3rd November 2026
Do livestock suffer?
Not only does meat and dairy production have a massive environmental footprint, its progress from birth to abattoir is frequently unimaginable.
In this chapter Goulson explores the reality of the living conditions of livestock which are frequently not the bucolic frolicking in meadows of happy animals that advertisements suggest. At root much of the inhumane farming of livestock is driven by the pressure to produce ever cheaper food products. Where chicken was once a treat for a special occasion, chicken is now very cheap. Goulson quotes £6 for four chicken breasts or a mere £4 for an oven ready chicken. (P128) To achieve those prices costs have to be pinched as much as possible. “Typically, in the UK, each chicken is reared with 25,000 others in a large, dimly lit building, usually windowless, with sawdust in the floor. The dim light discourages movement, so that the birds do not waste energy. They eat carefully formulated feed, usually soy-based, with much of the soy brown in South America, in what was once tropical forest…Often the feed has palm oil added too, and/or fish meal from small fish such as sand eels. The birds are stocked at … nineteen grown chickens squeezed into every 1 meter by 1 meter …Naturally, chickens have a life expectancy of twelve years or more, but meat chickens are slaughtered at five or six weeks old…” (p128-9 Eat the Planet Well) Goulson follows through this chapter with equally disturbing descriptions of the raising of egg-laying hens, pigs, dairy and beef cattle.
Although he doesn’t advocate not eating meat or dairy products, he asks that if we do do so, surely at the least we should ensure the wellbeing of each animal throughout its short life. He recommends choosing products that have in someway been certified to ensure this – whether that be organic, Pasture for Life, and RSPCA Assured – but notes that certification is not always enough.
