As I’ve written about several times over the past year, sustainability and climate change seem to be the current priorities of many animal rights extremist organizations — even more than animal welfare. Activist organizations have jumped at the chance to insert themselves into national and global conversations around protecting the environment, including the UN Food Systems Summit earlier this year and the UN Climate Change Conference (referred to as COP26) held over the past few weeks.

The official outcome of COP26 is a document called the Glasgow Climate Pact, which includes a firmer global agreement to accelerate action on climate this decade and calls on countries to report their progress toward more climate ambition at next year’s COP27. Several other significant announcements and pledges were made during the event, including a pledge led by the U.S. and the European Union in which 100 counties agreed to cut methane emissions by 2030, a pledge by over 120 countries to halt and reverse deforestation by 2030, an agreement by more than 40 countries to shift away from coal, a private sector agreement to align $130 trillion with the goals in the Paris Agreement, a declaration on zero-emission cars and vans and a joint declaration by the U.S. and China to boost climate cooperation.

None of these outcomes involved calls for reductions or eliminations of animal agriculture or shifts toward plant-based diets. In fact, Sec. Vilsack made it clear that the U.S. climate strategies do not involve any efforts to restrict or reduce animal agriculture, and that the current administration wants to push back on the nation that the only way to reduce emissions from livestock is to reduce the amount of animals raised. Activist groups are now complaining that “the cow in the room is being ignored,” the event was “all talk, no action” and that leaders are “making serious mistakes" by not focusing on animal agriculture.

While they may not have gotten their way during the official discussions, activists were successful at capturing media coverage for various campaigns held alongside COP26. While groups like Animal Rebellion held several protests in various locations, others used the opportunity to call for the signing of a “Plant Based Treaty” as a companion to the Paris Agreement or issue new reports about the “climate catastrophe” awaiting us if we don’t cut meat consumption. Social media campaigns such as #CowInTheRoom were also used to push the narrative that animal agriculture is the “elephant in the room” being ignored by leaders during official discussions.

COP26 is now in the rearview, but the focus on climate change by legislators, media, investors and other key stakeholder groups isn’t going anywhere — and neither will animal rights extremist organizations’ attempts to make that focus work to their advantage.

COP26 used as opportunity for activism

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