Animal Welfare and Climate Change: Intersecting Crises

Climate change is emerging as one of the most significant threats to animal welfare globally, affecting wild animals through habitat loss and extreme weather, and farm animals through heat stress and disease, while dietary shifts toward plants reduce both emissions and animal suffering.

Key Facts

Ocean temperature rise is driving coral bleaching events that eliminate habitat for reef-dependent fish and invertebrates
Arctic ice loss is reducing polar bear habitat and foraging opportunities, causing documented declines in body condition
Heat stress events are increasing in frequency and severity for livestock — causing mortality and chronic welfare compromise
Climate-driven wildfire has caused the deaths of billions of wild animals in Australia, California, and other regions
Shifting seasonal timing disrupts migration, hibernation, and breeding schedules for wildlife globally
Plant-based diets produce 75% fewer greenhouse gas emissions than meat-heavy diets, providing a direct welfare-climate link

Welfare Considerations

Climate change and animal welfare are deeply interconnected. The environmental stressors of climate change — extreme heat, drought, flooding, wildfire, and ocean acidification — cause direct welfare harm to animals across every ecosystem. Wild animals facing habitat transformation have limited capacity to adapt within generations. Farm animals exposed to increasingly frequent extreme heat events suffer from heat stress that impairs wellbeing, fertility, and immune function. The dietary choice dimension of this relationship is significant: reducing animal product consumption reduces the greenhouse gas emissions driving climate change while simultaneously reducing the number of animals in welfare-compromised farming systems. The same dietary shift that addresses climate change addresses farm animal welfare — making diet change one of the highest-leverage welfare and environmental interventions available to individuals.

What You Can Do

Reduce animal product consumption, particularly beef and dairy, as the most impactful individual climate-welfare action
Support climate mitigation policies that address the emissions from animal agriculture explicitly
Donate to wildlife conservation organizations addressing climate adaptation for endangered species
Advocate for farm animal welfare standards that include heat stress management as climate change increases risk
Support renewable energy transition to reduce the climate harms driving wildlife and farm animal welfare deterioration