As I’ve shared previously, the Animal Ag Alliance and many other organizations within food and agriculture have been closely watching the development of the UN’s Food Systems Summit (FSS) coming up later this year. The Summit is being convened by the UN’s Secretary-General as part of the Decade of Action to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and will “launch bold new actions to deliver progress on all 17 SDGs”. The main Summit will be held in September alongside the UN General Assembly, but important conversations will be held at the end of July during the pre-Summit event happening in Rome and virtually.

Earlier this year, we took the opportunity to contribute to the FSS by convening an Independent Dialogue event in April, titled “U.S. Animal Agriculture as a Solution to Food Systems Challenges.” This Dialogue brought together stakeholders from across the U.S. animal agriculture community to engage meaningfully, explore collectively and emerge resiliently for sustainable food systems. Through engagement and discussion, the Dialogue considered animal agriculture’s role in achieving the SDGs and ability to be a “game changer” in delivering progress across all five Action Tracks of the FSS. This report summarizes the Independent Dialogue event and major discussion themes.

Unfortunately, despite our attempts to engage within the FSS process, many of its outputs thus far are concerning for animal agriculture. Each Action Track has put forth “game changing propositions” as potential solutions to food systems issues. While some of these propositions recognize the potential for livestock to positively contribute to the planet, others call for a “global transition away from industrialized animal production” or make references to the “true cost of food” (increasing food prices to account for environmental impacts).

The latest round of “game changing propositions” contains a pretty remarkable suggestion from Action Track 2, “shift to sustainable and healthy consumption patterns” (which has Gunhild Storladen of EAT-Lancet fame within its leadership). The solution calls for a “UN-supported, concerted campaign to dissociate meat and masculinity,” including using “mass media, social media and influencers like celebrity chefs” to “attack the relationship between meat eating and stereotypically male traits” and “positively relate consumption of plant foods with these traits.” No, seriously – this is a real thing.

We’ll continue pushing back on these concepts, and I’d encourage you to do the same. One simple way to help showcase animal agriculture and the meat community’s commitment to sustainability is by submitting to USDA’s U.S. Compendium of Actions in Support of Sustainable Food Systems and the UN Food Systems Summit. The U.S. Compendium of Sustainable Food Systems Actions is a voluntary listing by businesses, coalitions, organizations, and state or local governments of the actions they are taking to build more sustainable food systems and contribute to the objectives of the FSS. Submitting your company’s sustainability initiatives to the Compendium will help demonstrate that the U.S. food and agriculture community has a track record of progress and ambitious commitments that align with the FSS’ focus on enhancing sustainability.

UN Food Systems Summit: making meat less “masculine”?

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