Vegans Support the Farmers launched this month in response to the escalating farming crisis and our broken food system.
The three-person team of Sarah Foy, Tom Gardener and Kerri Waters attended VegFest London earlier in the month (18-19/11/23) with a stall, a talk, and a panel discussion.
The project aims to work with farmers on three goals [1]:
A fair price for farmers
Grow more food in the UK and import less
Listen to farmers instead of corporations
It also aims to fundraise £100,000 to support the mental health of young farmers as they face an abundance of overlapping crises [2].
Three individuals from Animal Rising have, this month, launched their Vegans Support the Farmers campaign. The project hopes to raise awareness around the challenges many farmers face; raise money for young farmer mental health initiatives; and break-down barriers between vegans and farmers [3].
Climate-change induced extreme weather events [4], shifting subsidies [5], labour shortages [6], increased input costs [7], profit squeezing from supermarkets [8], zoonotic disease outbreaks [9], rural crime [10], and shortages of vets [11] are just some of the pressures facing farmers in Britain, all of which result in a huge mental health burden [12].
Animal Rising, formerly Animal Rebellion, has previously campaigned alongside farmers, for example, at the 2020 ‘Save British Farming’ protests [13], and the ‘Proud to Farm’ supermarket distribution centre blockades in October of this year [14].
Kerri Waters, Vegans Support the Farmers co-founder, said:
“Having had a passionate interest in the food system, we are acutely aware of how many issues farmers are currently facing. We have always aimed to promote dialogue and discussion on these critical topics to find solutions that can benefit everyone.”
“It is clear that the scale of the problems in our broken food system require significant changes, collaboration, and innovation. This will just not be possible if farmers are permanently in crisis and worrying about surviving rather than thriving.”
“The challenges that farmers are facing are manifesting as a mental health crisis which results in farm workers being three times more likely to think life is not worth living than non-farmers, a horrific statistic that has to change. As vegans we have to break the counterproductive us versus them divide.”
Those involved in the project will be attending vegan and farming events, as well as running four half-marathons to raise money for their Young Farmers fundraiser [15].
ENDS
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Notes to Editor:
[13] https://www.agriland.co.uk/farming-news/tractor-protesters-take-to-london-to-save-british-farming/