"Stockfree" Green Manure. All The Nutrients, None Of The Exploitation.
The Associated Press recently published this fascinating article on veganic farming. Unlike most organic farms that use animal products such as manure, bone meal, and blood meal to fertilize their crops, veganic farmers take out the middle man (in this case, the animals who process plant foods into manure) and put composted plant matter--"stockfree" or green manure--directly onto their fields instead. The famous Huguenot Street Farm in New Paltz, NY offers this helpful explanation of the basic principles of veganic farming, and Friends of Animals goes into a bit more depth in this article. If you're in the market for a whole book on the subject, Jenny Hall and Ian Tolhurst's Growing Green comes highly recommended by our friend Harold Brown of Farm Kind. If you're looking for a more hands-on experience, consider this Veganic Farming Training Program offered by the Tree of Life Rejuvenation Center in Patagonia, AZ.

Recent Editorial Blasts Industrial Animal Production
"The so-called efficiency of industrial animal production is an illusion, made possible by cheap grain, cheap water and prisonlike confinement systems." So says an editorial published today in the New York Times under the scathing title "The Worst Way of Farming". Citing recent reports including the Pew Commission Study and The Union of Concerned Scientists' new paper, CAFOs Uncovered, the editorial board of the Times concludes that "animal husbandry has been turned into animal abuse"--"millions of animals are crowded together in inhumane conditions, causing significant environmental threats and unacceptable health risks for workers, their neighbors and all the rest of us." Three cheers for the Gray Lady! Be sure to send the links to your family and friends.

Prestigious Pew Commission Affirms California Ballot Initiative
The following is the text of an e-mail update from Paul Shapiro, director of the factory farming campaign at The Humane Society of the United States.

"The prestigious Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production just concluded its 2.5-year study of American animal agriculture with unanimous findings from its 15 members. The Commission was chaired by former Kansas governor John Carlin and included, among others, former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman, former Dean of the Univ. of Tennessee's College of Veterinary Medicine Dr. Michael Blackwell, and more.

The panel concluded that factory farms pose unacceptable risks to public health, the environment and animal welfare. It also issued a series of recommendations, including a phase-out of battery cages, gestation crates, veal crates, foie gras, and tail-docking of dairy cows, along with inclusion of poultry under the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act. The Commission even put out a press release in which it cites the pending California anti-cruelty ballot measure as one of "the types of modest animal welfare public policy improvements that the Commissioners recommend implementing."

The Washington Post published a great story on page A2 today entitled, "Report Targets Cost of Factory Farming." USA Today's story begins, "The way America produces meat, milk and eggs is unsustainable, creates significant risks to public health from antibiotic resistance and disease, damages the environment and unnecessarily harms animals, a report released Tuesday says." The Wall Street Journal's coverage focuses both on the problems caused by factory farming and the Commission's conclusion that the "agriculture industry is exerting 'significant influence' on academic research." And the Des Moines Register's article highlights the fact that the Commission is accusing "some livestock interests of trying to disrupt a wide-ranging study of the industry by threatening to yank financing for scientists and universities."

Both the Associated Press and Reuters have national stories on it, as well.

Taking Veganism to Church
As a Mennonite youngster, I worked the church potluck circuit with reckless abandon--especially the dessert table. Back then, it would have been difficult to imagine a church potluck without animal products. But as the evidence mounts that industrial livestock production has serious repercussions for creation, more and more faith communities are taking notice of the moral and spiritual significance of eating. As a case in point, Splinters and I are members of a small group at Sherman Street CRC that recently put on a multi-cultural, intergenerational vegan potluck with over 40 parishioners and friends.

Enchiladas, Lasagna, and Dahl, Oh My!
I brought our favorite Seitan Enchiladas with Salsa Verde (from Ann Gentry's spectacular Real Food Daily Cookbook) along with a side of refried black beans.

Others prepared vegan lasagna, Indian dahl, African groundnut stew, fresh salads and fruits, and a variety of other amazing offerings. Suffice it to say that no one went away hungry, least of all those who spent any time near the sweet table, which boasted vegan coconutty cookies (from Wealthy Street Bakery), "cockeyed" chocolate cake with coconut frosting, chocolate banana cupcakes with peanut butter creme frosting (from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World), and a transcendent ginger coconut macadamia carrot cake that obliterated my previous conception of the standard for vegan desserts.

Rediscovering the Intersection of Food and Faith
Though a lot of vegans have given up on seeing the church as a potential ally in the struggle for justice for all God's creatures, there is reason to be hopeful. As Christine Gutleben of the Humane Society of the United States points out in a recent editorial in the New York Times, the principles of compassion, mercy, and justice for animals are built into our faith traditions, just waiting for visionary people of faith to reawaken the church to their significance for our everyday lives. For more information on the resurgence of religious interest in these matters and links to resources that can help you communicate the message of compassion for animals in your own church community, check out the Animals and Religion initiative of the Humane Society of the United States.

Compassionate Eating as Care of Creation
As many of you know, I spent the summer writing a booklet on the intersection of animal ethics and faith issues (from a Christian perspective) for the Humane Society of the United States. The result of this endeavor is finally available online and you can check it out here. The limited edition version of the publication (which is not yet featured on the website) includes 14 amazing collages by our very own Adam Wolpa. We hope to have a pdf of the limited edition up soon, but until then you can check out Wolpa's collages here.

Something for Everyone
While the argument developed in this booklet is grounded primarily in broadly Christian assumptions, my hope is that there may still be some strategic value in the booklet for people who do not share these assumptions. After all, many non-Christians who care about the plight of animals still have a vested interest in being able to appeal to Christian audiences in a language that such audiences can understand and appreciate. Moreover, there are certain empirical facts about the fallout of our dependence on industrial animal agriculture that all of us have a vested interest in knowing, regardless of our diverse religious identities. Pages 23-36 focus specifically on these empirical issues, so if you're allergic to religious discourse but still interested in the general topic, you can skip straight to this section of the booklet for a succinct overview (with recourse to the latest scientific research) of the hidden human, animal, and environmental consequences of the traditional American diet.

Confronting Global Climate Change
Calvin College right here in Grand Rapids is one of over 1,700 universities and colleges participating in an exciting national initiative called Focus the Nation. Its purpose is to provide a day of focused discussion on global climate change and solutions for the future that can help "to move America beyond fatalism to a determination to face up to this civilizational challenge, the challenge of our generation." At Calvin, a series of events is planned during the first week of the spring semester culminating on January 31, 2008 with a teach-in, discussion with elected leaders, and a celebratory concert.

Food & the Future
Among the sessions planned for the teach-in (download the full schedule) is an offering on "Food & the Future" (9:00 am TODAY in the DeVos Forum) during which I will make a brief ten-minute presentation on Industrial Animal Agriculture and Global Warming. The purpose of this post, in addition to publicizing Calvin's contribution to this important nationwide initiative, is to provide attendees of the teach-in (and other interested parties) with links to online resources for further investigation of the general issues that I briefly consider in my presentation. Though ten minutes is not enough time to provide in-depth coverage of the serious environmental challenges posed by our reliance on industrial animal agriculture, my hope is that the following resources might inspire you to give these challenges the rigorous consideration they deserve.

Tuition-Free Online Education!
My general strategy for approaching this constellation of issues is articulated in a paper I recently gave in the Calvin College Christian Perspectives in Science Series titled Animal Welfare and Global Sustainability. In writing this paper, I found many of the following articles, papers, and reports illuminating. Check them out and decide for yourself!

RECENT POPULAR MEDIA
1. "Rethinking the Meat Guzzler", New York Times, January 27, 2008.
2. A Factory Farm Near You, New York Times, July 31, 2007.
3. Meat Is Murder On the Environment, NewScientist, July 18, 2007.
4. Rearing Cattle Produces More Greenhouse Gasses Than Driving Cars, UN News Service, November 29, 2006.

ONLINE ARTICLES
1. Diet, Energy, and Global Warming, Gideon Eshel and Pamela Martin (University of Chicago), 2005.
2. Meat: Now, It's Not Personal, World Watch Magazine, 2004.
3. Sustainability of Meat-Based and Plant-Based Diets and the Environment, Pimentel and Pimentel, The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 2003.

DEVELOPMENT ORGANIZATION REPORTS
1. Livestock's Long Shadow: Environmental Issues and Options, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 2006.
2.Livestock Development: Implications for Rural Poverty, the Environment, and Global Food Security, The World Bank, 2001.
Managing the Livestock Revolution
3. Global Warming: Climate Change and Farm Animal Welfare (Executive Summary), Compassion in World Farming, 2007.
4. Global Warming: Climate Change and Farm Animal Welfare (Full Report), Compassion in World Farming, 2007.

Your State-by-State Guide to Exploitation and Degradation
Is it me, or is the New York Times feeling guilty about that "Death By Veganism" fiasco awhile back? In yet another op-ed on the environmental fallout of factory farming, the NYT showcases an organization called Food and Water Watch which has recently launched this fascinating interactive map offering a state-by-state breakdown of all the CAFOs (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation) in the U.S. You can even search by facility type to find out, for instance, how many pig operations exist in your home state (that's a whopping 220 for Michaganders). To our shame, the state of Michigan is the 11th worst factory farm polluter in the union, with Allegan and Cass counties being by far the worst offenders.

Please consider informing your friends and family in Michigan of this educational opportunity and encourage them to boycott factory farms and do their part to help clean up our great state!

It's dirtnap time for another grand myth of corporate making.
Big Agriculture. "Better living through chemicals!", they said. "Animal protein is the foundation of a healthy diet!", they promised. "Organic farming simply can't produce enough food to feed the world!", they told us. These first two myths bought the farm years ago. The third one should be pushing up daisies any day now, as this press release on a new study from the University of Michigan explains.

Drive less, turn out the lights, and GO VEGAN!
The links between animal product consumption and environmental degradation are long established, but the studies just keep pililng up. Here's the latest from Japan, where researchers have concluded that "[a] kilogram of beef is responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions and other pollution than driving for 3 hours while leaving all the lights on back home."There's just no getting around it: meat is murder on the environment.

I nostri amici italiani sono molto bei, non sono?
A few minutes ago, I received an e-mail informing me that a new comment had been made on one of our posts. When I checked the email, I was delighted to see that we now seem to have an Italian readership, as the address linked back to this enchanting e-shop called Tippitappi recently launched by an eco-vegan graphic designer in Reggio Emilia, a beautiful place in northern Italy. In addition to a whole host of must-have 100% organic cotton t-shirts printed with inventive animal and earth friendly designs, Tippitappi has a great blog which you may read in either Italian or English. Here are a couple of my favorite t-shirt designs:
I don't eat animals.

Zoos = Prisons

Is International Organic Apparel Swapping even legal?
We're no match for our Italian friends, of course, but perhaps we could persuade them to trade some of their wares for some of ours? We love you, Tippitappi! Thanks for visiting us and keep up the great work. Buona Fortuna!

Stay tuned for more designs...
If you spend all your disposable income at Tippitappi, that's just fine with us. But if you manage to save $15-20, you just might be able to cash in on one of our limited edition extraVEGANza! "FUNDAMENTALIST VEGANGELICAL" tees later this summer. Dare to dream!

Rearing cattle produces more greenhouse gases than driving cars, UN report warns

29 November 2006 – Cattle-rearing generates more global warming greenhouse gases, as measured in CO2 equivalent, than transportation, and smarter production methods, including improved animal diets to reduce enteric fermentation and consequent methane emissions, are urgently needed, according to a new United Nations report released today.
...
The livestock business is among the most damaging sectors to the earth's increasingly scarce water resources, contributing among other things to water pollution from animal wastes, antibiotics and hormones, chemicals from tanneries, fertilizers and the pesticides used to spray feed crops.

Kathy Freston

. . We can make a huge difference in the environment by eating a plant based diet instead of an animal based one. Factory farming pollutes our air and water, reduces the rainforests, and goes a long way to create global warming. And although the vast majority of responses to the piece were positive, there were some environmentalists for whom the idea of giving up those chicken nuggets was impossible to swallow. . .