Never let a crisis go to waste, they say. Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine immediately triggered alarmist statements from the livestock industry that the war would pose a serious threat to food security in Europe and beyond.
There is an immediate call to reassess or even shelve the environmental goals of farm-to-fork and biodiversity strategies.
No one denies that the brutal war in Ukraine will affect the supply of wheat, corn, sunflower seeds and sunflower oil for food and feed to the EU, as well as EU agricultural exports, especially meat exports to our eastern neighbors.
Consumption
But it is very cynical to see this conflict as an excuse to delay or limit the critical transformation of our food system, which is so desperately needed to stop biodiversity loss and fight climate change.
Global warming will not suddenly slow down until the Russians lay down their arms. Without decisive action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and protect biodiversity, the impact on people and ecosystems will be catastrophic and irreversible.
The issue of food security is of course a sensitive one. No one wants to see food prices soar, staples run short or people (often the most vulnerable) go hungry.
One question, however, is now even more important: how much of the grains and oilseeds we produce and import is directly for human consumption.
Be exploited
According to the European Commission, about two-thirds of the EU’s grain production and 70 percent of its oilseed production are used in animal feed — not enough to feed the billions of farm animals that are used to produce meat, dairy and eggs. EU.
We also supplement this by importing millions of tons of soybean meal each year, mainly from the industrial monocrop that destroys the rainforests of Latin America. About 95 percent of these imports are fed to farm animals, not directly to people.
Feeding farm animals with grains and legumes is a very inefficient and wasteful way of producing protein. It may take about 20 kilograms of feed to make one kilogram of beef. Feed conversion ratios vary by species, but nothing beats feeding humans directly with these plant-based proteins.
If we are serious about protecting food security, we should be talking about prioritizing feeding people over feeding the vast numbers of farm animals that go into food production.
Assure
My own country, the Netherlands, provides a shameful example of how a country’s intensive livestock industry can far exceed the food needs of its population. In fact, the industry mainly focuses on export markets for its products, such as pork.
