Letter to the Editor, The Guardian, January 2020

Dear Editor,

In her article ‘Veganuary is huge. But is it really as simple as animal foods bad, plant foods good?’ (22^nd January 2020), Joanna Blythman invites readers to accept a number of statements regarding animal products: that ‘it’s not the cow, but the how’ (the authors of the White Oaks Pastures life cycle analysis, published December 2020, may beg to differ), and insinuates that ‘“plant chicken pieces” that come from a factory in Holland’ must be intrinsically worse for the environment than a ‘leg of grass-fed British lamb’, despite a number of studies - such as the largest meta-analysis of global food systems to date, first published in Science by Joseph Poore and Thomas Nemecek in 2018 - disproving the popular notion that local must also mean low impact.

While demonising almond milk for its environmental impact, this investigative journalist has omitted any mention of the soya used to feed the UK’s farm animals – even the free-range ones. It’s been estimated that over 75% of all soya imported to this country is fed to livestock or embedded in their produce, and much of this is linked to Amazonian deforestation. When her penultimate paragraph attempts to shame avocado eaters for contributing to the Mexican deforestation, Joanna’s omission is rather extraordinary. And while extolling the virtues of free-range farming on land that ‘could often serve no other agricultural purpose’, she appears not to have considered that land historically cleared for pasture could be rewilded, providing precious habitat for wildlife in decline.

The science is clear – consumption of animal products must dramatically decrease, or end entirely, if we are to avert climate catastrophe – but the wider challenge may lie in ensuring the honesty of reporting surrounding the complexities of farming and food production. Joanna’s column has certainly left a bitter taste in my mouth.

Yours sincerely,

Mrs Rachael Simpson-Jones