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10 “Cowgate”
Meat eating and climate change denial
Vasile Stanescu
“Urgent action is required”
Arguably, the single most categorical and effective statement on the environ-
mental dangers of the raising of animals for human consumption was issued by
the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). In 2006, the
FAO produced a 391-page report titled “Livestock’s Long Shadow”, conclud-
ing that animal farming presents a “major threat to the environment” with
such “deep and wide-ranging” impacts that it should rank as a leading focus
for environmental policy. The report concluded that “[t]he livestock sector is a
major player [in climate change], responsible for 18 percent of greenhouse gas
emissions measured in CO2 equivalent. This is a higher share than transport”
(Steinfeld et al., 2006, p. xxi). Nor was the call for action at all hidden: As Hen-
ning Steinfeld, Chief of FAO’s Livestock Information and Policy Branch, put it
(FAO, 2006): “Livestock are one of the most significant contributors to today’s
most serious environmental problems. Urgent action is required to remedy the
situation”.1 Furthermore, the chair of the United Nations Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, repeatedly suggested
that people should decrease their consumption of meat in order to help offset
climate change. As he stated (in Jowit, 2008): “In terms of immediacy of action
and the feasibility of bringing about reductions in a short period of time, it
clearly is the most attractive opportunity. . . . Give up meat for one day [a week]
initially, and decrease it from there”. The evidence caused Yvo de Boer, then
executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCCC), to conclude “the best solution would be for us all to become
vegetarians” (BBC, 2008).
Unfortunately, these United Nations statements on the environmental effects
of animal agriculture and meat eating are not more well-known because of
what I term meat-eating denial. This analogy is a reference to the concept of cli-
mate change denial, i.e. the concept that large-scale businesses with specific inter-
ests in influencing public policy internationally misrepresent scientific studies,
via a series of rhetorical strategies, in order to influence public opinion. This is
not to suggest that all the information provided by the denialists is false; it is to
suggest that this information is presented to the media in an intentionally biased
manner that produces media coverage that effectively distorts public opinion
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“Cowgate” 179
on the issue. For example, according to Pew research, belief in climate change
has been steadily eroding even as scientific support has steadily been growing.
In April 2008, 71 per cent of U.S. citizens believed in climate change; by 2009,
that number had fallen to only 51 per cent, of which an even smaller percent-
age, only 36 per cent, believed that climate change is caused by human activity
(The Pew Research Center, 2009). What changed was not the scientific con-
sensus about climate change (which has only grown) nor individual reasons and
ethics but instead the creation of an effective and systematic attempt to distort
public information based, in part, on claims that scientific claims about climate
change had been “debunked”. Likewise, a similarly successful pattern of sup-
posed “debunking” of scientific studies was undertaken by the meat and dairy
industry to confuse the public about the environmental effects of eating meat.
And it is in this broader sense that I mean the analogy between climate change
denial and meat-eating denial.
In this chapter I focus on the research by Dr. Frank Mitloehner as a repre-
sentative example of the growing manner in which animal agribusiness has been
able to utilize the strategies already used by climate change deniers in order
to distort the debate on livestock production and its environmental effects.
I focus on Mitloehner’s research, in some detail, because his supposed “debunk-
ing” of the link between animal agriculture and greenhouse gases emission has
been the most effective and most widely reported example of meat-eating denial.
However, to be clear, this single example is not only about Dr. Mitloehner; it is
meant to highlight an ongoing and overarching industry-funded trend.
“Everywhere in the world”
FAO’s “Livestock’s Long Shadow” (Steinfeld et al., 2006) concluded that world-
wide meat production produced 18 per cent of all emissions relating to climate
change, which the report went on to note was “a higher share than transport”.
The response, particularly by livestock-based agribusiness, has been to empha-
size minor errors in the report that do not dispute the essential claim linking
animal agriculture to greenhouse gases but that, at the same time, they suggest,
disprove the study. For example, Frank Mitloehner, a researcher at the Univer-
sity of California at Davis, gave a presentation, entitled “Clearing the Air on
Livestock’s Contribution to Climate Change”, before the 239th national meet-
ing of the American Chemical Society criticizing the FAO research (Mitloeh-
ner, 2011). In this presentation Mitloehner made essentially two arguments:
The first one, which was not his main point, was that the number 18 per cent
represents only a worldwide average and therefore does not, directly, say any-
thing about the “carbon footprint” of any one particular country (Loglisci,
2009).2 This is true, although it does not in any way dispute the validity of the
18 per cent itself, and the UN food and agriculture agency has been working
on precisely this type of country-by-country break down (Abend, 2010). How-
ever, it was his second argument, which is both the main one he stressed and
the one emphasized by all the media coverage of the presentation, that caught
international attention. Namely, when the report claimed that agriculture
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180 Vasile Stanescu
released more greenhouses gases than transportation this statement was incor-
rect, not because it over-reported the amount of emissions by livestock, but
instead because it underestimated the amount produced by the transportation
industry. Specifically, he pointed out the study had only focused on the amount
of gases being released via transportation (i.e. direct emissions) but had not
included the entire “life-cycle” amount of transportation, i.e. how many emis-
sions went into, say, mining the materials to build the cars. As the press release
from the event explained:
Mitloehner says confusion over meat and milk’s role in climate change
stems from a small section printed in the executive summary of a 2006
United Nations report, “Livestock’s Long Shadow.” It read: “The livestock
sector is a major player, responsible for 18 percent of greenhouse gas emis-
sions measured in CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalents). This is a higher
share than transport.”
Mitloehner says there is no doubt that livestock are major producers
of methane, one of the greenhouse gases. But he faults the methodology
of “Livestock’s Long Shadow,” contending that numbers for the livestock
sector were calculated differently from transportation. In the report, the
livestock emissions included gases produced by growing animal feed; ani-
mals’ digestive emissions; and processing meat and milk into foods. But the
transportation analysis factored in only emissions from fossil fuels burned
while driving and not all other transport lifecycle related factors. “This lop-
sided analysis is a classical apples-and-oranges analogy that truly confused
the issue,” he said.
(American Chemical Society, 2010)
Mitloehner’s point, as such, is accurate and has been conceded by the creators
of the United Nations report. At the same time, the point is itself fairly irrel-
evant, as it has nothing to say about the actual rate of greenhouse gas emissions
from livestock. As one of the United Nations study’s co-authors, Pierre Gerber,
explained (in Armstrong, 2010): “[T]he comparability of the data does not
challenge the estimate of 18 percent” since “[i]t has been endorsed by the scien-
tific community”, and even “the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change) made reference to it”. In other words, Mitloehner’s presentation had
nothing to say about the amount of greenhouse gases livestock actually emitted,
only a minor correction of the amount produced by transportation, which, in
turn, had only been included for the purposes of comparison. As James McWil-
liams, a historian focused on the issue of food politics, wrote:
On the grand scale of scientific errors, though, this one was relatively
minor. What matters most is that the 18 percent figure – and the corre-
sponding implication that reduced meat consumption would lower global
warming – remained essentially untouched by Mitloehner’s report. . . .
Mitloehner’s debunking of the transportation comparison changes nothing
about the overall impact of livestock on the environment.
(McWilliams, 2010)
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“Cowgate” 181
However, these fairly minor corrections, which did not, in any way, dispute
the actual finding of the report concerning the connection of livestock and
global warming, were picked up and reported by numerous media organiza-
tions that claimed, without context, that Mitloehner’s research “disproved” and
“debunked” the original FAO report. This misrepresentation was clearly inten-
tional as I will highlight via examples of the media coverage of Mitloehner’s
research: As earlier noted, the American Chemical Society released the original
press release, inaccurately entitled “Eating Less Meat and Dairy Products Won’t
Have Major Impact on Global Warming” (2010). The press release also included
the quotation from Mitloehner: “We certainly can reduce our greenhouse-gas
production, but not by consuming less meat and milk. . . . Producing less meat
and milk will only mean more hunger in poor countries” (American Chemical
Society, 2010). The Cattlemen’s Association followed quickly with a press release
to the AG (agriculture) Network entitled “Meat Avoidance Cures Flat Feet &
Other Lies”, which claimed that Mitloehner had “disproven” the UN report
(Cattlemen’s Association, 2010). Likewise, the Center for Consumer Freedom,
which, despite the positive sounding name, is a lobbying group funded in part
by the meat industry (Mayer & Joyce, 2005), also generated a series of press
releases to the same effect. As the center’s blog explains:
We felt yesterday’s news deserved a big audience, so we circulated a state-
ment to the media. . . . Perhaps one day the anti-meat activists at PETA
[People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals] and HSUS [The Humane
Society of the United States] will get the memo: We should be applauding
eco-friendly American livestock farmers, not attacking them.
(Center for Consumer Freedom, 2010)
The result was that the story was widely carried through the news media
but only in a completely inaccurate manner. No news agency reported that
a minor correction to an otherwise entirely accurate report had been noted.
Instead, universally, the story was reported as though the link between animal
agriculture and greenhouse gases emissions had been disproven.
Unfortunately, this completely inaccurate claim was carried by news media
around the world. For example, in the United States, FOX News first seized on
these findings with a headline “Eat Less Meat, Reduce Global Warming – or
Not” with the introductory line “Save the planet, eat less meat . . . right? That’s
what the UN said, anyway, but one scientist has a grade A beef with that claim”
(FOX News, 2010). The FOX story even included a caption with the claim:
“Reducing consumption of meat and dairy products might not have a major
impact in combating global warming despite claims that link diets rich in ani-
mal products to production of greenhouse gases” (2010). Likewise CNN car-
ried a headline “Scientist: Don’t Blame Cows for Climate Change” (Armstrong,
2010). Time Magazine covered it with the headline “Meat-Eating Vs. Driving:
Another Climate Change Error?” (Abend, 2010). Both the Washington Examiner
(Hollingsworth, 2010) and the Washington Times (Haper, 2010) ran the article
under the headlines “Don’t Blame Climate Change on the Cows” and “Meat,
Dairy Diet Not Tied to Global Warming” respectively. In Australia the story
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182 Vasile Stanescu
was covered by both the Sydney Morning Herald under the headline “Eating
Less Meat ‘Won’t Help Climate’ ” (2010) and The Australian under the head-
line “Emissions Campaign Lacks Meat” (2010). Maclean’s, published in Canada,
ran the story under “Where’s the Beef: Scientist Takes a Second Look at UN
Numbers That Have Led Many Environmentalists to Forego Meat”, beginning
with the line “For those advocating for urgent action on the climate change, it’s
been a rough few months. . . . Now the latest: the notion, trumpeted by envi-
ronmentalists and animal rights crusaders in Europe and in North America, that
reducing our consumption of meat will help keep the planet cool [has been dis-
proven]” (Kohler, 2010). The Toronto Sun covered the story, in a column piece,
under the title “My Beef with Meatless Monday” including the sentence “Too
bad that like so many other environmental fads, Meatless Monday turns out to
be mostly a waste of time and effort and could even do more harm than good”
(Woodcock, 2010). In France the piece was carried in France 24 under the
headline “Eating Less Meat Won’t Reduce Global Warming: Study” with the
lead-in “Eating less meat will not reduce global warming, and claims that it will
distract from efforts to find real solutions to climate change, a leading air qual-
ity expert said Monday” (2010). The BBC in the UK covered the story under
the neutral headline “UN Body to Look at Meat and Climate Link” but still
included, without comment, both Mitloehner’s claim that “Producing less meat
and milk will only mean more hunger in poor countries” and that “Smarter
animal farming, not less farming, will equal less heat” (Black, 2010). The Lon-
don Times carried the story under the title “Now It’s Cowgate: Expert Report
Says Claims of Livestock Causing Global Warming Are False” (Warner, 2010).
However, perhaps The Daily Mail in the UK had the most emphatic headline:
“Veggies Are Wrong and Eating Less Meat Will NOT Save Planet”. It followed
this headline with the first sentence: “Calls to save the planet by eating less meat
are based on an exaggerated UN report linking livestock to global warming,
according to an analysis of the study” (Derbyshire, 2010).
It is true that the UN report included an admittedly unintentional exaggera-
tion of the comparison with the transportation industry, which does count as
an error. But what none of these stories adequately explains is that this error had
nothing whatsoever to do with the actual point of the study, that raising ani-
mals causes significant environmental degradation, but instead involved a single
sentence included only for the purposes of comparison. Instead, universally, the
headlines for all of these stories suggest that Mitloehner’s evidence “disproved”
the claim that raising farm animals helps to cause global warming as well as fre-
quently claiming that decreasing factory farming would somehow exacerbate
world hunger, even though his study had nothing to say about world hunger.3
However, instead of trying to correct these misunderstandings of the science
involved, Mitloehner has, consistently, been the major force trying to distort the
importance of his own findings.4 In fact Mitloehner cites, with approval, the
large amount of coverage his talk has received (including several of the sources
already cited) when addressing industry groups as a way to show his direct ben-
efit to their business (Hearden, 2010).5 As he explained in concrete terms at a
convention of dairy farmers:
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“Cowgate” 183
This is the equivalent of Newsweek in Canada, it is called Macleans. A year
ago they said “Save the planet: Stop eating meat. The UN says so, and so
do a growing list of school boards. Meet the new eco enemy.” The same
journalist who wrote this article a year ago called me after my talk at the
American Chemical Society and now says: “Where’s the beef? Scientist
takes a second look at UN numbers that have led many environmentalists
to forego meat.” Totally different article written by the same journalist.
Totally, totally different. . . . These are the same journalists who say some-
thing very adverse to your industry and then turn around completely once
they get the facts right. . . . CNN put it out and it was listened to and read
by twenty million people, you know, CNN will really have a major impact
if you hit that. . . . And if you think it is only a question in Europe or the
United States it’s not. . . . Australia wrote about it, numerous articles, but
it went much further than that. I always wanted to know how to spell my
name in Chinese, now I know how to because it went there. It went to
India. It went all over the world. It was Turkey and Argentina and China
and Taiwan – everywhere in the world.
(Mitloehner, 2010a)
“Proactively” shaping the debate
It is also therefore important to note that virtually none of the newspaper
articles included the information that Mitloehner has significant ties with the
beef, pork, and dairy industries (Hickman, 2010).6 As Mitloehner’s own univer-
sity press release admits (although absent from the press release by the Ameri-
can Chemical Society) Mitloehner received 26,000U.S. dollars from the Beef
Checkoff Program specifically for this research, and 5 per cent of the five mil-
lion dollars in funding he has received since 2002 has come explicitly from
the beef industry (Wright, 2009). To be more concrete, the Beef Checkoff
Program is administrated exclusively by the Cattlemen’s Beef Promotion and
Research Board for the sole purpose of increasing the consumption of beef
(Cattleman’s Beef Board, n.d.; California Beef Council, n.d.). As its own web-
site explains: “The Beef Checkoff . . . program was designed to stimulate oth-
ers to sell more beef and stimulate consumers to buy more beef” (Cattlemen’s
Beef Board, n.d.). This is not the only funding from the livestock industry
that Dr. Mitloehner has received, as other significant sources of funding from
the livestock industry were simply not explicitly disclosed in the press release
(Hickman, 2010).
Nor are these links purely monetary, as Mitloehner has previously published
his research in multiple agriculture industry-funded publications (California
Cattleman, 2009). Such close ties with the industry that Mitloehner is studying
are of concern since the Cattlemen’s Association has been quite clear that its
strategy is to “proactively” shape the debate in a manner that favors eating beef
(Cameron, 2011). For example, in fall 2009 the beef industry created a new
periodical, entitled Beef Issues Quarterly, funded in part by the Beef Checkoff
program. This publication is explicitly open about its desire to “proactively”
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184 Vasile Stanescu
shape the debate via both public relations and “issue management”. As the
first issue explains: “This publication is designed to be a tool to support the
industry’s identification and management of issues that can affect beef demand”
(Advisory Panel Outlook, 2009). Mitloehner published an article, entitled
“Livestock’s Role in Climate Change”, in the first issue of Beef Issue Quarterly
(Mitloehner & Place, 2009).
Mitloehner also has similar ties to the dairy industry. For example, in 2011
the dairy industry awarded him the Outstanding Dairy Industry Educator/
Research; this award was presented at the Dairy Profit Seminars and spon-
sored exclusively by the Western Dairy Business (Dairy Profit Seminars, 2011).
As the name Dairy Profit Seminars would suggest, the stated purpose of this
conference is to help the dairy industry to increase its profit and, like the Cat-
tlemen’s Association, to “proactively” shape the debate against both environ-
mentalists and animal rights activists (Goble, 2010). In fact, the press release
associated with the award specifically thanks Dr. Mitloehner for making sure
that “the dairy industry and agriculture in general are not needlessly over-
regulated” (Goble, 2010).
Mitloehner has defended himself against these accusations of bias by claim-
ing that he is only being attacked by environmentalists and animal rights activ-
ists who are simply displeased by the results that science has achieved. As he
phrases it, “[w]hat I really regret is that these individuals do not really argue
the science but try to discredit the scientist instead (i.e. conflict of interest
discussion)” (Mitloehner, 2010b). At the same time, having multiple close ties
with the industry under study does raise concerns about objectivity, particu-
larly when the organizations themselves consciously and repeatedly explain
that their very purpose is to shape research to a predetermined conclusion that
is favorable to their own economic self-interests: Mitloehner himself ended a
speech to the dairy industry in 2010 with a nearly identical call of the beef and
dairy industries’ own attempt to be “proactive” in shaping the debate (Mitloeh-
ner, 2010a).7 Hence in the same manner that we might question a climatolo-
gist who received (and accepted) an award at an Oil Profit Seminar sponsored
exclusively by the petroleum industry, particularly if it began by praising him or
her for debunking climate change environmentalism, so too I suggest we may
wish to be hesitant in accepting the claims of a scientist with identical ties to
the beef and dairy industry. Particularly when this researcher has, himself, made
comments that both dairy farmers and researchers should be “proactive” along
determined lines. As Gidon Eshel explained in an interview contrasting his
own work, which is critical of animal agribusiness, to Mitloehner’s:
Mitloehner’s study also had $5 million in underwriting, five percent of
which came from the beef industry. “Livestock’s Long Shadow” was under-
written by “nobody whatsoever,” says Eshel. “I am not beholden to any-
body, financially, morally or otherwise. . . . When you eat meat, you exert
three times as much pressure on land demand and reactive nitrogen as you
do with a plant-based diet”.
(Quoted in Kanner, 2010)
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“Cowgate” 185
“A model for the world”
Furthermore, what Mitloehner seems to fail to understand is that the cr itique is
actually not about the research itself. As earlier noted, the crafters of the report
themselves agree on the two scientific critiques. It is instead a critique of the
way in which he has chosen to phrase the significance of his research, which is
both biased and intentionally misleading. For example, Mitloehner in both the
original talk and in many of the subsequent interviews on the topic claims that
reduced meat consumption would lead to world hunger since “[p]roducing
less meat and milk will only mean more hunger in poor countries” (American
Chemical Society, 2010). Why people in other countries could not, say, eat
the grains and legumes currently fed to the animals is never discussed. And,
as earlier mentioned, his own research has nothing to do with world hunger.
Moreover, anyone who has studied this question has come to the exact opposite
conclusion; not only would decreasing meat consumption of animals raised in
factory farms not cause world hunger but it would, in fact, significantly help to
alleviate hunger (Motavalli, 2001; Fry, 2010).8 In other words, far from being
an argument against ending factory farms, world hunger represents one of the
strongest arguments in favor of ending them. And, as with meat eating and cli-
mate change, virtually all major works on this topic support this idea. However,
Mitloehner simply makes the claim that decreasing factory farms would help
to cause world hunger without any references to support it, which is then, uni-
versally, reproduced in all of the news media coverage of his talk as undisputed
fact. As Jillian Fry wrote for the Center for a Living Future:
Professor Mitloehner . . . is quoted as saying that reduced meat produc-
tion would result in more hunger in developing countries. Hunger is not
addressed in the “Clearing the Air” report and it is not an issue researched
by any of the report’s three authors. In fact, research has shown the opposite
to be true. Some experts suggest that reducing meat production and con-
sumption is one way to feed a growing human population.
(Fry, 2010)
Let me give another example of what I mean: Dr. Mitloehner has repeatedly
claimed that the confined feeding operations (CAFOs) or “factory farms” are
environmentally sound and should, in fact, be used as a “model” for the entire
rest of the world (Kohler, 2010).9 As he put it in an interview: “Mitloehner
said the big picture is that U.S. agriculture is a model for the rest of the world
to follow because of its growing efficiency and environmental stewardship”
(Radke, 2011). These are statements that he made even clearer in an interview
with Feedstuffs FoodLink (an agribusiness news show):
The most important thing that the consumers need to know is that the
way we raise livestock here is really a model of how livestock should be
raised. Because we can produce a certain amount of animal protein with
the smallest possible environmental impact. And that is very important. We
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186 Vasile Stanescu
are a model for the world with respect to how we raise cattle and pigs and
chickens and so on. So that is one of the most important messages I think
the consumer needs to have.
(Feedstuff’s. FoodLink, 2010)
Statements such as these read more like advertising than science. They are
sweeping statements – not even supported by Mitloehner’s own scientific
research. Mitloehner’s claim – that confined feeding operations or factory
farms actually represent an environmental model that the rest of the world
should attempt to emulate – is an extreme statement far outside of any main-
stream discussion of the environmental effects of eating meat.10 For example,
the Natural Resources Defense Council documented that CAFOs produce
“lagoons” of manure and urine that can run as much as forty-five million gal-
lons per “lagoon” and regularly contaminate water supply and cause a mass
kill-off of millions of fish (Marks, 2001). Likewise, the Union of Concerned
Scientists compiled a 68-page report entitled “CAFOs Uncovered: The Untold
Costs of Confined Animal Feeding Operations”; the report criticizes factory
farms and echoes all of the cr itiques made by the Natural Resources Defense
Council including lengthy sections on water pollution, air pollution, human
health, and climate change (Gurian-Sherman, 2008). Most categorically the
Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production conducted a 2.5-year
study of American animal agriculture; the unanimous finding from all of its
fifteen members was that factory far ming was completing devastating to the
environment within the United States (Pew Commission, 2008). Furthermore,
the report also specifically addressed Mitloehner’s assertion that CAFOs should
serve as an environmental “model” for the developing world. Under the title
“The Global Impact of the U.S. Industrial Food Animal Production Model”
the report documented that previous examples of exporting CAFOs into other
countries had exclusively produced, in the words of the report, “disastrous con-
sequences” (Pew Commission, 2008, p. 9).
Mitloehner likes to claim, in both speeches and interviews, that he is a sci-
entist merely attempting to interject scientific rigor into debates about animal
agriculture and the environment against unscientific animal and environmental
activists. For example, as Mitloehner recently explained to an agribusiness sup-
ported news outlet:
Mitloehner added he has noticed that the tone of coverage has changed for
some media organizations that previously portrayed the beef and dairy indus-
tries as destructive to the planet: “Prior to our article, everyone said if you
cut animal protein from your diet, this is the biggest contribution you could
make to reduce global warming,” Mitloehner said. “I think we infused some
science into this discussion. I don’t think it was always all that scientific”.
(Hearden, 2010)
However, the reality is that it is Mitloehner’s claims – such as his comments
about world hunger, his claim that decreasing domestic meat consumption
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“Cowgate” 187
would not help the environment, and particularly the claim that factory farms
should represent an environmental “model for the world” – are deeply and
fundamentally at odds with virtually all mainstream science on the topic. In fact
I cannot find a time when Mitloehner cites, or even discusses, any of the reports
I’ve mentioned, not the Natural Resources Defense Council, not the Union of
Concerned Scientists, not the Pew research study.
As such, it is difficult not to see Mitloehner’s research, itself supported and
recognized by the beef and dairy industry, as intentionally biased, not in the
sense that the particular scientific findings themselves are false – the compari-
son with the transportation industry was indeed incorrect – but in the sense
that the conclusions he attempts to draw from these findings are sweeping,
unsupported, and inaccurately biasing to any conversation on the topic. What
any reasonable listener would take away from Mitloehner’s comment that the
most important item affecting the planet is that consumers need to use factory
farms as an environmental model for the world is not that the comparison with
transportation is flawed, nor that a global average cannot account for regional
variation. It is instead intended to help engender the belief that American live-
stock production, including factory farms, is not harmful to the environment
or to human health, which are demonstratively false beliefs. Therefore, I believe
that meat-eating denial operates in a similar method as climate change denial in
which a single, relatively minor, error in a report is seized on as a way to “dis-
prove” and “debunk” the report as whole – as though one error, no matter how
minor or unrelated, was significant enough to disprove an entire study. And
likewise, research by a single scientist not even trained as a climatologist,11 with
questionable ties to the industry under study, is held up as superior to the broad
based consensus of numerous domestic and international researchers working
on the same topic for many years.
Winning the argument
The reality is that the currently available scientific evidence suggests that people
should reduce – or eliminate – their consumption of meat, eggs, and dairy. This
evidence is reported with the same type of evidence standards that are currently
used by those who wish to argue that climate change is happening, such as
multiple peer-reviewed studies, United Nations reports, and even the recom-
mendation of the chair of the IPCC. It is, therefore, intellectually inconsistent
to choose to believe in one body of evidence (climate change) and to, at the
same time, choose to ignore a similar, albeit smaller, body of evidence (environ-
mental effects of animal agriculture). I have suggested that anyone who does so,
in essence, engages in meat-eating denial.
In this chapter, I have demonstrated that this body of evidence on eating
meat is not more widely known because, much as with climate change, industry
groups, opposed to the conclusions for economic reasons, have successfully used
public relations to distort the mainstream discourse on the topic. These indus-
tries have engaged in similar rhetorical strategies earlier deployed against cli-
mate change by lobbyists and public relations officers of the organized climate
Climate Change Denial and Public Relations : Strategic Communication and Interest Groups in Climate Inaction, edited by
Núria Almiron, and Jordi Xifra, Taylor & Francis Group, 2019. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/merceru/detail.action?docID=5798112.
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188 Vasile Stanescu
change denial countermovement (Dunlap & McCright, 2015), such as seizing
on a single error in a report, unrelated to the conclusion of the report as whole,
as evidence that the report had been “debunked” or “disproven”, or holding
individual scientists, not trained as climatologists and receiving funding from
the affected industry, as equal to, and indeed superior to, entire UN govern-
mental reports. Hence, the standard set by industry for “proof ” of either climate
change or the environmental effects of eating meat is the impossible standard
of completely flawless studies unanimously unopposed by any scientist in any
field whatsoever. Dunlap and McCright document this use of “manufactured
controversy” throughout the larger climate change denial countermovement:
Conservatives seized upon the strategy of “manufactured uncertainty”
that had been effectively employed for several decades by corporations
and entire industries, most notably the tobacco industry, in efforts to pro-
tect their products from regulations and lawsuits by questioning the ade-
quacy of evidence suggesting the products were hazardous. . . . Over time,
manufacturing uncertainty has evolved into “manufacturing controversy.”
To accomplish this, corporations . . . have supported a small number of
contrarian scientists (many with no formal training in climate science) . . .
creating the impression that there is major debate and dissent within the
scientific community over the reality of anthropogenic climate change.
(Dunlap & McCright, 2015, pp. 306–308)
Specifically, I have shown how the industry further cloaks its influence via
appeals to impartiality. In other words, while, in reality, Mitloehner receives
money from the agriculture industry, is a featured speaker at its events, publishes
in its industry-funded publications, and even accepts awards from it specifically
for helping it to prevent regulations, he is – via public relations – still able to
present himself as an objective researcher and spokesperson. Likewise, while
not even trained as a climatologist, he is able to present himself as an expert in
the news media, equal to, or even superior to, trained climatologists working
on the same issue for many years. And finally, once these supposed creden-
tials of objectivity and expertise have been established in the media, he is able
to forward claims – frequently reproduced word for word and without criti-
cal commentary – that are far outside the norm of current scientific research
on animal agriculture and have nothing to do with his own research – for
example, Mitloehner’s claim that moves to decrease factory farms will produce
“world hunger” or that factory farms should serve as “model for the rest of
the world”. The result, I believe, is to sow confusion when, in reality, there is
widespread scientific agreement. This deliberate confusion is a particular prob-
lem in animal agriculture, as repeated studies have demonstrated that while
people surveyed reported a high degree of concern for both animals and the
environment, they also admitted a lack of knowledge and confusion about what
is actually occurring in animal agriculture and, in specific, on “factory farms”
(Cornish, 2016; European Commission, 2007; Faunalytics, 2012; Reese, 2017;
Schröde & McEachern, 2004). What this research seems to demonstrate – as
an aggregate – is that, while the public strongly wants animals to be treated
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Núria Almiron, and Jordi Xifra, Taylor & Francis Group, 2019. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/merceru/detail.action?docID=5798112.
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“Cowgate” 189
well and the environment to be protected, at the same time it believes that
current farming practices, including industrial farming, already treat animals
well and do enough to protect the environment. In other words, it is likely to
believe claims forwarded by Mitloehner and the animal agriculture lobby that
the United States’ factory farms should be used as an “environmental model”
for the rest of the world.
Allow me to end with a personal anecdote: I worked with the Stanford
Environmental Humanities project for several years, a project that attempted to
draw together people working on issues related to the environment from across
all the disparate disciplines of the university. I remember one meeting where
several of the most famous researchers on climate change came to Stanford and
gave a completely compelling presentation on the reality of climate change
and significant actions we had to take in order to offset the effects. However,
they ended the presentation on a despondent note: “We have won the scien-
tific argument; what we do not know how to win is the argument against the
industry and in the media”. That same dilemma is true for the case of animal
agriculture and its effects on climate change. While there is still important sci-
entific disagreement on individual questions, the scientific argument about the
environmental danger created by our current system of animal agriculture has
been decided; however, because of industry lobbying, and the effects of public
relations campaigns (such as those highlighted in this chapter), there has yet
to be widespread action to combat the problem. In other words, as with the
issue of climate change, researchers may have won the scientific debate against
animal-based agribusiness, but they have yet to win the fight against the indus-
try and in the media. Unfortunately, if the wider debate about climate change
is any guide, until we are able to think about animal agriculture, not only in
terms of scientific and ethical dimensions, but also in terms of communication,
public relations, advocacy, and industry lobbying, it is unlikely that any ethical
or environmentally sound changes will ever occur.
Notes
1 The UN report “Livestock’s Long Shadow” does not itself consider the option of veg-
etarianism, veganism, or active programs to decrease meat consumption as possible
options to decrease the environmental effects of animal agriculture. It is, however, a
logical conclusion to draw from the report as the comments by UN officials highlight.
Moreover, Peter Gaber, one of the co-authors of the report, has later stated that decreas-
ing meat consumption – particularly in industrialized countr ies such as the United
States – would represent a helpful environmental strategy (Abend, 2010).
2 A sub point of this argument is that the EPA pegs current emission rates by the United
States at only 3 per cent, a claim that Dr. Mitloehner routinely cites as the “correct” esti-
mate of U.S. emissions. However, the problem with this claim is that the EPA figure is
not, itself, a full “life-cycle” estimate. Specifically it leaves out issues such as turning fuels
to make fertilizer, tilling soil to grow feed crops, and even transportation of meat to
market. As Ralph Loglisci, the Project Director for the Johns Hopkins Healthy Monday
Project, explains:
A while ago I called up the EPA to find out why their numbers were so differ-
ent. One researcher told me it’s because their figures omit many of the factors that
Livestock’s Long Shadow takes into account. If you read the executive summary of the
Climate Change Denial and Public Relations : Strategic Communication and Interest Groups in Climate Inaction, edited by
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190 Vasile Stanescu
EPA’s 2009 U.S. Greenhouse Gas Inventory report you’ll see that, unlike Livestock’s
Long Shadow, when EPA researchers determined U.S. agriculture’s contributions
they were not looking at GHG emissions from fuel combustion or CO2 fluxes due
to land use.
(Loglisci, 2009)
Therefore Mitloehner, himself, routinely employs exactly the same type of “apples and
oranges” comparison (contrasting a life cycle by the UN that is a life cycle assessment
against a report by the EPA, which is not), which he claims is inherently misleading
and determinedly to the scientific process. This is not to mention that the attempt to
use only percentages of emission (versus total emission themselves) is itself completely
misleading. The EPA statement of 3 per cent of total emissions, even if the number
is accurate, tells us little about our contribution to worldwide livestock emission and,
instead, a lot about how polluting the United States is in other areas. As Loglisci again
phrases it:
Industry groups are trying to confuse the American public by focusing on percent-
ages rather than hard numbers. Even if the percentage is actually lower, that doesn’t mean
that the total GHG emissions are any less. The fact that the U.S. spits out so much more
GHG through its power plants, fossil fuel powered vehicles and factories than most other
countries, it’s not surprising that the percentage number is lower. The U.S. is arguably
the number one GHG emitter in the world. (Loglisci, 2009)
3 As discussed earlier, the CNN article does have some discussion of this issue (Armstrong,
2010).
4 To be fair, since Mitloehner has fallen under criticism, he has now recently claimed that
he has been misquoted, throughout the news and in the original press release by the
A.C.G./American Chemical Society (Brainard, 2010).
5 As Mitloehner again explained in an interview with Capital Press that describes itself as
the “West Coast’s agriculture home page for news”:
Today, search for Mitloehner’s name on the Internet and the word “meat” and you’ll
find some 11,800 entries. “Most of them just came out in the last month,” Mitloeh-
ner said. “You will see articles from all over the world – India, Finland, Chile, Brit-
ain, you name it. You’ll find that this issue of meatless Mondays has been revisited
because of our contribution.”
(Hearden, 2010)
6 Time Magazine briefly comments upon it as well as Maclean’s. Maclean’s’ full coverage of
the topic reads “Mitloehner is transparent about funding he has received from organiza-
tions bankrolled by the beef industry, but downplays its importance, calling one industry
source ‘such a small percentage that it is inconsequential’ ” (Kohler, 2010).
7 As Mitloehner phrased it:
So I think that there are many, many different areas, of course that play into sustaina-
bility but the number one is your industry and other livestock industries have to take
societal pressures seriously. You can’t say, in my opinion, we know how to produce
milk, we do a good job, leave us alone. Because the public will not leave you alone.
They are told by people on the other side that the way we produce animal protein
is cruel, is polluting, is unsustainable, and, in my opinion, animal agriculture has to
come out of the corner and stop being defensive. In my opinion animal agriculture
has to be ahead of the curve. . . . We have to be more proactive. We have to be ahead
of the curve.
(Mitloehner, 2010a)
8 As Jim Motavalli has written in a very clear summary of some of the work on this topic:
While it is true that many animals graze on land that would be unsuitable for cul-
tivation, the demand for meat has taken millions of productive acres away from
farm inventories. The cost of that is incalculable. As Diet For a Small Planet author
Climate Change Denial and Public Relations : Strategic Communication and Interest Groups in Climate Inaction, edited by
Núria Almiron, and Jordi Xifra, Taylor & Francis Group, 2019. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/merceru/detail.action?docID=5798112.
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“Cowgate” 191
Frances Moore Lappé writes, imagine sitting down to an eight-ounce steak. “Then
imagine the room filled with 45 to 50 people with empty bowls in front of them.
For the ‘feed cost’ of your steak, each of their bowls could be filled with a full cup of
cooked cereal grains.” Harvard nutritionist Jean Mayer estimates that reducing meat
production by just 10 percent in the U.S. would free enough grain to feed 60 mil-
lion people.
(Motavalli, 2001)
9 For example, as Mitlohern phrased it in the earlier mentioned Maclean’s interview:
Mitloehner argues the focus on reducing meat consumption is a dead end, one that
distracts us from more significant sources of greenhouse gases (like that Hummer)
and which may deprive hungry people in developing countries of a crucial food
source – meat. He also believes more intensive livestock farming – more animals on
less land – can reduce meat’s relatively small footprint even further, particularly in
the developing world.
(Kohler, 2010)
10 Mitloehner pr imarily supports this view by citing the report “Livestock’s Long Shadow”
itself. And it is true that the report does describe several problems with so-called “pasture
raised” or “free-range” animal agriculture. However, these claims represent a critique of
“free-range” meat, not an endorsement of factory farms as an environmental model nor
a critique of decreasing meat consumption (Abend, 2010; Stanescu, 2014).
11 Dr. Mitloehner is not a trained climatologist. His PhD is in Animal Science from Texas
Technical University, which he received in 2000.
References
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Magazine. Retrieved from www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1975630,00.html.
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issuesquarterly.com.
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tlemen.org/.
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Núria Almiron, and Jordi Xifra, Taylor & Francis Group, 2019. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/merceru/detail.action?docID=5798112.
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192 Vasile Stanescu
Cameron, P. (2011, February). The benefits of being involved. Why the head-in-the-sand
approach doesn’t work. California Cattleman. Retrieved from www.calcattlemen.org.
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448/index.html.
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welfare-polls-conducted-in-the-last-decade/.
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unsupported-claims-about-livestock-and-climate-change-in-the-media/.
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Núria Almiron, and Jordi Xifra, Taylor & Francis Group, 2019. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/merceru/detail.action?docID=5798112.
Created from merceru on 2021-01-13 07:43:37.
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“Cowgate” 193
Hearden, T. (2010, May 6). UC scientist quietly wins worldwide attention. Researcher finds
dairies contribute small portion to greenhouse gases. Capital Press. Retrieved from www.
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ment cited came in the “Media Response” section of his slideshow.]
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based diet is bad for the environment, aggravates global hunger, brutalizes animals and
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Núria Almiron, and Jordi Xifra, Taylor & Francis Group, 2019. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/merceru/detail.action?docID=5798112.
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194 Vasile Stanescu
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help-climate-20100323-qrky.
Warner, G. (2010, March 25). Now it’s CowGate: Expert report says claims of livestock
causing global warming are false. The London Times. Retrieved from http://blogs.tele
graph.co.uk/news/geraldwarner/100031389/now-its-cowgate-expert-report-says-
claims-of-livestock-causing-global-warming-are-false/ [The London Times website no
longer hosts the original article; a reprint available from https://nwoandsecretsocieties.
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Núria Almiron, and Jordi Xifra, Taylor & Francis Group, 2019. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/merceru/detail.action?docID=5798112.
Created from merceru on 2021-01-13 07:43:37.
Copyright © 2019. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.
