Food System Transition and Animal Welfare

Transitioning global food systems toward lower animal product consumption is the highest-impact pathway for improving animal welfare at scale, alongside improving standards within animal agriculture.

Key Facts

An estimated 70 billion land animals are farmed globally each year, with over 80% in factory farming systems
Global meat consumption has tripled since 1961 and is projected to continue growing with rising incomes
Plant-rich diets that reduce but do not necessarily eliminate animal products could reduce farmed animal numbers by 50%
Dietary shift is complementary to welfare standards improvement - both are needed for maximum impact
High-income country per capita meat consumption reduction would have global welfare and environmental impacts

Welfare Considerations

Food system transformation is the ultimate scale lever for animal welfare. Farm welfare standards affect the quality of life of animals in production, but reducing the number of animals in industrial production through dietary shift addresses the problem at its root. The welfare case for dietary transition is not about individual consumer virtue but about collective impact: even modest shifts in high-consumption societies toward less animal-intensive diets translate to hundreds of millions of animals spared factory farming.

What You Can Do

Reduce animal product consumption, particularly factory-farmed products, in your own diet
Advocate for food environment policies that make plant-rich options the easy, default choice
Support plant-based and alternative protein innovation through consumer purchasing
Engage with food system advocacy organizations working on both welfare standards and consumption change
Choose the highest-welfare animal products when you do consume them - better welfare matters within current systems