Together we can kickstart a food and farming revolution

Image of Razia Khatan (mother) and Shaheena Khatan (daughter) in Bangladesh, 02/09/2011 © Nicolas Axelrod/ActionAid ¹

Challenge the UK Government to tackle the global hunger crisis at the 2013 G8 Summit

Spiraling food prices and the effects of climate change have produced a ‘perfect storm’ hunger crisis, threatening millions of lives from sub-Saharan Africa and south-east Asia to South America.

Eight of the world’s ‘superpowers’² meet for the 39th G8 Summit in July 2013 to discuss solutions to the global hunger crisis, building on a 2012 pledge³ to lift 50 million people out of poverty over the next decade.

The right kind of agriculture is critical

In his concluding remarks at the 2012 G8, President Obama said⁴: ‘History teaches us that one of the most effective ways to pull people and entire nations out of poverty is to invest in their agriculture’. The President is absolutely right, but it depends on the kind of agriculture.

Factory farming is not the answer – humane-sustainable farming is

Some policy makers argue that the intensification of livestock farming is the answer to the food crisis; that we need to cram animals together in the pursuit of ‘efficiency’. But this is no solution – it will deepen the hunger crisis and create havoc for people, the planet and animals.

In October, Compassion in World Farming published ‘Food Security and Farm Animal Welfare’⁵, which shows that we can feed the world without factory farming and that continuing along the path of livestock intensification will have dramatic consequences on global land use and food production.

We must urge the UK Government to tackle the global hunger crisis in the right way

As host of the 39th G8 Summit in July 2013, the UK government has the power to set the agenda. We urge David Cameron and his colleagues⁶ to read our report and use their power to promote policies that provide humane-sustainable farmers with the tools to flourish, rather than fund large-scale factory farming operations.

Take action today

Humane-sustainable livestock systems allow animals to graze or forage outside and provide a large proportion of feed from sources that humans cannot consume, such as grasses, harvest residues and wastes.

If you agree that this is the right path for global agriculture, take action; send David Cameron, Owen Paterson and Justine Greening a copy of Compassion’s food security report and help fight hunger today.

Please edit the message we have prepared below, or even better, write your own. The email you send will include a link to the report.