threats away has worked

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Speaker 2: really well.

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Speaker 4: I think Catherine's point is kind of like the cracks here,

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Speaker 4: there is absolutely no discussion of consumption issues, everything everything

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Speaker 4: else they might talk about, you know, the tech fixes,

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Speaker 4: but the real cracks of the matter, particularly in the

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Speaker 4: global North, in places like Europe, in places like Australia,

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Speaker 4: in places like the United States, is consumption and how

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Speaker 4: policy facilitates consumption and pushes for consumption. This is not

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Speaker 4: like a free market kind of situation, right, So that's

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Speaker 4: off the table in so many places. You know, we'll

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Speaker 4: talk about this more, But it's not just legislature. Is

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Speaker 4: the science, is the education everything.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and like DIFI guidance is really boring to most people,

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Speaker 2: but that actually gets a lot more heated than you

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Speaker 2: think around animal products and.

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Speaker 1: Towards Yeah, no, I know, I don't know. I randomly

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Speaker 1: had a window into just the way that the industry

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Speaker 1: uses like health influencers too, and has really been involved

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Speaker 1: in this pushing of like more meat, more meat is

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Speaker 1: actually good for you, and butter is actually really good

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Speaker 1: for you, and all of this stuff. So yeah, anyway, Okay,

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Speaker 1: I wanted to ask you about this two thousand and

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Speaker 1: six Long Shadow Report. You have a little call out

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Speaker 1: on this in the chapter, and I think it's really interesting,

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Speaker 1: But like people outside of the sort of food and

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Speaker 1: egg universe don't necessarily know what this report is, and

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Speaker 1: it was so important that I'd love to have you

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Speaker 1: kind of say what was this report and why did

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Speaker 1: it spark so much concern from the animal egg industry, lifetock.

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Speaker 2: So Long Shadow is really really important to people like

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Speaker 2: us because essentially it was the first estimate of the

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Speaker 2: life stock sectors contribution to global anthropogenic climate change. So

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Speaker 2: this is the first time at least a authority of

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Speaker 2: agency like the UN agency, Food, an alcopult organization that

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Speaker 2: published it put a number and how much of our

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Speaker 2: quenascus emissions comes from livestock, and they put that at

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Speaker 2: eighteen percent. Again, that's been contested since and the number

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Speaker 2: is varied, but we're not that far off that now.

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Speaker 2: But essentially that was the first time that there's been

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Speaker 2: a really concrete warning of the environmental consequences of business

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Speaker 2: as usual in the life sect sector. If say, we

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Speaker 2: keep growing a media dairy consumption as we are doing

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Speaker 2: right now. They put a really clear warning up that

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Speaker 2: this is not going to be tenable in environmental and

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Speaker 2: climate twins. And when that initially landed the report, it

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Speaker 2: was pretty quiet. It took a couple of years to

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Speaker 2: probably gain traction. But as the report itself gained more

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Speaker 2: traction among people interested in climate and themal welfare for example,

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Speaker 2: the pushback also started to develop a lot. And you

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Speaker 2: could tell that particularly the beef industry that had been

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Speaker 2: highlighted as a major source of emissions in the report,

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Speaker 2: got pretty nervous and there was a more concerted effort

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Speaker 2: to discredit the report's message that kind of emerged around

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Speaker 2: two thousand and nine twenty ten, alongside the kind of

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Speaker 2: growing positive attention.

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Speaker 3: One of the things that happened that.

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Speaker 2: We addressed in the chapter is that the beef industry

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Speaker 2: awarded some funding to someone called Commit Learner, who was

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Speaker 2: a scientist with a bant background in animal science and

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Speaker 2: UC Davis, and he was essentially funded to assess Livestock

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Speaker 2: song Shadow. What came out of that process is essentially

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Speaker 2: a article that he could published with other academics, where,

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Speaker 2: among other things, an argument that he makes is that

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Speaker 2: the comparison between livestock emissions and transport emissions that's made

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Speaker 2: in the executive summary of Livestock Song Shadow, where the

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Speaker 2: authors say something along the lines of life stock submissions

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Speaker 2: are greater than transport. He says that essentially that that's

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Speaker 2: flawed because the lifetecle emissions calculation included full life cycle

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Speaker 2: assessments where the transport one didn't. So on this tiny

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Speaker 2: tiny point that was not really something that came out

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Speaker 2: of the formal analysis of the authors. That was just

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Speaker 2: kind of a point that was picked up in the

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Speaker 2: executive summary for and was picked up in a lot

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Speaker 2: of media reporting actually, but that's what he really lashed onto,

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Speaker 2: and one of the authors of life Stocks Some Shadow

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Speaker 2: even acknowledged that, yeah, he has a point, But essentially

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Speaker 2: the meat of the report wasn't really in question. Ever,

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Speaker 2: the main analysis of how much emissions does lifet contribute

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Speaker 2: was never really in question. But the problem is afterwards,

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Speaker 2: the way that this was reported in the media and

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Speaker 2: also by a lot of industry groups is essentially the

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Speaker 2: link between animal agriculture and climate change and quenascas emissions

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Speaker 2: had been debunked. And there's also kind of I think

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Speaker 2: one someone described Midlearner as the scientist who debunked livestock shadow.

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Speaker 2: So this is a really interesting example, and it wasn't

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Speaker 2: just him. There was a lot of other noise around

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Speaker 2: the report, and there was a lot of other pushback.

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Speaker 2: But that's a really really interesting example of how something

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Speaker 2: really small essentially led to the discrediting in the eyes

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Speaker 2: of some of this really really important report. And I

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Speaker 2: note that also picked off a lot of complaints that

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Speaker 2: the FAO, the Food and Agriculture Organization got internally from

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Speaker 2: some member states and some of the industry groups that

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Speaker 2: they work with, and that's kind of picked off a

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Speaker 2: lot of discussions internally within their fail but how they

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Speaker 2: deal with livestock and climate change.

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Speaker 1: And we should note that Midliner receives quite a bit

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Speaker 1: of funding from the industry.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, still very involved in interesting discussions that are going

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Speaker 2: on at the moment about how we measure.

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Speaker 3: Methane that could have major implications for what we.

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Speaker 2: Do about animal agriculture, So he remains very relevant.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, Okay, I want to make sure we talk about

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Speaker 1: some of the early days too, because actually, for me

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Speaker 1: ben as a climate reporter, and I think a lot

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Speaker 1: of other people too, there's this tendency to think that

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Speaker 1: the industry just started pushing back on stuff around climate

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Speaker 1: and emissions, you know, and in response to livestock's long shadow.

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Speaker 1: But they were working on things in the nineties too,

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Speaker 1: So can I have you talk a little bit about

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Speaker 1: what that what the industry obstruction looked like in the

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Speaker 1: nineties as well.

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Speaker 4: Actually it starts before the nineties. So there's a paper

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Speaker 4: that Jennifer Duquet and Vivicamores, who are also co author

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Speaker 4: of this chapter, wrote this year where they trace back

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Speaker 4: some of the early efforts to nineteen eighty nine, because

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Speaker 4: in nineteen eighty nine EPA held this workshop and then

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Speaker 4: published a report on reducing methane emissions from livestock, and

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Speaker 4: that kind of like triggers some of the early strategies

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Speaker 4: that we see that you know, that Catherine was talking about,

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Speaker 4: that they're using today. So we have the National Cattleman Association,

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Speaker 4: with which is today the National Cattleman's Beef Association, basically

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Speaker 4: hiring public relation firms, forming coalitions with other industry members,

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Speaker 4: coming up with campaigns and slogans that are pro beef production.

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Speaker 4: And again I want to emphasize that this is all

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Speaker 4: part of an overall strategy to gut any possible regulatory

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Speaker 4: action beyond greenhouse gases too, because at that point we

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Speaker 4: have more and more concentration of livestock production, and so

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Speaker 4: the industry realizes that they need to overcome the facts

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Speaker 4: right with Actually, in my house, my kid came up

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Speaker 4: with this term propaganda, you know, with a message that

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Speaker 4: basically goes counter to all the evidence, where whether it's climate, water, air, labor, conditions,

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Speaker 4: you know, all the issues associated with agriculture. And I

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Speaker 4: think that's why they've been so successful. It's because they've

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Speaker 4: had this history that's now you know, decades long of

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Speaker 4: campaigns and the co opting, as Katherine was saying, co

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Speaker 4: opting parts of the scientific community too.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's fascinating. Okay, we're going to come back

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Speaker 1: to the US for like a lot, because it you know,

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Speaker 1: it does so much, always doing the most. But I

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Speaker 1: would love to talk about what this looks like in

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Speaker 1: some other places too. So let's start with the European Union.

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Speaker 1: What does climate obstruction look like coming from the Animal

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Speaker 1: act guys in the EU.

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Speaker 2: Yes, So we looked at the EU because they are

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Speaker 2: parfterward that consumes and produces a lot of animal protein,

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Speaker 2: and that's why they have arguably more responsibility in other

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Speaker 2: parts of the world for addressing the missions that come

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Speaker 2: from food production through animals. So the situation that we

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Speaker 2: have in the European Union that will start with essentially

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Speaker 2: is that the European Union spends its largest the largest

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Speaker 2: part of his budget on agriculture actually, so they have

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Speaker 2: a huge agriculture policy program called the Common Agricultural Policy

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Speaker 2: that goes back to the nineteen sixties and actually in

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Speaker 2: the same year as the Agricultural Policy was founded launched.

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Speaker 2: Initially we have seen the start of the most powerful

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Speaker 2: and still active agricultural lobby group that they have in

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Speaker 2: the European Union.

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Speaker 3: That's called Coppakajeca.

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Speaker 2: So that was established in nineteen sixty two, the same

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Speaker 2: year as the policy, and so a lot of these

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Speaker 2: kind of this interest representation around agriculture goes a really

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Speaker 2: really long way back, and agricul cultural interests are really

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Speaker 2: entrined and have a huge amount of political sway in

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Speaker 2: the European Union context. And obviously this looks really different

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Speaker 2: at national context that you know, in all the member states.

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Speaker 3: But essentially at the EU level that's always a huge debate.

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Speaker 2: And in more recent years what we've seen is that

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Speaker 2: as climate change becomes a bigger issue and it's really

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Speaker 2: acknowledged by the European Union through strategies like the Eogreen

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Speaker 2: Deal for example, we've seen this clash between this really

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Speaker 2: entrined agricultural kind of workstream and the Common Agricultural Policy

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Speaker 2: and everything around it. They have an Agricultural Ministry department

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Speaker 2: as well. Do do you agree within the European Union,

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Speaker 2: we've seen this clash between those entried interests kind of

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Speaker 2: promote agricultural production. Again, this is more about quantity than

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Speaker 2: about what we produce. And then at the same time,

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Speaker 2: the main aim has always been to generate livelihoods for farmers.

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Speaker 2: So it's like there's an economic and there's a production element.

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Speaker 2: There's never been an environmental element to it. And as

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Speaker 2: this environmental aim has kind of come in a bit more,

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Speaker 2: we've seen a lot of issues essentially. So one of

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Speaker 2: the most ambitious kind of pieces of strategy that EU

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Speaker 2: is published in the last couple of years is the

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Speaker 2: Founder Folk Strategy, which I'm.

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Speaker 3: Sure you've heard about as well.

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Speaker 2: That was really ambitious in combining not just production but

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Speaker 2: also kind of bringing in the consumption element. And they

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Speaker 2: were saying, which is exactly what we need particularly and

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Speaker 2: I'm just talking about livestock and animal agriculture here, but

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Speaker 2: if we just do one or the other, that's not

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Speaker 2: really going to fix the problem. We do need both,

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Speaker 2: and the fund of Folk Strategy addressed that really nicely,

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Speaker 2: and it was quite an abitious piece of strategy. But strategy

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Speaker 2: alone doesn't do anything we needs to happen in the

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Speaker 2: European Unions that this needs to be turned into legislation,

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Speaker 2: and very sadly, what we've seen with almost all of

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Speaker 2: the files at the consumption end is that they've not

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Speaker 2: gone anywhere, So a lot of these have been abandoned,

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Speaker 2: and at least to some extent, this can be traced

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Speaker 2: back to the power that agricultural lobbies have in the

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Speaker 2: European Union. And we're also so kind of around a

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Speaker 2: similar time of the fund folk strategy, we also sort

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Speaker 2: of kind of emergence of groups specifically focused on livestock.

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Speaker 2: So we have something called the European Livestock that was

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Speaker 2: formed by Corbacajaca and some other groups representing meat, feed, leather,

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Speaker 2: kind of meat production and any allied industries, and they're

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Speaker 2: specifically aiming to promote pro life of messaging.

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Speaker 3: So it's not only they're doing, but.

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Speaker 2: Essentially, you know that emergence of those kind of groups

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Speaker 2: really illustrates a level of concern that came about emergence

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Speaker 2: of farmer fork.

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Speaker 1: Here's a little clip from European Livestock Voices video on

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Speaker 1: the farm to fork strategy, just to give your little

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Speaker 1: taste of what they do.

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Speaker 5: The nine paradoxes of farm to Fork. At this time,

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Speaker 5: Europe is reviewing its food system and proposing a strategy

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Speaker 5: for transitioning to more sustainable production. It is called farm

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Speaker 5: to Fork and it is part of a larger and

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Speaker 5: more complex plan called the Green Deal. This project contains

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Speaker 5: ambitious and far reaching targets, but there are also a

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Speaker 5: few paradoxes steming from the preconception that meat is not

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Speaker 5: sustainable to the environment nor our health.

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Speaker 2: And yeah, because of this, and because of you know,

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Speaker 2: for all of other reasons, we've had a right shift

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Speaker 2: in European Parliament, for example, and we've had a lot

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Speaker 2: of farms protests that will get back to later. That's

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Speaker 2: why a lot of these files have sadly not not

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Speaker 2: manifested into actual legislation.

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Speaker 1: Interesting, Okay, let's talk about China, which I don't feel

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Speaker 1: like we talk about enough around animal agriculture, but it's

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Speaker 1: very interesting. So, yeah, what is happening in China? Run

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Speaker 1: this topic?

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Speaker 4: Well, in China, you know, and more generally, I would say,

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Speaker 4: in all the brick countries, so Brazil, Russia, China, and India.

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Speaker 4: Would India being a little bit of an exception because

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Speaker 4: of their you know, cultural differences in terms of eating meat,

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Speaker 4: meat consumption, and the consumption of red meat. As the

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Speaker 4: country became has become richer, was actually promoted by the government,

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Speaker 4: and in general, environmental regulations associated with agriculture have lagged

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Speaker 4: behind all sorts of other environmental regulations.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 4: We know that China is really exploded in terms of

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Speaker 4: green energy and the production and consumption of solar panels

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Speaker 4: and things like that, but it's not the same thing

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Speaker 4: in the case of animal agriculture, because there's still this

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Speaker 4: kind of, you know, traditional role that food and the

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Speaker 4: promotion of certain types of food has had. In terms

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Speaker 4: of internal policies, China is very driven by internal needs.

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Speaker 4: They are a big player on the world market in

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Speaker 4: terms of I mean, they're the biggest consumers of meat now,

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Speaker 4: but they also need a lot of imports and they're

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Speaker 4: not really that concerned with environmental regulations and environmental issues.

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Speaker 4: We're starting to see some movements there, but I would

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Speaker 4: say the Chinese meat production industry doesn't have the same

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Speaker 4: kind of you know, threats to their footprint that we

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Speaker 4: have seen in places like the European Union and the US.

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Speaker 4: In Brazil, you know, because Brazil is a completely different

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Speaker 4: story compared to China.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so actually, yeah, let's talk about Brazil because it's

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Speaker 1: so interesting, and you know, we're heading into this Cup

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Speaker 1: in Brazil and a couple of months too, so yeah,

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Speaker 1: what's the situation there.

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Speaker 4: So Brazil is all about production, right, Brazil is a

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Speaker 4: big exporter of commodities, agricultural commodities in particular, and there

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Speaker 4: is this huge tension between the promotion of agri business

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Speaker 4: and the protection of the Amazon. In these days, more

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Speaker 4: and more we appreciate the Serado savannah as an ecosystem

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Speaker 4: to protect, and so in Brazil, this kind of like

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Speaker 4: Cago war of the agribusiness in particular has a long history.

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Speaker 4: There is a ruralist caucus in the Brazilian legislature, and

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Speaker 4: there's all sorts of associations that agribusiness is involved in,

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Speaker 4: all sorts of local you know, all the way up.

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Speaker 4: It's a federalist country, so all the way up from

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Speaker 4: local to national, and a very long history of obstruction

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Speaker 4: of regulations and also a history of trying to work

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Speaker 4: through private public partnerships. In the case of beef and

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Speaker 4: soybeans for example, some of these things have been driven

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Speaker 4: by the global North. So it was the buyers of

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Speaker 4: Brazilian soyabeans or Brazilian beef who put some conditions on

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Speaker 4: where these things would be raised and grown. But of

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Speaker 4: course a lot of this was uphanded by Bolsonaro and

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Speaker 4: we're still kind of trying to figure out where we

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Speaker 4: go from there. One thing that I would say is

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Speaker 4: that Lula is much more progressive, of course in Bolsonao.

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Speaker 4: But these interests in Brazil, both the agri business and

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Speaker 4: the oil interests, let's not forget that powerful. And so

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Speaker 4: even though there's more protection for indigenou as people, more

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Speaker 4: considerations of consideration of environmental consequences, it's not all.

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Speaker 1: Roses right right. We're working on a project in Brazil

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Speaker 1: right now with a group of reporters there, and they

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Speaker 1: were just trying to explain to me that Agro is

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Speaker 1: pop campaign. They're like, do you know that agro is pop?

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Speaker 1: And I'm like no. So even that level of like

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Speaker 1: cultural power is interesting.

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Speaker 4: I mean, per capita, I think Argentina is by far

437
00:25:37,200 --> 00:25:42,600
Speaker 4: the biggest consumer right and Brazil is not very far behind.

438
00:25:42,640 --> 00:25:46,600
Speaker 4: And so you really see the the culture associated with

439
00:25:46,680 --> 00:25:50,280
Speaker 4: a certain type of patterns of consumption and of course

440
00:25:50,320 --> 00:25:54,760
Speaker 4: the industry launches into that right and create narratives associated

441
00:25:54,800 --> 00:25:55,040
Speaker 4: with that.

442
00:25:55,600 --> 00:25:59,960
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, Okay. So it seems like governments in general,

443
00:26:00,240 --> 00:26:06,720
Speaker 1: especially in countries where animal egg is a big industry economically,

444
00:26:06,920 --> 00:26:12,120
Speaker 1: have been very resistant to regulating this industry. I would say,

445
00:26:12,160 --> 00:26:16,760
Speaker 1: maybe more so than the energy industry, Like there's something

446
00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:20,800
Speaker 1: about it that makes them not want to touch it.

447
00:26:20,880 --> 00:26:23,720
Speaker 1: So I'm curious for your thoughts on that. Why is

448
00:26:23,760 --> 00:26:28,240
Speaker 1: it that governments are so averse to regulating this industry.

449
00:26:28,880 --> 00:26:32,160
Speaker 2: I mean, from my perspective, one really important point here

450
00:26:32,280 --> 00:26:35,359
Speaker 2: is what we call agricultural exceptionalism, and that's kind of

451
00:26:35,400 --> 00:26:39,679
Speaker 2: the approach of treating agriculture, including animal agriculture, as a

452
00:26:39,680 --> 00:26:43,120
Speaker 2: really exceptional industry that we can't treat the same way

453
00:26:43,160 --> 00:26:46,600
Speaker 2: as other industries. And that's got something to do cultural importance.

454
00:26:46,640 --> 00:26:49,000
Speaker 2: I think that we've touched on a lot at political importance,

455
00:26:49,080 --> 00:26:51,560
Speaker 2: but also this kind of sense that everybody needs to

456
00:26:51,600 --> 00:26:55,399
Speaker 2: eat and that's why we can't just regulate. And I

457
00:26:55,440 --> 00:26:58,080
Speaker 2: think that's particularly from my perspective, in the European Union,

458
00:26:58,080 --> 00:27:00,359
Speaker 2: but also in the other regions we mentioned us, and

459
00:27:00,400 --> 00:27:03,199
Speaker 2: results really work in a favor, and I think industry

460
00:27:03,200 --> 00:27:05,520
Speaker 2: has done a very good job at maintaining this and

461
00:27:05,640 --> 00:27:08,639
Speaker 2: upholding this, even as we've seen really high levels of

462
00:27:08,640 --> 00:27:11,040
Speaker 2: corporate concentration. So we're not just you know, a lot

463
00:27:11,040 --> 00:27:13,000
Speaker 2: of the time, we're not talking about farmers, we're talking

464
00:27:13,040 --> 00:27:16,240
Speaker 2: about really large corporations, but they're still kind of being

465
00:27:16,280 --> 00:27:20,000
Speaker 2: treated as if they're you know, in need of protecting.

466
00:27:20,640 --> 00:27:22,679
Speaker 2: And there was a lot of NEOs to this, but

467
00:27:22,680 --> 00:27:24,240
Speaker 2: I think that's a major factor.

468
00:27:24,400 --> 00:27:27,400
Speaker 4: And I think they've been very successful in terms of

469
00:27:27,480 --> 00:27:34,680
Speaker 4: achieving bipartisanship, right or multipartisanship. So a really good example

470
00:27:34,720 --> 00:27:38,520
Speaker 4: that ties in with the Catherines farm to fork conversation,

471
00:27:40,240 --> 00:27:43,960
Speaker 4: both the first Trump administration and then when Biden came

472
00:27:44,000 --> 00:27:49,960
Speaker 4: in the USCA under Vilsack. We're absolutely opposed to the

473
00:27:50,040 --> 00:27:53,000
Speaker 4: farm to fork strategy. I think Veilsa calls it in

474
00:27:53,560 --> 00:27:58,639
Speaker 4: one clip the farm to empty fork strategy, and we

475
00:27:58,920 --> 00:28:04,200
Speaker 4: really rests right. They're really afraid, clearly of the reduction

476
00:28:04,280 --> 00:28:07,520
Speaker 4: of the consumer side of things and the dietary aspect

477
00:28:07,760 --> 00:28:12,840
Speaker 4: right being brought in through legislation and regulation, and I

478
00:28:12,880 --> 00:28:15,760
Speaker 4: think that's that's very indicative, right of the type of

479
00:28:15,800 --> 00:28:16,879
Speaker 4: opposition you see.

480
00:28:16,920 --> 00:28:17,720
Speaker 3: So in Brazil.

481
00:28:17,840 --> 00:28:20,679
Speaker 4: You know, like we eat meat in Europe. We have

482
00:28:20,800 --> 00:28:24,760
Speaker 4: to protect our farmers, you know which I'm from Italy

483
00:28:24,800 --> 00:28:27,480
Speaker 4: by the way, and you know when I go back home,

484
00:28:27,720 --> 00:28:32,280
Speaker 4: we eat like Dutch pork in Sardinia. You know which

485
00:28:32,320 --> 00:28:34,159
Speaker 4: is like which farmers.

486
00:28:33,800 --> 00:28:34,639
Speaker 3: Are you protective?

487
00:28:34,840 --> 00:28:40,720
Speaker 4: You know, antual operations pork from the Netherlands. It's not

488
00:28:40,800 --> 00:28:44,480
Speaker 4: particularly culturally appropriate or anything like that. But that's not

489
00:28:44,600 --> 00:28:45,480
Speaker 4: the story you hear.

490
00:28:45,840 --> 00:28:49,000
Speaker 1: That's really interesting. Okay, I want to talk about some

491
00:28:49,120 --> 00:28:52,040
Speaker 1: of the common narratives. We've talked about them a little bit,

492
00:28:52,120 --> 00:28:56,000
Speaker 1: but what are the narratives that got used to kind

493
00:28:56,040 --> 00:28:59,760
Speaker 1: of tell this like hands off of animal agg story.

494
00:29:00,360 --> 00:29:03,840
Speaker 2: We have pulled out five main narratives for the chapter,

495
00:29:03,960 --> 00:29:06,240
Speaker 2: which wasn't easy because they're all really related and it's

496
00:29:06,240 --> 00:29:10,160
Speaker 2: incredibly context dependent. But one the five narratives that we've

497
00:29:10,160 --> 00:29:12,000
Speaker 2: seen kind of across the board and across the different

498
00:29:12,040 --> 00:29:16,479
Speaker 2: regions are firstly, that animal agriculture's contributions to the climate

499
00:29:16,520 --> 00:29:19,880
Speaker 2: crisis are uncertain or overstated, and you often find out

500
00:29:19,880 --> 00:29:21,960
Speaker 2: with the kind of you know, in the scientific space,

501
00:29:21,960 --> 00:29:24,600
Speaker 2: in particular basically saying there's no consensus, we need to

502
00:29:24,600 --> 00:29:28,440
Speaker 2: do more work bringing all those scientists that say opposite, essentially,

503
00:29:28,720 --> 00:29:30,560
Speaker 2: like doctor MacLean that we talked about earlier.

504
00:29:30,680 --> 00:29:31,640
Speaker 3: So that's really common.

505
00:29:31,680 --> 00:29:34,520
Speaker 2: But then also within that you also get the animal

506
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:36,360
Speaker 2: arg is actually only a small part of the mission,

507
00:29:36,360 --> 00:29:38,719
Speaker 2: so we should really focus on fossil fuels and we

508
00:29:38,760 --> 00:29:41,600
Speaker 2: don't deserve to be a target here, So that's also

509
00:29:41,640 --> 00:29:44,360
Speaker 2: really common. The second narrative that we picked up on

510
00:29:44,600 --> 00:29:49,480
Speaker 2: was that livestock production is essential or positive for public health,

511
00:29:49,480 --> 00:29:53,040
Speaker 2: for food security, for the climate. So you get a

512
00:29:53,040 --> 00:29:56,960
Speaker 2: lot of talk that basically, if we didn't have animal agriculture,

513
00:29:56,960 --> 00:29:59,360
Speaker 2: we didn't have food security, which is a really paradoxical

514
00:29:59,440 --> 00:30:02,200
Speaker 2: argument to make because we grow so much, we grow

515
00:30:02,240 --> 00:30:05,560
Speaker 2: so much grains and soy to feed animals, which is

516
00:30:05,600 --> 00:30:10,280
Speaker 2: a really inefficient way of using land and resources. So yeah,

517
00:30:10,280 --> 00:30:12,000
Speaker 2: but that comes up a lot, and you get off

518
00:30:12,040 --> 00:30:15,400
Speaker 2: the kind of dystopian narratives like the Servia said the

519
00:30:15,400 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 2: farmflare empty fork, or one of the European livestock groups

520
00:30:18,880 --> 00:30:21,640
Speaker 2: said that farmer fork was going to lead to societal chaos,

521
00:30:21,720 --> 00:30:25,120
Speaker 2: which is incredibly dystopian. Yeah, and then you also, you know,

522
00:30:25,240 --> 00:30:27,520
Speaker 2: you get to argument a lot about farmers and you know,

523
00:30:27,560 --> 00:30:31,040
Speaker 2: the importance for economic growth and livelihoods, and also again

524
00:30:31,200 --> 00:30:33,560
Speaker 2: kind of paradoxically, you get a lot of arguments around

525
00:30:33,640 --> 00:30:38,080
Speaker 2: environmental stewardship under this narrative, so that livestock, particularly in

526
00:30:38,160 --> 00:30:41,000
Speaker 2: I think North America, that grazing is really important to

527
00:30:41,080 --> 00:30:45,640
Speaker 2: maintain land, which is there's never any discussion of scale

528
00:30:45,680 --> 00:30:47,680
Speaker 2: and of how much meat could we technique we could

529
00:30:47,720 --> 00:30:50,040
Speaker 2: we really eat if we were to graze all animals

530
00:30:50,040 --> 00:30:52,520
Speaker 2: that we eat. So yeah, In connected to that, you

531
00:30:52,600 --> 00:30:55,400
Speaker 2: often get of green branding of grass fed beef for example,

532
00:30:55,600 --> 00:30:58,960
Speaker 2: that's been challenged a lot, like Tyson sprays and beef

533
00:30:58,960 --> 00:31:02,080
Speaker 2: for example. A fair narrative that we picked up on

534
00:31:02,440 --> 00:31:05,360
Speaker 2: was that any climate impacts that agriculture animal acc does

535
00:31:05,400 --> 00:31:08,080
Speaker 2: have that they do accept can be addressed through technical

536
00:31:08,120 --> 00:31:11,080
Speaker 2: fixes and sevia somehow said really well already, but there's

537
00:31:11,120 --> 00:31:14,600
Speaker 2: a huge emphasis at the moment, at least not necessarily

538
00:31:14,600 --> 00:31:17,400
Speaker 2: on contesting that there is a contribution of animal ac

539
00:31:17,480 --> 00:31:21,000
Speaker 2: to greenas gas emissions, but there's a huge emphasis and essentially,

540
00:31:21,040 --> 00:31:23,520
Speaker 2: all we're going to do efficiency increases, We are going

541
00:31:23,600 --> 00:31:26,600
Speaker 2: to reduce how much emissions we produce per kilogram, but

542
00:31:26,600 --> 00:31:28,800
Speaker 2: we're not going to talk about how much we produce overall,

543
00:31:29,120 --> 00:31:32,880
Speaker 2: we're going to talk about relative emissions intensity and the

544
00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:35,360
Speaker 2: kind of technologies that come in here, our feed additives

545
00:31:35,400 --> 00:31:38,400
Speaker 2: for example, vaccines, et cetera. A lot of these might

546
00:31:38,440 --> 00:31:40,720
Speaker 2: do something, but a lot of these are really tricky

547
00:31:40,760 --> 00:31:43,959
Speaker 2: to scale. And again there's a really there's a lot

548
00:31:43,960 --> 00:31:47,000
Speaker 2: of authoritative reports, including for example, from the World Bank

549
00:31:47,120 --> 00:31:49,440
Speaker 2: that's say, the most cost effective thing we can do

550
00:31:49,840 --> 00:31:54,920
Speaker 2: to address life circumissions is to reduce consumption. And the

551
00:31:54,960 --> 00:31:57,200
Speaker 2: fourth narrative we picked up on was that regulating life

552
00:31:57,200 --> 00:32:00,960
Speaker 2: circumissions or consumption is unfeasible DAMA. So this kind of

553
00:32:00,960 --> 00:32:03,920
Speaker 2: ties to the benefits that they illustrate, so that essentially

554
00:32:04,360 --> 00:32:08,160
Speaker 2: scaling down production of consumption would really harm food security,

555
00:32:08,280 --> 00:32:12,000
Speaker 2: would harm livelihoods in town environment. And that's also connected

556
00:32:12,000 --> 00:32:14,520
Speaker 2: to kind of claims that agriculture is already doing enough

557
00:32:14,560 --> 00:32:19,040
Speaker 2: to solve the problem through technofixes. And then lastly, and

558
00:32:19,120 --> 00:32:23,040
Speaker 2: this actually animal rights activists have probably received at to most,

559
00:32:23,040 --> 00:32:24,720
Speaker 2: but you get a lot of arguments that the people

560
00:32:24,760 --> 00:32:29,040
Speaker 2: that are advocating for meat production are extremists and misguided.

561
00:32:29,440 --> 00:32:31,600
Speaker 2: We saw that really strongly around the launch of the

562
00:32:31,640 --> 00:32:34,200
Speaker 2: eat landset Clinanciy Health diet a couple of years ago,

563
00:32:34,200 --> 00:32:35,840
Speaker 2: and it'd be interesting to see what happens when the

564
00:32:35,840 --> 00:32:40,080
Speaker 2: next one comes out in October. So yeah, this is

565
00:32:40,080 --> 00:32:41,640
Speaker 2: really common as well, and I think a lot of

566
00:32:41,640 --> 00:32:44,760
Speaker 2: scientists get this, but animal rights activists are probably most

567
00:32:44,800 --> 00:32:46,480
Speaker 2: familiar with those kind of arguments.

568
00:32:47,080 --> 00:32:49,600
Speaker 4: Let me give you a couple of examples. And emeritus

569
00:32:49,720 --> 00:32:53,960
Speaker 4: professor from Davis actually wrote a paper with walk on

570
00:32:54,080 --> 00:32:59,480
Speaker 4: the title attacking the eat Lancet study as being written

571
00:32:59,560 --> 00:33:04,600
Speaker 4: by extremists. You know so and by the way, he's

572
00:33:04,640 --> 00:33:07,680
Speaker 4: an agricultural economist, so they take.

573
00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:11,240
Speaker 1: Not a scientist. Then the construction.

574
00:33:11,000 --> 00:33:15,000
Speaker 4: Levels that the industry wants for granted. And then I

575
00:33:15,000 --> 00:33:18,760
Speaker 4: think another good example of these strategies, which ties in

576
00:33:18,840 --> 00:33:22,080
Speaker 4: with a lot of like what Drilled has discussed, is

577
00:33:22,120 --> 00:33:26,840
Speaker 4: this issue of biodigesters, right, because biodigesters are an end

578
00:33:26,840 --> 00:33:31,760
Speaker 4: of pipe tech fix that doesn't really change anything upstream.

579
00:33:32,600 --> 00:33:36,200
Speaker 4: They have been really pushed by California, right, the Low

580
00:33:36,200 --> 00:33:41,760
Speaker 4: Carbon Fuel Standard has really expanded this technology beyond the

581
00:33:42,400 --> 00:33:47,240
Speaker 4: borders of California. And I think in terms of the narrative,

582
00:33:47,320 --> 00:33:50,640
Speaker 4: what they say is a little bit like in the

583
00:33:50,680 --> 00:33:54,440
Speaker 4: case of ethanol. They say, oh, we're part of the solution.

584
00:33:55,040 --> 00:33:57,120
Speaker 4: Look at all the things we're doing to be part

585
00:33:57,120 --> 00:34:01,880
Speaker 4: of the solution. When these solutions are causing still a

586
00:34:01,920 --> 00:34:05,560
Speaker 4: pollution to occur, in some cases more pollution because you

587
00:34:05,720 --> 00:34:10,200
Speaker 4: have more production associated with them. But also they're super

588
00:34:10,239 --> 00:34:14,640
Speaker 4: heavily dependent on public money which could be spent elsewhere,

589
00:34:14,800 --> 00:34:17,279
Speaker 4: and it's never mentioned, right. I mean, we have the

590
00:34:17,320 --> 00:34:22,240
Speaker 4: biodigesters because California pays a premium for renewable natural gas

591
00:34:22,560 --> 00:34:26,920
Speaker 4: associated with them, and so they really they are the

592
00:34:27,000 --> 00:34:31,880
Speaker 4: industries got really really good at you know darvo. You know,

593
00:34:32,040 --> 00:34:35,239
Speaker 4: like that people talk about with abusers, you know, put

594
00:34:35,280 --> 00:34:39,279
Speaker 4: the blame on the person who is abused, on consumers

595
00:34:39,320 --> 00:34:42,400
Speaker 4: and taxpayers. Yeah, and kind of like make yourself to

596
00:34:42,400 --> 00:34:44,600
Speaker 4: be this fantastic entity.

597
00:34:45,160 --> 00:34:48,399
Speaker 1: Yeah. I remember when there was like the initial sort

598
00:34:48,400 --> 00:34:52,440
Speaker 1: of boom in these biodigestors and the talk around renewable

599
00:34:52,520 --> 00:34:55,400
Speaker 1: natural gas, which I should say because every time we

600
00:34:55,480 --> 00:34:58,279
Speaker 1: mention it, I feel compelled to say, like, could never

601
00:34:59,320 --> 00:35:02,520
Speaker 1: do more than at most twelve to fifteen percent of

602
00:35:02,880 --> 00:35:07,520
Speaker 1: natural gas demand. It gets used to lock in natural gas.

603
00:35:07,600 --> 00:35:09,560
Speaker 1: So this is like an area where the fossil fuel

604
00:35:09,600 --> 00:35:13,360
Speaker 1: guys and the animal ag guys unite, you know. But

605
00:35:13,760 --> 00:35:15,640
Speaker 1: I remember when it first started happening, there was a

606
00:35:15,680 --> 00:35:19,200
Speaker 1: guy who was a pr guy for you know, an

607
00:35:19,200 --> 00:35:22,879
Speaker 1: animal ag industry group who is on Twitter having these

608
00:35:22,920 --> 00:35:27,000
Speaker 1: like very disingenuous conversations about how like I don't understand,

609
00:35:27,080 --> 00:35:30,480
Speaker 1: like what did the environmentalists want. I don't understand why

610
00:35:30,520 --> 00:35:33,200
Speaker 1: they would be against this. And I was like, I

611
00:35:33,200 --> 00:35:35,800
Speaker 1: don't think you're asking in good faith, but I'll explain

612
00:35:35,880 --> 00:35:36,359
Speaker 1: it to you.

613
00:35:36,560 --> 00:35:39,839
Speaker 4: I mean, I looked into this in Iowa and where

614
00:35:39,880 --> 00:35:44,680
Speaker 4: we have also deregulated this biodigesters, and almost half of

615
00:35:44,760 --> 00:35:48,040
Speaker 4: the dairy expansion we've seen in the last four or

616
00:35:48,080 --> 00:35:52,080
Speaker 4: five six years is associated with biodigesters because all these

617
00:35:52,800 --> 00:35:56,600
Speaker 4: were big, right, these things make sense, and so it

618
00:35:56,640 --> 00:36:00,759
Speaker 4: really increases concentration. And then you'll have all the associated

619
00:36:00,800 --> 00:36:05,040
Speaker 4: problems with that. By the way, because the digestate still

620
00:36:05,120 --> 00:36:10,080
Speaker 4: needs to be spread somewhere. It's not like all the nutrients,

621
00:36:10,160 --> 00:36:13,759
Speaker 4: all the pesticides, all the other stuff goes away. We

622
00:36:13,800 --> 00:36:17,080
Speaker 4: don't know very much at all about how how things

623
00:36:17,120 --> 00:36:20,680
Speaker 4: may be mobilized. As the manuver goes through the bi digester.

624
00:36:21,160 --> 00:36:24,160
Speaker 4: Then there's no money to study it, really because we

625
00:36:24,200 --> 00:36:25,560
Speaker 4: don't want to know some things.

626
00:36:25,480 --> 00:36:29,960
Speaker 1: Right, right, Okay, we talked about narratives, let's talk about tactics.

627
00:36:30,040 --> 00:36:32,440
Speaker 1: What are some of the tactics that get deployed to

628
00:36:33,320 --> 00:36:36,239
Speaker 1: you know, keep regulation at bay. It's like amazing to

629
00:36:36,320 --> 00:36:40,879
Speaker 1: me that they've been so effective preventatively, Like they don't

630
00:36:40,920 --> 00:36:44,000
Speaker 1: even have to fight regulation because they've managed to keep

631
00:36:44,040 --> 00:36:45,960
Speaker 1: it at bay for so long. So what are some

632
00:36:46,000 --> 00:36:47,680
Speaker 1: of the tactics that get used to do that.

633
00:36:48,120 --> 00:36:50,279
Speaker 2: Yeah, So when something does come up, what we see

634
00:36:50,360 --> 00:36:51,960
Speaker 2: quite a lot is really similar to kind of what

635
00:36:51,960 --> 00:36:54,400
Speaker 2: we know from other industries. So we see traditional lobbying,

636
00:36:54,560 --> 00:36:58,640
Speaker 2: we see political donations by companies and their representative groups

637
00:36:58,640 --> 00:37:03,160
Speaker 2: and some brand groups for example. But one thing that

638
00:37:03,200 --> 00:37:04,960
Speaker 2: we wanted to pick up on that we thought it

639
00:37:05,000 --> 00:37:06,840
Speaker 2: was really important to pick up on a chapter is

640
00:37:06,960 --> 00:37:09,920
Speaker 2: essentially the extent of which they've ramped up their presence

641
00:37:09,960 --> 00:37:12,560
Speaker 2: in global spaces because not much is happening at the

642
00:37:12,640 --> 00:37:16,120
Speaker 2: national level, and that's for a reason. Currently in global

643
00:37:16,160 --> 00:37:19,279
Speaker 2: climate governance in particular, there's a bit of pressure to

644
00:37:19,320 --> 00:37:22,160
Speaker 2: pay more attention to methane and you know, to do

645
00:37:22,239 --> 00:37:25,520
Speaker 2: more about those short lived, really potent gases, and there's

646
00:37:25,520 --> 00:37:28,440
Speaker 2: been a lot of push to essentially get climate cops

647
00:37:28,480 --> 00:37:31,759
Speaker 2: and you know, other global food governance spaces to pay

648
00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:34,520
Speaker 2: more attention to the climate impacts of animal agg and

649
00:37:34,560 --> 00:37:37,239
Speaker 2: you can tell that animal agg knows this, and they've

650
00:37:37,320 --> 00:37:39,239
Speaker 2: kind of really ramped up their presence over the last

651
00:37:39,239 --> 00:37:41,480
Speaker 2: couple of years, over the last say, three or four

652
00:37:41,520 --> 00:37:43,839
Speaker 2: COPS in particular, and the SMOKE has done a really

653
00:37:43,880 --> 00:37:47,719
Speaker 2: good tracking of how many agribusiness representatives come to every COP,

654
00:37:47,760 --> 00:37:49,839
Speaker 2: and that's been going up over the last couple of years,

655
00:37:49,840 --> 00:37:51,200
Speaker 2: and I'm sure we're going to see a lot of

656
00:37:51,200 --> 00:37:53,840
Speaker 2: them at COP thirteen this year. But that's really important,

657
00:37:53,840 --> 00:37:57,480
Speaker 2: and a lot of their focus at in those spaces

658
00:37:57,520 --> 00:38:00,520
Speaker 2: has been very much on positioning animal agg as a

659
00:38:00,560 --> 00:38:03,480
Speaker 2: solution rather than the problem. So this is all about

660
00:38:03,520 --> 00:38:06,160
Speaker 2: how we can help, you know, increase so carbon This

661
00:38:06,239 --> 00:38:08,520
Speaker 2: is all about how they can you know, how they

662
00:38:08,560 --> 00:38:11,760
Speaker 2: can basically turn cows into a solution. But then also

663
00:38:12,000 --> 00:38:13,839
Speaker 2: one thing we've seen at the national level is that

664
00:38:13,880 --> 00:38:16,520
Speaker 2: industry groups can get pretty aggressive around things like the

665
00:38:16,560 --> 00:38:19,160
Speaker 2: eat land set report that I mentioned earlier, which personally

666
00:38:19,200 --> 00:38:21,120
Speaker 2: really surprised me because you do still see that quite

667
00:38:21,200 --> 00:38:24,239
Speaker 2: rarely to that extent, and to do that, you know,

668
00:38:24,480 --> 00:38:27,120
Speaker 2: it's important not that these are not powerless actors. They've

669
00:38:27,160 --> 00:38:30,160
Speaker 2: paid PR firms like Red Flag for example, red Flag

670
00:38:30,400 --> 00:38:32,799
Speaker 2: I actually knew that from my tobacco days. They've worked

671
00:38:32,800 --> 00:38:36,399
Speaker 2: for tobacco, for chemicals. It's an Irish company that has

672
00:38:36,440 --> 00:38:40,120
Speaker 2: supported several animal agg initiatives like, for example, the Irish

673
00:38:40,200 --> 00:38:43,319
Speaker 2: medi and dairy Fax platform and the Protein Impact for

674
00:38:43,440 --> 00:38:46,560
Speaker 2: the US Media Institute that used to be the National

675
00:38:47,120 --> 00:38:48,640
Speaker 2: North American Meatia Institute.

676
00:38:48,840 --> 00:38:49,759
Speaker 3: So they do.

677
00:38:49,800 --> 00:38:52,480
Speaker 2: Have money to pay, you know, PR firms as well.

678
00:38:52,520 --> 00:38:54,359
Speaker 2: I think they were recently linked as well to the

679
00:38:54,520 --> 00:38:56,800
Speaker 2: pushback to the eat landset diet very directly.

680
00:38:57,360 --> 00:39:01,359
Speaker 4: Another thing that we see is the industry has been

681
00:39:01,400 --> 00:39:05,000
Speaker 4: really good at pushing the can down the road. And

682
00:39:05,200 --> 00:39:09,200
Speaker 4: so I think that the best example of this is

683
00:39:09,880 --> 00:39:14,759
Speaker 4: EPA twenty years ago started this air quality National air

684
00:39:14,800 --> 00:39:19,400
Speaker 4: Emission Monitoring Study and it's twenty years and they still

685
00:39:19,480 --> 00:39:23,840
Speaker 4: are not done with it. And in the meantime, basically

686
00:39:24,160 --> 00:39:27,480
Speaker 4: they surveyed I don't know a couple dozen operations, but

687
00:39:27,760 --> 00:39:33,399
Speaker 4: everybody was grandfathered in if they asked to be exempt, right,

688
00:39:33,719 --> 00:39:36,520
Speaker 4: and so we any way, EPA did the same thing

689
00:39:36,560 --> 00:39:39,680
Speaker 4: a couple of years ago. For water quality and air

690
00:39:39,760 --> 00:39:43,720
Speaker 4: quality is more important in this case because the Clean

691
00:39:43,760 --> 00:39:47,360
Speaker 4: Air Act does not exempt confined animal feeding operations or

692
00:39:47,640 --> 00:39:51,560
Speaker 4: treats them any way differently than any other point source

693
00:39:51,680 --> 00:39:55,200
Speaker 4: or polluter. Right. But basically, we need to study this

694
00:39:55,200 --> 00:39:55,560
Speaker 4: some more.

695
00:39:56,280 --> 00:39:56,440
Speaker 3: Right.

696
00:39:56,640 --> 00:39:58,480
Speaker 4: We are not opposed to this, but we need to

697
00:39:58,520 --> 00:40:01,160
Speaker 4: study this some more. And I'll see you ten years

698
00:40:01,200 --> 00:40:01,680
Speaker 4: from now.

699
00:40:01,840 --> 00:40:02,040
Speaker 3: Right.

700
00:40:02,400 --> 00:40:05,720
Speaker 4: And in the meantime, then they give money to academics

701
00:40:05,760 --> 00:40:09,120
Speaker 4: who are favorable to their positions. They they say, oh,

702
00:40:09,120 --> 00:40:13,080
Speaker 4: we're doing good stewardship. We just don't know enough. There's

703
00:40:13,120 --> 00:40:16,200
Speaker 4: too much uncertainty. Right, As Katain said, this is like

704
00:40:16,280 --> 00:40:19,840
Speaker 4: one of their big tactics that we point to in

705
00:40:19,880 --> 00:40:23,600
Speaker 4: the chapter. So we have so many examples of we

706
00:40:23,640 --> 00:40:26,960
Speaker 4: need to study it some more. They pacify academics by

707
00:40:27,000 --> 00:40:30,080
Speaker 4: giving them money to study things that we already have

708
00:40:30,160 --> 00:40:33,880
Speaker 4: plenty of evidence about. That's why we rewrite the same papers,

709
00:40:34,080 --> 00:40:36,439
Speaker 4: you know, every ten years. It's a cycle. It's because

710
00:40:36,440 --> 00:40:39,560
Speaker 4: we're studying it again, you know, and that's why we

711
00:40:39,600 --> 00:40:40,600
Speaker 4: are where we are.

712
00:40:40,880 --> 00:40:44,359
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, that's a great lead into my next question,

713
00:40:44,400 --> 00:40:48,200
Speaker 1: which is about how they work to capture science and

714
00:40:48,360 --> 00:40:52,080
Speaker 1: you know, information public perception in general. So we've talked

715
00:40:52,080 --> 00:40:56,000
Speaker 1: about this, like you know, repeat study thing, we've talked

716
00:40:56,000 --> 00:40:59,920
Speaker 1: about mit leinner, We've talked about like organized response to

717
00:41:00,080 --> 00:41:03,080
Speaker 1: scientific reports, which I think is really interesting and maybe

718
00:41:03,080 --> 00:41:06,480
Speaker 1: a little bit unique to the animal ag or ag

719
00:41:06,560 --> 00:41:10,480
Speaker 1: industry in general, Like you occasionally see this from the

720
00:41:10,520 --> 00:41:13,279
Speaker 1: fossil fuel guys too, but not as coordinated and not

721
00:41:13,360 --> 00:41:15,840
Speaker 1: as global, I would say. Anyway, So, yeah, what are

722
00:41:15,880 --> 00:41:18,239
Speaker 1: some of the other ways that they work to sort

723
00:41:18,239 --> 00:41:21,600
Speaker 1: of capture the information ecosystem around this stuff.

724
00:41:22,400 --> 00:41:24,440
Speaker 2: I think we've covered a lot of them, but it's

725
00:41:24,520 --> 00:41:27,200
Speaker 2: essentially this is like other industries, but I think maybe

726
00:41:27,200 --> 00:41:30,160
Speaker 2: to a slightly large extent, this is about kind of shaping,

727
00:41:30,239 --> 00:41:32,640
Speaker 2: like promoting and highlighting the certain types of evidence that

728
00:41:32,800 --> 00:41:34,560
Speaker 2: worked really well for them, that kind of show what

729
00:41:34,560 --> 00:41:37,279
Speaker 2: they wanted to show, and undermining others. And I think

730
00:41:37,280 --> 00:41:41,040
Speaker 2: they've been particularly aggressive in the undermining and attacking the

731
00:41:41,080 --> 00:41:44,240
Speaker 2: science that threatens them that particularly it's about dietary change

732
00:41:44,719 --> 00:41:48,520
Speaker 2: and herd size reduction, so that's been really striking.

733
00:41:48,600 --> 00:41:49,479
Speaker 3: And there's also more.

734
00:41:49,400 --> 00:41:51,840
Speaker 2: Recent paper that I think came out after we finished

735
00:41:52,320 --> 00:41:55,960
Speaker 2: the chapter, but that showed the kind of I think

736
00:41:56,040 --> 00:42:00,760
Speaker 2: they looked at the impact of industry funding on science

737
00:42:00,880 --> 00:42:04,560
Speaker 2: about cardiovascular health and meat consumption, and they found that

738
00:42:04,680 --> 00:42:07,320
Speaker 2: industry funded science was a lot more likely to conclude

739
00:42:07,360 --> 00:42:10,720
Speaker 2: that there was no link between cardiovascular zase and meat consumption.

740
00:42:11,080 --> 00:42:13,279
Speaker 3: So there's it's really good at work is.

741
00:42:13,239 --> 00:42:15,439
Speaker 2: Happening solely on this, But there's not been a huge

742
00:42:15,440 --> 00:42:18,279
Speaker 2: amount of systematic research. But we know anecdotally, and we

743
00:42:18,360 --> 00:42:20,920
Speaker 2: know from a couple of really well studied cases, that

744
00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:22,799
Speaker 2: industry is really active on this, and there's a lot

745
00:42:22,800 --> 00:42:23,520
Speaker 2: of happening here.

746
00:42:24,000 --> 00:42:24,879
Speaker 3: And I think when we.

747
00:42:24,760 --> 00:42:26,839
Speaker 2: Talk about science and evidence, one thing that's also really

748
00:42:26,880 --> 00:42:29,320
Speaker 2: important to members that they're really good at using scientists

749
00:42:29,760 --> 00:42:33,040
Speaker 2: as messengers. So it's not just about shaping the science

750
00:42:33,320 --> 00:42:36,800
Speaker 2: and the scientific outputs. This is also about using people

751
00:42:36,800 --> 00:42:40,520
Speaker 2: that have credibility in the public eye to you know,

752
00:42:40,840 --> 00:42:43,600
Speaker 2: to convey the messages that they want to commit.

753
00:42:44,680 --> 00:42:47,000
Speaker 3: And I think particularly nutrition has come in here as well.

754
00:42:47,040 --> 00:42:49,080
Speaker 2: That you mentioned that earlier, but there's a lot of

755
00:42:49,080 --> 00:42:54,560
Speaker 2: really popular nutrition scientists that have been saying the industry

756
00:42:54,600 --> 00:42:55,839
Speaker 2: lines for quite a long time.

757
00:42:55,960 --> 00:42:56,160
Speaker 1: Yeah.

758
00:42:56,960 --> 00:43:00,680
Speaker 4: I think one good example here is, well, i'm speaking

759
00:43:00,680 --> 00:43:03,239
Speaker 4: to you from Iowa, where we produce one third of

760
00:43:03,640 --> 00:43:08,719
Speaker 4: America's pigs, right, and my alma mater, Iowa State University,

761
00:43:08,960 --> 00:43:12,880
Speaker 4: is one of the centers of this quote unquote scientific approach.

762
00:43:13,480 --> 00:43:16,799
Speaker 4: And the National Pork Board gave eight and a half

763
00:43:16,960 --> 00:43:21,960
Speaker 4: millions to a consorti led by Iowa State for the

764
00:43:22,080 --> 00:43:27,200
Speaker 4: Real Pork Trust. And so this was led by an

765
00:43:27,239 --> 00:43:32,000
Speaker 4: animal scientist, but it incorporated those adult specialties disciplines that

766
00:43:32,080 --> 00:43:35,319
Speaker 4: Catherine was talking about. What's really interesting about this, by

767
00:43:35,320 --> 00:43:38,160
Speaker 4: the way, is that they just terminated their contract and

768
00:43:38,200 --> 00:43:39,920
Speaker 4: they're giving the money straight to PR.

769
00:43:40,840 --> 00:43:41,480
Speaker 1: Wow.

770
00:43:41,680 --> 00:43:46,520
Speaker 4: So maybe you know, the emergence of the tireffs is

771
00:43:46,800 --> 00:43:51,360
Speaker 4: moving the industry towards more straight up, we need to

772
00:43:51,640 --> 00:43:53,960
Speaker 4: move towards PR. But if we're talking about PR in

773
00:43:54,000 --> 00:43:56,759
Speaker 4: the United States, we have the Chekhov system and so

774
00:43:56,880 --> 00:44:00,919
Speaker 4: basically farmers pay in to this kitty right that can

775
00:44:00,960 --> 00:44:05,080
Speaker 4: be used for promoting their industry. And you know, you

776
00:44:05,160 --> 00:44:10,600
Speaker 4: got milk campaigns. All sorts of very successful marketing strategies

777
00:44:10,640 --> 00:44:13,360
Speaker 4: have been based on the checkofs. So there is a

778
00:44:13,360 --> 00:44:18,280
Speaker 4: whole ecosystem right that reinforces this message. And there's various

779
00:44:18,360 --> 00:44:23,400
Speaker 4: actors from the universities from the PR firms. The checkof

780
00:44:24,080 --> 00:44:28,920
Speaker 4: money is also some of it goes to promoting exports

781
00:44:28,960 --> 00:44:33,600
Speaker 4: of American meat, and the US may contribute to those

782
00:44:33,960 --> 00:44:37,640
Speaker 4: market access programs. So, as I said, there is a

783
00:44:37,680 --> 00:44:41,200
Speaker 4: whole ecosystem of funding moving in various ways to promote

784
00:44:41,200 --> 00:44:42,000
Speaker 4: the message.

785
00:44:42,239 --> 00:44:45,719
Speaker 1: Yeah, my favorite example of the dairy checkof is the

786
00:44:45,719 --> 00:44:46,839
Speaker 1: butterboard thing.

787
00:44:47,239 --> 00:44:47,520
Speaker 3: Do you know?

788
00:44:47,640 --> 00:44:50,440
Speaker 1: This story element was their main PR firm for a

789
00:44:50,480 --> 00:44:53,839
Speaker 1: long time, and now they've kind of been ousted and

790
00:44:54,040 --> 00:44:56,440
Speaker 1: replaced by someone else, but they were paying them for

791
00:44:56,480 --> 00:44:59,000
Speaker 1: a really long time to do like they did the

792
00:44:59,120 --> 00:45:03,000
Speaker 1: undeniably d thing as a counter to like nut and

793
00:45:03,040 --> 00:45:06,440
Speaker 1: plant based milks, where it was like it's real dairy.

794
00:45:06,840 --> 00:45:09,520
Speaker 1: But they also had this team of influencers that they

795
00:45:09,719 --> 00:45:14,240
Speaker 1: tasked with coming up with dairy forward recipes and putting

796
00:45:14,320 --> 00:45:18,080
Speaker 1: them out on like TikTok and Instagram and you know whatever.

797
00:45:18,360 --> 00:45:22,720
Speaker 1: And one of them came up with this butterboard idea

798
00:45:23,239 --> 00:45:25,520
Speaker 1: from a shot it was like in a chef's cookbook,

799
00:45:25,520 --> 00:45:27,000
Speaker 1: and then she just sort of copied it and put

800
00:45:27,040 --> 00:45:30,840
Speaker 1: it out there and I went super super viral, and

801
00:45:30,840 --> 00:45:34,200
Speaker 1: the then Edelman and DMI took credit. They were like

802
00:45:34,239 --> 00:45:36,200
Speaker 1: that was us, that was us, And then they got

803
00:45:36,239 --> 00:45:39,680
Speaker 1: into a whole like debate about it because she was like, actually,

804
00:45:39,760 --> 00:45:42,120
Speaker 1: I submitted that recipe, but you guys said you didn't

805
00:45:42,200 --> 00:45:44,799
Speaker 1: like it, and I did it anyway, and that's why

806
00:45:44,840 --> 00:45:47,480
Speaker 1: I didn't label it as sponsored and blah blah blah.

807
00:45:47,520 --> 00:45:50,200
Speaker 1: That one recipe got picked up by the New York

808
00:45:50,239 --> 00:45:53,920
Speaker 1: Times bbceded something on it. All of these like morning

809
00:45:53,960 --> 00:45:56,839
Speaker 1: shows were like how to make the viral trend blah

810
00:45:56,880 --> 00:46:01,040
Speaker 1: blah blah, And it was entirely funded and and strategized

811
00:46:01,080 --> 00:46:03,320
Speaker 1: by the dairy industry.

812
00:46:03,920 --> 00:46:07,239
Speaker 4: You can see the through line from the butter cows

813
00:46:07,280 --> 00:46:11,799
Speaker 4: at the state fair right to the influencers. This, by

814
00:46:11,840 --> 00:46:15,879
Speaker 4: the way, is punctuated by the story during World War

815
00:46:15,920 --> 00:46:20,160
Speaker 4: Two again my alma mater, where Theodore Schultz, who was

816
00:46:20,200 --> 00:46:23,960
Speaker 4: an economist wrote a had his group write a pamphlet

817
00:46:23,960 --> 00:46:28,440
Speaker 4: that said you could eat margarine instead of butter, and

818
00:46:28,520 --> 00:46:32,120
Speaker 4: they basically got him fired. Now don't worry about to

819
00:46:32,200 --> 00:46:34,920
Speaker 4: guy went to the University of Chicago, won the Nobel

820
00:46:34,960 --> 00:46:38,319
Speaker 4: Prize for economics. But you can see the influence of

821
00:46:38,360 --> 00:46:42,680
Speaker 4: the dairy industry in wanting to control the narrative that

822
00:46:42,760 --> 00:46:46,000
Speaker 4: pamphlet was not paid by taxpayer money. It was paid

823
00:46:46,320 --> 00:46:49,640
Speaker 4: by foundation money because Schultz knew that he was going

824
00:46:49,719 --> 00:46:52,480
Speaker 4: to get in trouble otherwise, but he still had to

825
00:46:52,520 --> 00:46:55,120
Speaker 4: go and all his research group was dismantled.

826
00:46:55,640 --> 00:46:56,400
Speaker 1: Wow.

827
00:46:56,560 --> 00:47:00,720
Speaker 2: Wow, this is really also not unique to the US.

828
00:47:00,760 --> 00:47:01,840
Speaker 2: I know, we have a lot of except we have

829
00:47:01,840 --> 00:47:03,399
Speaker 2: a lot of examples from the US because it's also

830
00:47:03,440 --> 00:47:06,560
Speaker 2: really well documented over there. But we have a similar

831
00:47:06,600 --> 00:47:09,600
Speaker 2: situation in the UK. Here, for example, there's a board

832
00:47:09,680 --> 00:47:13,280
Speaker 2: called Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board that's a levy funded

833
00:47:13,360 --> 00:47:16,799
Speaker 2: organization similar to the Chekhov and Dave recently had a

834
00:47:16,800 --> 00:47:19,680
Speaker 2: campaign that was called Let's Eat Balance, where it's meant

835
00:47:19,680 --> 00:47:21,759
Speaker 2: to be about balance, but essentially what it shows is

836
00:47:21,840 --> 00:47:25,400
Speaker 2: just a bunch of meals that all campaign quite significant

837
00:47:25,440 --> 00:47:27,600
Speaker 2: amounts of meat. So it's like it's like this whole

838
00:47:27,680 --> 00:47:31,719
Speaker 2: like the campaign is essentially about promoting British beef and land,

839
00:47:32,480 --> 00:47:35,440
Speaker 2: but it's kind of faed's this kind of healthy, balanced

840
00:47:35,440 --> 00:47:37,480
Speaker 2: health campaign, but essentially it just so you know, it

841
00:47:37,560 --> 00:47:38,920
Speaker 2: just looks like you're meant to eat meat in every

842
00:47:38,960 --> 00:47:41,480
Speaker 2: single meal. And I think there's a lot of those

843
00:47:41,560 --> 00:47:43,760
Speaker 2: exists across the European Union as well.

844
00:47:43,960 --> 00:47:48,799
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, I feel like the European Union, each

845
00:47:48,840 --> 00:47:53,319
Speaker 1: country has so much of this cultural campaigning around meat too,

846
00:47:53,520 --> 00:47:57,120
Speaker 1: or it's like it's part of our identity that we

847
00:47:57,200 --> 00:47:59,680
Speaker 1: have this one particular meat, and like the US does

848
00:47:59,719 --> 00:48:02,480
Speaker 1: it too, but I don't know there's something special about

849
00:48:02,520 --> 00:48:04,040
Speaker 1: the European one.

850
00:48:04,560 --> 00:48:07,480
Speaker 2: Indeed, and we briefly touch on that in our chapter

851
00:48:07,719 --> 00:48:10,880
Speaker 2: that the European Union's Common Agricultural Policy also has a

852
00:48:10,880 --> 00:48:14,480
Speaker 2: budget for promotion of European products and a huge amount

853
00:48:14,480 --> 00:48:17,239
Speaker 2: of that goes to promoting meat and dairy products. And

854
00:48:17,280 --> 00:48:19,160
Speaker 2: there was a whole debate about it a couple of

855
00:48:19,239 --> 00:48:22,480
Speaker 2: years ago where Greenpeace I think, challenged that and you know,

856
00:48:22,800 --> 00:48:25,279
Speaker 2: try to get it reviewed in line with founder Folk

857
00:48:25,320 --> 00:48:29,640
Speaker 2: and European Green Deal, and that didn't go anywhere, perhaps unsurprisingly.

858
00:48:29,320 --> 00:48:35,080
Speaker 1: Those radicals at Greenpeace. Yeah, don't want anyone to eat anything, Okay, Okay,

859
00:48:35,120 --> 00:48:38,720
Speaker 1: So I want to talk about the USDA Land Grant

860
00:48:38,960 --> 00:48:43,520
Speaker 1: complex because it's so weird and I'd love to have

861
00:48:43,600 --> 00:48:46,399
Speaker 1: you just explain what it is and then what role

862
00:48:46,480 --> 00:48:49,040
Speaker 1: it plays in climate obstructure.

863
00:48:50,040 --> 00:48:54,319
Speaker 4: So we go back really to manifest destiny here, right,

864
00:48:54,920 --> 00:48:59,719
Speaker 4: because USDA and the land grant universities were created through

865
00:49:00,200 --> 00:49:03,759
Speaker 4: acts in the same year eighteen sixty two. And the

866
00:49:03,880 --> 00:49:09,000
Speaker 4: land grant universities are university that received land grants if

867
00:49:09,160 --> 00:49:11,120
Speaker 4: in the in the East there was no land to

868
00:49:11,120 --> 00:49:14,640
Speaker 4: be granted. So actually in Iowa, for example, we granted

869
00:49:14,719 --> 00:49:19,880
Speaker 4: land to Penn State and Rutgers and Cornell.

870
00:49:20,200 --> 00:49:20,399
Speaker 6: Right.

871
00:49:20,560 --> 00:49:25,800
Speaker 4: So these universities, together with USDA, were created to promote

872
00:49:25,800 --> 00:49:28,960
Speaker 4: a certain type of agriculture, the kind of agriculture that

873
00:49:29,080 --> 00:49:32,959
Speaker 4: is super pro technology, the tech fixes that we talked about,

874
00:49:33,080 --> 00:49:38,120
Speaker 4: that's really their wheelhouse was Also there were also institutions

875
00:49:38,160 --> 00:49:42,640
Speaker 4: created to promote agriculture as an export industry. Historically in

876
00:49:42,680 --> 00:49:46,560
Speaker 4: the United States, the agricultural sector has done well when

877
00:49:46,600 --> 00:49:50,839
Speaker 4: we have exported out we have access production capacity. So

878
00:49:50,920 --> 00:49:55,720
Speaker 4: think about the nineteen seventy earlbuts friends rout to Fensro,

879
00:49:56,040 --> 00:49:59,319
Speaker 4: right when we were selling to the Russians. But before then,

880
00:49:59,360 --> 00:50:02,600
Speaker 4: think about the plan after the Second World War when

881
00:50:02,640 --> 00:50:05,360
Speaker 4: we were in the United States was giving aid to

882
00:50:05,480 --> 00:50:09,040
Speaker 4: Europe for reconstruction after the war, right, And those were

883
00:50:09,080 --> 00:50:14,359
Speaker 4: the thriving years of agriculture. This relationship that goes back

884
00:50:14,480 --> 00:50:18,839
Speaker 4: almost two hundred years now between the universities and USDA.

885
00:50:19,440 --> 00:50:22,680
Speaker 4: You have a very poorest kind of like barrier people

886
00:50:22,719 --> 00:50:26,240
Speaker 4: get jobs at USDA from the land grants. They serve

887
00:50:26,480 --> 00:50:31,319
Speaker 4: in USDA panels from the land grants. Professors that land

888
00:50:31,360 --> 00:50:36,000
Speaker 4: grants get money from industry and USDA and their students

889
00:50:36,400 --> 00:50:42,000
Speaker 4: to work for industry. They have partnership private public private

890
00:50:42,040 --> 00:50:48,720
Speaker 4: partnership that USDA supports. You know, this complex that ranges

891
00:50:48,840 --> 00:50:53,960
Speaker 4: from you know, agronomies, soul science, to animal science, to

892
00:50:54,440 --> 00:50:59,879
Speaker 4: rural sociology and economics has really produced a certain type

893
00:50:59,880 --> 00:51:03,880
Speaker 4: of science that is of service to the industry. I

894
00:51:03,960 --> 00:51:07,800
Speaker 4: call that small science. It's science that takes for granted,

895
00:51:07,880 --> 00:51:11,000
Speaker 4: for example, the consumption levels of meat and does a

896
00:51:11,200 --> 00:51:15,759
Speaker 4: question them, doesn't even think about, you know, doing scenarios

897
00:51:15,800 --> 00:51:18,839
Speaker 4: where we reduce meat consumption and what things would look

898
00:51:18,880 --> 00:51:22,920
Speaker 4: like if we did right. It's science that is, you know,

899
00:51:23,000 --> 00:51:27,759
Speaker 4: it's properly done. But the questions that you're asking and

900
00:51:27,800 --> 00:51:31,480
Speaker 4: the support that you're receiving to ask those questions, it's

901
00:51:31,480 --> 00:51:34,879
Speaker 4: all directed to being of service to the industry and

902
00:51:34,960 --> 00:51:39,560
Speaker 4: furthering a certain type of very productivist, I would argue,

903
00:51:39,680 --> 00:51:42,240
Speaker 4: extractivist agricultural system.

904
00:51:42,840 --> 00:51:46,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's super interesting. Can we talk about coalitions and

905
00:51:46,200 --> 00:51:49,200
Speaker 1: trade groups and how important they are to all of this,

906
00:51:49,440 --> 00:51:51,840
Speaker 1: What do they kind of do for the industry.

907
00:51:52,560 --> 00:51:55,360
Speaker 2: Yes, so, actually a lot of the most aggressive and

908
00:51:55,480 --> 00:51:59,880
Speaker 2: concidered lobeing is happening through trade groups. So that's animal agricultures,

909
00:52:00,000 --> 00:52:05,359
Speaker 2: civic industry associations, farming more broad farming industry, agribusiness industry associations,

910
00:52:05,560 --> 00:52:08,720
Speaker 2: but also some of the mixed associations that contain different

911
00:52:08,719 --> 00:52:10,799
Speaker 2: sectors so den't really central to a lot of the

912
00:52:10,840 --> 00:52:12,040
Speaker 2: lobbying across the.

913
00:52:11,960 --> 00:52:13,319
Speaker 3: Different regions that we looked at.

914
00:52:13,760 --> 00:52:15,920
Speaker 2: One thing that we wanted to highlight in terms of

915
00:52:15,960 --> 00:52:18,560
Speaker 2: when we think about alliances and coalitions is actually something

916
00:52:18,600 --> 00:52:21,600
Speaker 2: that kind of gets forgotten sometimes is these kind of

917
00:52:21,600 --> 00:52:25,080
Speaker 2: alliances that are really important for separating the message from

918
00:52:25,080 --> 00:52:27,480
Speaker 2: the messenger. So one of those groups would be, you know,

919
00:52:27,600 --> 00:52:30,120
Speaker 2: one of the kind of categories of allies would be

920
00:52:30,239 --> 00:52:34,280
Speaker 2: environmental groups. So we know that some more motivate ennmental groups,

921
00:52:34,280 --> 00:52:37,759
Speaker 2: for example, have worked with the industry to help them

922
00:52:37,920 --> 00:52:41,440
Speaker 2: do small changes, you know, small fixers around you know,

923
00:52:41,480 --> 00:52:44,520
Speaker 2: how can we increase soil carbon storage? How can we

924
00:52:44,880 --> 00:52:47,959
Speaker 2: know make more things better? How can we improve biodiversity,

925
00:52:48,120 --> 00:52:49,640
Speaker 2: on grazing land.

926
00:52:49,440 --> 00:52:49,880
Speaker 3: Et cetera.

927
00:52:50,239 --> 00:52:53,080
Speaker 2: Those initiatives in some cases might have some small positive yields,

928
00:52:53,400 --> 00:52:55,640
Speaker 2: but the problem is that essentially in some cases it

929
00:52:55,640 --> 00:52:59,200
Speaker 2: can look a lot like legitimizing something that essentially is

930
00:52:59,239 --> 00:53:03,920
Speaker 2: the status quo. And you know, in that case, some

931
00:53:03,960 --> 00:53:07,200
Speaker 2: of those environmental groups in effect have ended up helping

932
00:53:07,480 --> 00:53:12,239
Speaker 2: companies like jbscreenwash their products. And that's quite important to note.

933
00:53:12,280 --> 00:53:14,200
Speaker 2: And if you wanted to include that, we have a

934
00:53:14,239 --> 00:53:18,640
Speaker 2: short clip where someone from the Canadian Catle Association puts

935
00:53:18,640 --> 00:53:22,200
Speaker 2: that into words, essentially saying that if we say catle

936
00:53:22,320 --> 00:53:24,040
Speaker 2: is good for the environment, no one's going to believe us,

937
00:53:24,040 --> 00:53:26,680
Speaker 2: so people won't take us as seriously, whereas if the

938
00:53:26,800 --> 00:53:29,279
Speaker 2: environmental groups say that, people will believe them. So for

939
00:53:29,480 --> 00:53:33,440
Speaker 2: industry working with those environmental groups, having those independent voices

940
00:53:33,480 --> 00:53:38,000
Speaker 2: in the room, it's really important for laundering the message.

941
00:53:38,440 --> 00:53:41,800
Speaker 6: We've been to the last six cop meetings, the climate

942
00:53:41,920 --> 00:53:46,760
Speaker 6: change meetings. We've also been involved in the biodiversity discussions,

943
00:53:47,480 --> 00:53:51,400
Speaker 6: and now we're part of the Canadian delegation. And to

944
00:53:51,440 --> 00:53:53,680
Speaker 6: give you an idea that wasn't the simplest task. We

945
00:53:53,760 --> 00:53:57,920
Speaker 6: have one of the most climate change focused governments in

946
00:53:57,960 --> 00:54:01,200
Speaker 6: the world. They're talking about having that the highest carbon

947
00:54:01,280 --> 00:54:05,360
Speaker 6: tax in the world, and we spend a lot of

948
00:54:05,400 --> 00:54:09,920
Speaker 6: time talking about the significant environmental role and the positive

949
00:54:10,000 --> 00:54:16,400
Speaker 6: role that cattle ranching, farming, and feeding creates both for

950
00:54:16,520 --> 00:54:21,160
Speaker 6: our economy, for the environment, and along the way. One

951
00:54:21,200 --> 00:54:23,879
Speaker 6: of the things that we found to amplify our message

952
00:54:23,920 --> 00:54:29,880
Speaker 6: was we knew the conservation groups were groups that we

953
00:54:30,000 --> 00:54:34,000
Speaker 6: worked with for decades. So when we go to a forum,

954
00:54:34,040 --> 00:54:38,640
Speaker 6: we go with Nature Conservancy and we co host the forum.

955
00:54:39,040 --> 00:54:42,680
Speaker 6: In Canada, we may have Birds Canada Inducts Unlimited that

956
00:54:42,760 --> 00:54:46,399
Speaker 6: are helping us co host the forum. And when they're

957
00:54:46,480 --> 00:54:50,480
Speaker 6: saying the cattle industry is good for the environment, people

958
00:54:50,520 --> 00:54:52,839
Speaker 6: pay attention to that more than if we say it's

959
00:54:52,880 --> 00:54:54,400
Speaker 6: good for the environment.

960
00:54:54,880 --> 00:54:57,160
Speaker 1: I mean that happens on the fossil fuel side of

961
00:54:57,200 --> 00:55:00,160
Speaker 1: the fence too. You know, you've got like Environment All

962
00:55:00,160 --> 00:55:04,080
Speaker 1: Defense Fund is the best known example r AM I

963
00:55:04,400 --> 00:55:07,440
Speaker 1: really getting in on that action. Lately. There are a

964
00:55:07,440 --> 00:55:12,560
Speaker 1: lot of these groups that are you know, around methane

965
00:55:12,560 --> 00:55:14,040
Speaker 1: actually in particular.

966
00:55:13,920 --> 00:55:17,360
Speaker 2: Exactly and in terms of those partnerships with NGOs, But

967
00:55:17,440 --> 00:55:18,759
Speaker 2: we also see a lot we see a lot of

968
00:55:18,760 --> 00:55:23,560
Speaker 2: this in the biodiversity environmental space, which again it's kind

969
00:55:23,560 --> 00:55:27,560
Speaker 2: of compared sometimes comparing these like extensive types of you know,

970
00:55:27,600 --> 00:55:32,200
Speaker 2: catarranting with crazing, with really intensive agriculture. Essentially it is incredible,

971
00:55:32,200 --> 00:55:34,440
Speaker 2: we know is incredible about biodiversity. So it's kind of

972
00:55:34,440 --> 00:55:38,279
Speaker 2: comparing you know, bad with worse. Yeah, it's kind of

973
00:55:38,320 --> 00:55:41,839
Speaker 2: measuring those things that can only end up making catarranting

974
00:55:41,880 --> 00:55:45,600
Speaker 2: look like a positive. And I'm saying that's the main sector,

975
00:55:45,640 --> 00:55:47,560
Speaker 2: but I've seen this, but yeah.

976
00:55:47,880 --> 00:55:50,279
Speaker 1: I've seen this also from a lot of the like

977
00:55:50,360 --> 00:55:54,680
Speaker 1: the ecomodernist people to have had this whole thing where

978
00:55:54,680 --> 00:56:03,120
Speaker 1: they're like very pro concentrated animal AAG and pro GMO

979
00:56:03,280 --> 00:56:06,200
Speaker 1: and whatever, and it's like they make this argument that

980
00:56:06,320 --> 00:56:12,960
Speaker 1: basically like by containing or limiting the impact on biodiversity.

981
00:56:14,200 --> 00:56:16,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean you also get the on the other

982
00:56:16,040 --> 00:56:19,759
Speaker 2: side where people are saying that branching, extensive ranching is

983
00:56:19,760 --> 00:56:23,080
Speaker 2: good for biodiversity because it helps maintain you know, I

984
00:56:23,080 --> 00:56:26,560
Speaker 2: think Canadian Cattle Association had this partnership with Ducks Unlimited.

985
00:56:26,600 --> 00:56:28,600
Speaker 2: I think it was, and you know, you get on

986
00:56:28,640 --> 00:56:31,640
Speaker 2: both sides, but there's just so many trade offs you

987
00:56:31,880 --> 00:56:35,120
Speaker 2: with every type of animal farming that we just can't

988
00:56:35,600 --> 00:56:37,120
Speaker 2: you know, it's just really hard to do any of

989
00:56:37,160 --> 00:56:38,719
Speaker 2: this without reducing the numbers.

990
00:56:39,840 --> 00:56:41,600
Speaker 4: One thing to think about is that a lot of

991
00:56:41,640 --> 00:56:44,640
Speaker 4: these NGOs are based in the Global North, and so

992
00:56:44,760 --> 00:56:49,520
Speaker 4: this is to me creeping neocolonialism. You know, DF is

993
00:56:49,560 --> 00:56:52,960
Speaker 4: more of an American institution, but the Nature Conservancy has

994
00:56:52,960 --> 00:56:56,400
Speaker 4: global operations, right, and they provide a lot of cover

995
00:56:56,840 --> 00:57:00,640
Speaker 4: to the industry with these partnerships and trying to make

996
00:57:00,719 --> 00:57:04,600
Speaker 4: things better. And I think the Conservancy is a particularly

997
00:57:04,680 --> 00:57:11,680
Speaker 4: interesting institution because they hire excellent scientists and they have

998
00:57:11,840 --> 00:57:15,960
Speaker 4: pretty independent state level chapters. So I'd like to compare

999
00:57:15,960 --> 00:57:20,520
Speaker 4: it a little bit to the Catholic Church actually structure,

1000
00:57:21,000 --> 00:57:23,240
Speaker 4: and I think that the role that they are playing

1001
00:57:23,960 --> 00:57:28,840
Speaker 4: is under scrutinized in terms of like how these organizations

1002
00:57:28,880 --> 00:57:32,480
Speaker 4: where a lot of money flows are from the global North,

1003
00:57:32,520 --> 00:57:36,160
Speaker 4: where they have you know, lots of interests from you know,

1004
00:57:36,200 --> 00:57:41,120
Speaker 4: big donors, industry, and participate in these coalitions that make

1005
00:57:41,680 --> 00:57:43,880
Speaker 4: decisions that impact the global self.

1006
00:57:44,640 --> 00:57:50,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, super super interesting. Okay, we talked about or sort

1007
00:57:50,080 --> 00:57:53,200
Speaker 1: of briefly mentioned the farmer protests in Europe, and I

1008
00:57:53,240 --> 00:57:55,320
Speaker 1: want to talk about one of the big ones that

1009
00:57:55,360 --> 00:58:01,000
Speaker 1: really made news everywhere. What is the Dutch nitrogenis and

1010
00:58:01,040 --> 00:58:04,640
Speaker 1: why were so many farmers taken to their tractors about it.

1011
00:58:06,200 --> 00:58:06,880
Speaker 3: Yeah, so this is.

1012
00:58:06,880 --> 00:58:09,400
Speaker 2: What the Dutch actually called the nitrogen crisis. This is

1013
00:58:09,440 --> 00:58:12,320
Speaker 2: not something that we came up with, but essentially that's

1014
00:58:12,360 --> 00:58:15,840
Speaker 2: something that happened after a court rolling in twenty nineteen

1015
00:58:16,000 --> 00:58:19,680
Speaker 2: that ordered the Dutch government to finally after nitrogen pollution

1016
00:58:19,880 --> 00:58:22,600
Speaker 2: because they essentially said, you haven't been doing enough. This

1017
00:58:22,640 --> 00:58:25,680
Speaker 2: is not compliant with EU nature legislation. Again, this is

1018
00:58:25,680 --> 00:58:27,920
Speaker 2: a really good case for why EU legislation is so

1019
00:58:27,960 --> 00:58:29,520
Speaker 2: important also holding.

1020
00:58:29,360 --> 00:58:30,600
Speaker 3: National governments to account.

1021
00:58:31,000 --> 00:58:33,520
Speaker 2: But essentially, after this ruling, one of the proposals that

1022
00:58:33,560 --> 00:58:36,840
Speaker 2: came out from the Dutch Liberal Dutch Green Liberal Party

1023
00:58:37,400 --> 00:58:39,920
Speaker 2: was that we should they should be harving livestock numbers

1024
00:58:40,160 --> 00:58:42,600
Speaker 2: because life sotong is a huge source of nitrogen pollution

1025
00:58:43,000 --> 00:58:45,640
Speaker 2: and nitrogen turns into no soxide, which is a huge

1026
00:58:45,720 --> 00:58:47,720
Speaker 2: you know, also greenhouse gas. But I think the main

1027
00:58:47,760 --> 00:58:51,800
Speaker 2: case was around impact on nature and pollution more directly

1028
00:58:52,560 --> 00:58:56,120
Speaker 2: essential and after the Green Liberal Party announced that proposal,

1029
00:58:56,400 --> 00:59:00,720
Speaker 2: protest led by farmers and farmers groups broke out and

1030
00:59:00,760 --> 00:59:05,240
Speaker 2: they lasted on and off until about twenty and twenty three,

1031
00:59:05,360 --> 00:59:07,439
Speaker 2: so they lasted for a very long time and kind

1032
00:59:07,480 --> 00:59:10,240
Speaker 2: of at some point started intermingling with the European level

1033
00:59:10,280 --> 00:59:12,959
Speaker 2: protests because they were happening all over Europe at the time,

1034
00:59:13,720 --> 00:59:16,080
Speaker 2: so I'm not going to get into that level of detail,

1035
00:59:16,160 --> 00:59:19,240
Speaker 2: but essentially they were in the beginning relatively peaceful disruptions.

1036
00:59:19,240 --> 00:59:21,600
Speaker 2: They turned a bit more extreme as time went on,

1037
00:59:21,760 --> 00:59:25,200
Speaker 2: when groups like the Farmer's Defense Force got involved, and

1038
00:59:25,560 --> 00:59:27,880
Speaker 2: it's really tricky, it's very complex. These things are never

1039
00:59:27,960 --> 00:59:31,680
Speaker 2: but one thing alone, but obviously the kind of threat

1040
00:59:31,720 --> 00:59:35,280
Speaker 2: to livestock farmers in particular was one of the reasons,

1041
00:59:35,280 --> 00:59:37,120
Speaker 2: and they're very unhappy with that proposal and the.

1042
00:59:37,080 --> 00:59:38,600
Speaker 3: Timeline, which was very ambitious.

1043
00:59:39,040 --> 00:59:42,760
Speaker 2: The policy proposal that the gut Dash government ultimately published

1044
00:59:43,040 --> 00:59:46,040
Speaker 2: was I think aiming to reduce livestock size lives of

1045
00:59:46,160 --> 00:59:49,200
Speaker 2: numbers by a third by twenty thirty and half night

1046
00:59:49,240 --> 00:59:51,800
Speaker 2: to GENERI mission, So it's pretty ambitious, but only because

1047
00:59:51,840 --> 00:59:55,280
Speaker 2: they hadn't been doing nearly enough. So that was the

1048
00:59:55,360 --> 00:59:57,520
Speaker 2: kind of quite immediate threat for farmers, but that at

1049
00:59:57,560 --> 00:59:59,520
Speaker 2: some points started to kind of get mixed up with

1050
00:59:59,600 --> 01:00:02,440
Speaker 2: politics around immigration, which is not something that we get

1051
01:00:02,440 --> 01:00:04,560
Speaker 2: into in a chapter, but essentially one thing that we

1052
01:00:04,600 --> 01:00:08,800
Speaker 2: felt was really interesting is that the protests, the farmers

1053
01:00:08,800 --> 01:00:10,520
Speaker 2: that were getting really loud on the protests and the

1054
01:00:10,560 --> 01:00:13,040
Speaker 2: farmers groups that were really active in organizing the realse

1055
01:00:13,080 --> 01:00:16,720
Speaker 2: protests did receive funding from feed industry, from the feed

1056
01:00:16,720 --> 01:00:20,000
Speaker 2: industry and from some meat and dairy processes, which is

1057
01:00:20,040 --> 01:00:22,760
Speaker 2: really I think it's really telling in terms of who

1058
01:00:22,800 --> 01:00:25,160
Speaker 2: has a voice in those debates, because by far not

1059
01:00:25,240 --> 01:00:28,600
Speaker 2: all farmers are against climate action. Climate action is really

1060
01:00:28,600 --> 01:00:32,680
Speaker 2: important because farming is really at risk by climate change,

1061
01:00:32,680 --> 01:00:36,200
Speaker 2: including livestock farming. So to us, this was a really

1062
01:00:36,200 --> 01:00:39,360
Speaker 2: interesting case showing who gets a voice into amplifies those

1063
01:00:39,400 --> 01:00:44,040
Speaker 2: voices that we have to acknowledge that the farmers protests were,

1064
01:00:44,120 --> 01:00:47,240
Speaker 2: but a lot more than just climate policy and environmental policy.

1065
01:00:47,440 --> 01:00:50,360
Speaker 2: What happened in a Dutch case is that they i

1066
01:00:50,400 --> 01:00:53,800
Speaker 2: think last year they pushed the target back to twenty

1067
01:00:53,840 --> 01:00:55,560
Speaker 2: thirty five. We're not sure if that's actually going to

1068
01:00:55,560 --> 01:00:58,080
Speaker 2: happen now, this might be really interesting debate around it's

1069
01:00:58,120 --> 01:01:00,880
Speaker 2: just a compliant with the U legislation. And at the

1070
01:01:00,880 --> 01:01:02,600
Speaker 2: same time, also in the last couple of years, the

1071
01:01:02,840 --> 01:01:06,440
Speaker 2: Dutch Farmer's Party I called it BBB has massively risen

1072
01:01:06,480 --> 01:01:09,280
Speaker 2: and they're part of the government now. So there's a

1073
01:01:09,280 --> 01:01:12,880
Speaker 2: really interesting dynamic that's essentially like a small petridish of

1074
01:01:12,920 --> 01:01:15,400
Speaker 2: what's been happening at the EU level as well. And

1075
01:01:15,560 --> 01:01:17,840
Speaker 2: again at the EU level there you know, protests and

1076
01:01:17,880 --> 01:01:20,120
Speaker 2: never does about one thing. We've also had mania jobs

1077
01:01:20,160 --> 01:01:23,919
Speaker 2: at the European Parliamentary Brussels and yeah, at the same

1078
01:01:23,960 --> 01:01:26,360
Speaker 2: time this has been accompanied by a huge production in

1079
01:01:26,520 --> 01:01:31,600
Speaker 2: ambition around climate policy and climate and agriculture actions in particular.

1080
01:01:32,040 --> 01:01:35,080
Speaker 4: You may add something to what Catherine said. She said

1081
01:01:35,320 --> 01:01:38,000
Speaker 4: because nothing had been done about this in the past.

1082
01:01:38,040 --> 01:01:40,040
Speaker 4: I think this is a really important point if you

1083
01:01:40,080 --> 01:01:45,840
Speaker 4: think about cost of abatement. Our industries have already done something,

1084
01:01:45,920 --> 01:01:49,000
Speaker 4: and so the cost of abatement is higher. In agriculture,

1085
01:01:49,160 --> 01:01:53,280
Speaker 4: we haven't really done anything. So that's actually another reason

1086
01:01:53,400 --> 01:01:56,240
Speaker 4: to say we should do something because some of these

1087
01:01:56,280 --> 01:02:01,600
Speaker 4: abatement activities are don't cost any thing. They might actually

1088
01:02:01,640 --> 01:02:04,919
Speaker 4: make things better, right, So I think that that's kind

1089
01:02:04,920 --> 01:02:07,160
Speaker 4: of like, you know, there's really a lot of low

1090
01:02:07,200 --> 01:02:10,760
Speaker 4: hanging fruit here because we haven't done anything at all.

1091
01:02:10,920 --> 01:02:14,120
Speaker 4: Now that we get that kind of reaction, but the

1092
01:02:14,240 --> 01:02:17,880
Speaker 4: reaction is not commensurate to the actual cost of some

1093
01:02:17,920 --> 01:02:18,840
Speaker 4: of the policies.

1094
01:02:19,280 --> 01:02:19,880
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1095
01:02:19,960 --> 01:02:23,920
Speaker 1: Yeah, I feel like too. The what that farmer protest

1096
01:02:23,960 --> 01:02:27,280
Speaker 1: in particular, really made me think about just the level

1097
01:02:27,320 --> 01:02:31,960
Speaker 1: at which this, like the farmer as like an archetype,

1098
01:02:32,000 --> 01:02:36,200
Speaker 1: has been created and promoted and all of this stuff.

1099
01:02:36,200 --> 01:02:38,160
Speaker 1: And I'm just like, I can't think of any other

1100
01:02:38,360 --> 01:02:43,560
Speaker 1: industry that has quite as much of an effective argument

1101
01:02:43,600 --> 01:02:46,000
Speaker 1: around like I should be able to get to keep

1102
01:02:46,040 --> 01:02:48,400
Speaker 1: doing my job and exactly the same way that I've

1103
01:02:48,440 --> 01:02:50,800
Speaker 1: always done it, and it's like a core part of

1104
01:02:50,840 --> 01:02:55,400
Speaker 1: my identity that everybody should protect. I'm like, I mean, how,

1105
01:02:55,480 --> 01:03:00,800
Speaker 1: like every industry has been impacted by you know, the

1106
01:03:00,840 --> 01:03:04,480
Speaker 1: digital revolution or new technology is coming or whatever whatever.

1107
01:03:04,560 --> 01:03:08,080
Speaker 1: It's like, why does this one get to be so protected?

1108
01:03:08,480 --> 01:03:10,760
Speaker 4: Well, I mean Europe and the US, not only do

1109
01:03:10,800 --> 01:03:13,120
Speaker 4: you get to keep doing what you're doing, but you

1110
01:03:13,320 --> 01:03:14,680
Speaker 4: do it on the public nine.

1111
01:03:15,080 --> 01:03:17,720
Speaker 1: Yeah, yes, exactly.

1112
01:03:18,200 --> 01:03:19,040
Speaker 3: I think this also.

1113
01:03:18,880 --> 01:03:21,960
Speaker 2: Gets back to the whole agricultural exceptionism point, because there's

1114
01:03:21,960 --> 01:03:25,240
Speaker 2: a huge exceptionalism for farmers and farming. But also I

1115
01:03:25,240 --> 01:03:27,640
Speaker 2: do think it's important to remember that this is not

1116
01:03:27,680 --> 01:03:30,400
Speaker 2: all farmers and this is just a specific you know,

1117
01:03:30,520 --> 01:03:32,800
Speaker 2: a specific sub group, and they're just a lot like

1118
01:03:32,840 --> 01:03:36,920
Speaker 2: in the European Union context, there's other farming associations. You know,

1119
01:03:37,000 --> 01:03:39,480
Speaker 2: Copacteca is really noisy, but you have a lot of

1120
01:03:39,520 --> 01:03:41,600
Speaker 2: other farming associations that are a lot more supportive of

1121
01:03:41,640 --> 01:03:44,600
Speaker 2: climate climate action. But definitely, you know, they don't get

1122
01:03:44,600 --> 01:03:46,760
Speaker 2: covered that much in politico or they don't get as

1123
01:03:46,840 --> 01:03:49,320
Speaker 2: much you know, in time, they're not anywhere nearly as

1124
01:03:49,360 --> 01:03:51,400
Speaker 2: big in terms of how many lobbyists they can center

1125
01:03:51,440 --> 01:03:54,640
Speaker 2: me to European Parliament. So it's really important to kind

1126
01:03:54,640 --> 01:03:58,360
Speaker 2: of note that imbalance in representation between the different corners

1127
01:03:58,400 --> 01:03:58,840
Speaker 2: of the farm.

1128
01:04:00,280 --> 01:04:02,600
Speaker 1: And you're I mean, you said this before, but it's true,

1129
01:04:02,640 --> 01:04:05,400
Speaker 1: like farmers are being impacted by this all the time.

1130
01:04:05,440 --> 01:04:09,000
Speaker 1: They're like they're very aware of all of the different

1131
01:04:09,600 --> 01:04:12,480
Speaker 1: climate you know, changes that they're having to deal with

1132
01:04:12,560 --> 01:04:18,120
Speaker 1: and how unstable that makes their livelihoods and all of

1133
01:04:18,160 --> 01:04:20,960
Speaker 1: that stuff. Way more so like I don't know, I've

1134
01:04:21,120 --> 01:04:24,280
Speaker 1: talked to both my grandfathers were farmers too, so I'm like,

1135
01:04:24,760 --> 01:04:28,040
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not anti farmer. I think that like, yeah,

1136
01:04:28,080 --> 01:04:32,840
Speaker 1: this one very vocal minority has been very effective.

1137
01:04:33,440 --> 01:04:36,080
Speaker 4: That's another topic if you do a season to think

1138
01:04:36,120 --> 01:04:40,320
Speaker 4: about unpacking the You know, the National Farmers Union in

1139
01:04:40,360 --> 01:04:44,600
Speaker 4: the United States has very different positions from the farm

1140
01:04:44,680 --> 01:04:47,880
Speaker 4: Yew Federation, for example, Right, Yeah, we just had the

1141
01:04:47,920 --> 01:04:51,480
Speaker 4: farm aid concept, right, that kind of those kinds of

1142
01:04:51,480 --> 01:04:54,840
Speaker 4: farmers are a little bit more progressive than the National

1143
01:04:54,920 --> 01:04:59,000
Speaker 4: Cattalian Association. So unpacking those groups and who gets to

1144
01:04:59,080 --> 01:05:02,000
Speaker 4: have a louder would be a good.

1145
01:05:01,760 --> 01:05:05,680
Speaker 1: Thing to look into. Yeah, yeah, it's interesting. Okay, So

1146
01:05:05,920 --> 01:05:08,480
Speaker 1: I want to just as like one last question, I

1147
01:05:08,480 --> 01:05:11,120
Speaker 1: do want to ask you guys about efforts that have

1148
01:05:12,240 --> 01:05:17,560
Speaker 1: been successful at countering this level of obstruction or that

1149
01:05:17,640 --> 01:05:20,840
Speaker 1: are maybe starting that are promising. What have you seen

1150
01:05:20,880 --> 01:05:24,920
Speaker 1: in terms of trying to get past this roadblock, and

1151
01:05:26,360 --> 01:05:29,920
Speaker 1: especially anything that seems like it's actually worked. I'm curious

1152
01:05:30,040 --> 01:05:31,560
Speaker 1: to hear about.

1153
01:05:32,400 --> 01:05:36,400
Speaker 4: Well, in the US, we've had the Mighty Earth complaint

1154
01:05:36,440 --> 01:05:39,400
Speaker 4: to the SEC about the claims that JBS has made

1155
01:05:39,760 --> 01:05:43,800
Speaker 4: on their net zero bonds, right, and I think that

1156
01:05:43,800 --> 01:05:47,760
Speaker 4: that was a good effort. But in the current administration,

1157
01:05:48,120 --> 01:05:51,520
Speaker 4: you know, one thing that we have seen work at

1158
01:05:51,560 --> 01:05:54,960
Speaker 4: the local level is the nusance lawsuits. You know, in

1159
01:05:55,000 --> 01:05:58,320
Speaker 4: places like North Carolina where they have had a moratorium

1160
01:05:58,400 --> 01:06:01,720
Speaker 4: and you confine an email feed operations. Things are driven

1161
01:06:01,760 --> 01:06:05,640
Speaker 4: by local concerns more than global and so I think

1162
01:06:05,680 --> 01:06:09,160
Speaker 4: people have to be strategic in terms of the kind

1163
01:06:09,200 --> 01:06:14,560
Speaker 4: of things that may resonate with local populations. These agricultural

1164
01:06:14,600 --> 01:06:20,280
Speaker 4: operations produce dozens, if not hundreds of pollutants, right, and

1165
01:06:20,320 --> 01:06:23,840
Speaker 4: so which one you go after really depends on which

1166
01:06:23,880 --> 01:06:27,120
Speaker 4: one is the most regulated and where the impact is,

1167
01:06:27,160 --> 01:06:30,400
Speaker 4: whether it's a watershed, airshed, or whatever. So I think

1168
01:06:30,760 --> 01:06:33,520
Speaker 4: people working at the local level, you know, you know,

1169
01:06:33,560 --> 01:06:37,960
Speaker 4: in places where they've had moratoria or where they've had limits,

1170
01:06:38,280 --> 01:06:40,840
Speaker 4: that I see that as going forward because at the

1171
01:06:40,840 --> 01:06:42,680
Speaker 4: federal level in the US, we're not going to see

1172
01:06:42,720 --> 01:06:43,960
Speaker 4: anything for quite a while.

1173
01:06:44,080 --> 01:06:47,120
Speaker 2: So yeah, and kind of in a similar vein this

1174
01:06:47,280 --> 01:06:49,320
Speaker 2: is a small win in the grand game of things,

1175
01:06:49,360 --> 01:06:52,360
Speaker 2: but in terms of similar to nuisance lourss in the US.

1176
01:06:52,400 --> 01:06:55,080
Speaker 2: There's also been a Spanish case this year where a

1177
01:06:55,080 --> 01:06:58,800
Speaker 2: Spanish called the local authorities have breached their residents human

1178
01:06:58,880 --> 01:07:02,160
Speaker 2: rights by fate to act on water and air pollution

1179
01:07:02,240 --> 01:07:05,160
Speaker 2: from mega farms, which was I think mostly pig farms.

1180
01:07:05,360 --> 01:07:06,840
Speaker 2: But I thought that was really nice and there's a

1181
01:07:06,840 --> 01:07:09,480
Speaker 2: lot more of those kind of cases underway, which is

1182
01:07:09,520 --> 01:07:11,720
Speaker 2: again I think tackling that a lot more immediate and

1183
01:07:11,800 --> 01:07:15,280
Speaker 2: water pollution, and there's been some more green washing cases

1184
01:07:15,280 --> 01:07:17,480
Speaker 2: as well. But one thing I thought it was really

1185
01:07:17,480 --> 01:07:20,040
Speaker 2: important to note is that it's really nice to see

1186
01:07:20,360 --> 01:07:23,960
Speaker 2: the level of investigative work in rescue journalism coming out

1187
01:07:23,960 --> 01:07:24,440
Speaker 2: on this topic.

1188
01:07:24,480 --> 01:07:26,600
Speaker 3: It's really really nice to see what I think is

1189
01:07:26,640 --> 01:07:27,800
Speaker 3: a ramping up in attention.

1190
01:07:28,720 --> 01:07:30,480
Speaker 1: And yeah, I've seen that too.

1191
01:07:30,520 --> 01:07:33,680
Speaker 2: I think, Yeah, I think that's amazing, and I really

1192
01:07:33,720 --> 01:07:35,680
Speaker 2: want to commend everyone doing this work, and I think

1193
01:07:35,680 --> 01:07:38,080
Speaker 2: that would be really important. Maybe not, I think it

1194
01:07:38,160 --> 01:07:40,280
Speaker 2: might be true getting get the tangible outwards, but I

1195
01:07:40,280 --> 01:07:42,360
Speaker 2: think this would be really important in just kind of

1196
01:07:42,360 --> 01:07:46,880
Speaker 2: denormalizing the proximity between animal agg and decision makers when

1197
01:07:46,920 --> 01:07:48,680
Speaker 2: it comes to what do we do about climate change

1198
01:07:48,680 --> 01:07:50,600
Speaker 2: and animal act that the.

1199
01:07:51,520 --> 01:07:52,360
Speaker 3: Lack of separation.

1200
01:07:52,680 --> 01:07:56,600
Speaker 2: I found that really really stunning, and I think there's

1201
01:07:56,800 --> 01:07:59,760
Speaker 2: that kind of work showing the obstruction and showing it

1202
01:07:59,760 --> 01:08:01,919
Speaker 2: over and over and over again. I think it's really

1203
01:08:01,960 --> 01:08:05,360
Speaker 2: important in you know, going towards denormalizing that a bit more.

1204
01:08:06,120 --> 01:08:08,360
Speaker 1: Yeah, I do feel like they might be the most

1205
01:08:09,760 --> 01:08:16,040
Speaker 1: ingrained in government of like any any industry. It's wild

1206
01:08:16,760 --> 01:08:17,519
Speaker 1: guess you do have.

1207
01:08:17,439 --> 01:08:21,160
Speaker 2: Those kind of agricultural departments and agricultural agencies that have

1208
01:08:21,240 --> 01:08:23,519
Speaker 2: this long history of working with industry where this was

1209
01:08:23,640 --> 01:08:27,160
Speaker 2: the point of the existence that they production, They promote

1210
01:08:27,200 --> 01:08:30,800
Speaker 2: more production, food security, you know, security of production, you know,

1211
01:08:31,240 --> 01:08:32,839
Speaker 2: promote as much income as possible.

1212
01:08:32,920 --> 01:08:34,320
Speaker 3: This is this was the point of them.

1213
01:08:34,320 --> 01:08:36,760
Speaker 2: And then suddenly we're asking them to, oh, you know,

1214
01:08:37,080 --> 01:08:39,800
Speaker 2: maybe regulating because it's you know, climate change. So it's

1215
01:08:39,840 --> 01:08:41,720
Speaker 2: just a lot trickier, like when we bring those things

1216
01:08:41,760 --> 01:08:45,760
Speaker 2: in afterwards you have this really ingrained system of aligned interests.

1217
01:08:46,040 --> 01:08:46,679
Speaker 3: It's tricky.

1218
01:08:46,800 --> 01:08:50,920
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, let's not forget that when Silence Spring

1219
01:08:51,080 --> 01:08:56,120
Speaker 4: was published US, THEA went after racial charis and basically

1220
01:08:56,280 --> 01:08:59,760
Speaker 4: because we're aligned with industry and they were promoting this

1221
01:09:00,320 --> 01:09:04,120
Speaker 4: heavily tech, right, we want to use pesticides. This was

1222
01:09:04,120 --> 01:09:07,439
Speaker 4: the time where they wanted to eradicate things. So there

1223
01:09:07,479 --> 01:09:11,439
Speaker 4: is a long history of these institutions not necessarily working

1224
01:09:11,479 --> 01:09:15,080
Speaker 4: towards the public good, but more like the sectoral good

1225
01:09:15,200 --> 01:09:18,200
Speaker 4: and even parts of the sector right