Editorial feature: “Zero grazing” vs. the Five Freedoms
From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)
Few animal advocates doubt these days
that the use and misuse of more than 47 billion
farmed animals worldwide is the most urgent and
critical issue before us. Whether one favors
ushering humanity toward vegetarianism or
veganism, or only more nuanced efforts to reduce
and mitigate animal suffering in husbandry and
slaughter, animal agriculture involves many
times more animals and more misery than all other
human activities combined.
Indeed, from a third to half of all the
birds in the world are factory-farmed chickens.
Farmed mammals far outnumber all companion
animals and probably all wildlife larger than a
dog. Even the highest estimates of the numbers
of animals used in laboratories per year appear
to be lower than the volume of animals
slaughtered for human consumption on most days of
the week.