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Fix The Food Chain – summer 2010 update

John Leech supports rainforest-free lunches and Robert Flello launches livestock bill.

Factory farming of poultry, pigs and cattle in Europe relies heavily on high-protein animal feed. This has created a global food chain depending on feed crops from the other side of the world, such as soy from South America, where rainforests are being cleared and local communities displaced to make way for vast soy plantations. The UN has estimated that the livestock sector is responsible for 18% of the world’s total greenhouse gas emissions.

On Friday 4th June, Lib Dem MP John Leech joined Manchester FoE for a photo shoot to show his support for Fix The Food Chain. This national campaign urges the Government to fix the food chain by shifting subsidies away from factory farming towards supporting farmers to grow their own animal feed.

John said:

“I am very concerned about the effect that the way in which we raise farm animals in this country is having on areas of natural beauty and global importance like the Amazon rainforest. Though it is difficult to have a rainforest-free lunch when we are eating meat and dairy, FOTE’s campaign shows that it is possible to farm animals without causing such significant damage to our planet. I fully support their calls for policies which will help British farmers to rear animals that are born, bred and fed British.”

Robert Flello MP’s Sustainable Livestock Bill requires the Secretary of State to introduce an action plan to improve the sustainability of livestock farming and the consumption of livestock produce – how we produce meat and dairy and how much we eat. This bill was introduced into Parliament in June, and we now need to ensure that it gets supported by MPs at its second reading on Friday 12th November.

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