Reporting of an IPCC study into meat production focused on the negative. Can the industry work to construct a positive narrative?

The meat industry was back in the firing line last week after a report by a group of UN scientists linked livestock and dairy ­production to climate change.

Some 25% to 30% of global greenhouse gas emissions come from the food system, according to the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which suggested eating less meat could help reduce those emissions.

The study also stressed meat consumption was an important part of a balanced diet, but that message was largely lost in the ensuing media headlines, which called on people to abandon meat and adopt plant-based diets to save the planet.

This led to a furious mudslinging match on Twitter, with NFU president Minette Batters accusing national journalists and news organisations of having a ‘deeply flawed approach’ to reporting on climate change.

‘I won’t stand by and watch farmers be bullied by a metropolitan elite that is too idle or too ignorant to face up to the fact that just focusing on meat eating alone doesn’t tackle climate change,’ she wrote.

It was the strongest reaction yet from the farming lobby and marked a distinct shift away from its usually defensive approach. So is this the beginning of a more robust fightback from the meat industry? And does it have a credible defence?

Until now, the UK meat industry has been fairly cautious in responding to allegations that it is driving climate change, admits Cranswick’s group commercial director Jim Brisby.

“I think what happens is that these reports come out and the industry tends to be on the back foot,” he adds. “It comes across as being very defensive.”

But with a series of studies linking global meat production to climate change - and consumers only hearing one side of the story - it is time to mount a more robust defence, Brisby suggests.

“Well-managed soils using grazing animals will actually capture carbon in soils. And this is something where British farming can lead the way,” he says. “The meat industry has a job to do now to get on the front foot and be proud of what we are doing.”

A spokesman for Tulip agrees. The IPCC report should “galvanise the UK meat sector to refocus on producing information on the environmental challenges beyond diets,” he says.

Lack of evidence

They’ve got a point. In the UK, agriculture accounts for 10% of greenhouse gas emissions, versus 15% for housing and 24% for energy. And the UK’s pasture-based livestock systems are very different from intensive production in the US and Brazil.

There is, however, still a lack of “100% peer-reviewed evidence” to back up claims over the benefits of grass-fed livestock systems, says Will Jackson, AHDB strategy director for beef and lamb.

“When looking at things like carbon sequestration there is quite a lot of research going on,” he adds. “Some of the work that has been done has shown it in quite a positive light. But there is also no consistently recognised way of measuring carbon sequestration across grassland at the moment.”

Waiting for the right facts to surface through research will take time and money. But there are things the sector can shout about now. Such as the fact UK farmers are already “working towards a net zero emissions ambition”, which “can be done without downsizing production or exporting our production”, Batters says.

“The British livestock industry has a great story to tell”

“The British livestock industry has a great story to tell,” she adds. “We just have to get out there and tell it.”

The net-zero by 2040 target is certainly ambitious, says AHDB’s Jackson, but “we have to make sure we are striving as an industry to make as positive a difference as we can do”.

Despite the positive aims of the net-zero target, however, the British meat industry will have to accept the “inconvenient truth” that some livestock products are more environmentally friendly than others if it wants to mount a credible defence, claims Patrick Holden, CEO of the Sustainable Food Trust.

“The painful thing for the meat industry is to recognise there is an increasing need to differentiate between the livestock systems which are part of the problem and those which are part of the solution”.

Grass-fed livestock systems aren’t so sustainable if diets are supplemented with imported soy, for example. “We are developing an annual sustainability audit, which would include factors in the diet of ruminants,” adds Holden. “That way, instead of saying ‘you are bad’ and ‘you are good’, we could create a labelling system in the marketplace which reflects the degree of sustainability of the production system.”

Chris Elliott: How UK livestock producers can cut their carbon footprint

While this proposed labelling system is still at planning stage, it has already attracted the interest of the government and consensus across the industry, Holden claims.

It might also reassure shoppers, over half of whom said the environment was important when choosing food during a recent survey by AHDB.

But with meat sales stagnating, the sector shouldn’t wait any longer to start shouting louder than the “vegan lobby”, insists Cranswick’s Brisby.

“There is no denying the [climate] problem is there but the plant-based burger is not necessarily the answer to the ­problem,” he adds.

Farmers and processors have clearly had enough. It’s time for the fightback to begin.

What the IPCC report says

  • Cattle are responsible for producing 65% to 77% of global livestock emissions
  • Livestock in low and middle-income countries contribute 70% of the emissions from ruminants
  • Red meat is one of the most inefficient products in terms of emissions per kilogram of protein produced
  • Emissions per unit produced have declined globally and are about 60% lower today than in the 1960s
  • Soils contain about 1.8 times more carbon than the atmosphere

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