Green Living

Coconuts are mostly produced in Southeast Asia but are consumed a lot of Europe and North America. Coconuts grow on coconut trees, a type of palm tree, and can only grow in tropical and subtropical climates. Coconuts and products made from coconuts like coconut milk are plant-based. After all, coconuts grow on trees and can be produced without the use of animals. However, unfortunately monkeys are often used to help harvest coconuts which means coconuts often aren’t vegan.

Why are monkeys used?

According to the National Primate Research Center of the University of Wisconsin, a macaque can harvest between 500 and 1000 coconuts per day, while humans can only get around 80 in a day. By using animals, a farmer can harvest coconuts much faster and also get a much bigger harvest. As monkeys don’t need to be paid wages, this also saves a lot of labour costs. According to the National Primate Research Center, sometimes half of a family’s income is earned by the labour of macaques. In addition, climbing up trees to harvest the coconuts is hard and risky work, so by letting monkeys do this work for them, farmers reduce their own risk of getting injured.

How are the monkeys treated?

The monkeys, mostly macaques, are especially trained for their work and there are even special training schools for this purpose. At the schools, macaques are taught how to harvest the coconuts and how to select only ripe ones. The macaque are kept on a leash with an metal chain 24/7 and are often housed individually. This means they can’t behave naturally or have social contacts with members of their species. It’s also dangerous work for them with risk of injury and according to one trainer at a training school, the monkeys are sometimes forced to work and train so hard that they faint from exhaustion. After finishing their training, the macaques are sold for a lot of money to individual coconut farmers. This is an expensive investment, but as macaques usually live for around 40 years, the monkey can easily earn back this money over time.

While some monkeys at the training schools are born there, unfortunately many of them are captures from the wild. Often the mother monkeys are killed and the babies are taken to be trained from a young age to do this work. According to a macaque trainer from Thailand, the majority of the monkeys they train were caught in the wild, even though this is illegal. In Malaysia there are also training schools where farmers who already have a macaque can take them temporarily to do a coconut picking course. In addition, there are also farmers who train their macaques themselves.

Tourism and macaque training schools

In recent years, the training schools have also become more popular as a tourist destination. It gives tourists an opportunity to see these animals close-by and to see them perform tricks. This is mostly done because the training schools can earn much more money this way, than by only training the macaques without opening up to tourists. According to wildlife experts this is against the animal protection laws in Thailand, but it still happens a lot. Some training schools are even said to be full time illegal mini zoos for tourists where animals are trained to do tricks, using the pretext of being a training school as a cover story.

How often are monkeys used?

Unfortunately, there are no precise statistics of how many monkeys are used to harvest coconuts or how prevalent this practice is. According to the Vegan Society, most brands they’ve approached say they use coconuts harvested by humans. However, the Vegan Society does not mention which or how many brands they’ve approached. According to Edwin Wiek, animal protector in Thailand, about 30 percent of coconuts in Southern Thailand are harvested by monkeys. According to a coconut industry insider from Thailand, 99 percent of coconuts in Thailand are harvested by monkeys. Also in Malaysia monkeys are used, and according to the Malaysian Animal Welfare Association, they can’t guarantee the monkeys well-being because of lack of oversight. Also in other Southeast Asian countries, such as Indonesia, India and Sri Lanka, it’s known that monkeys are used by coconut farmers but there are no exact numbers of how often this happens. As using monkeys for labour is legal in most Southeast Asian countries, no one keeps track of the prevalence of this practice. Therefore, while it is certain that this happens on a considerable scale, it’s not known how many monkeys are used.

Environmental impact

The growing demand for coconut products has led to an increase in coconut production in recent years. Unfortunately, this also has a negative impact on the environment. Deforestation is common to make space for new coconut farms. Deforestation is not only necessary to keep up with the growing demand, but also because coconut trees start to produce less coconuts after a while. That’s why farmers try to keep planting new trees, to keep up production. Nowadays it’s becoming more usual for coconut trees to be grown as mono cultures. According to researchers from Stanford, this has a great impact on the ecosystems of tropical islands. This changes the vegetation, which leads to certain animals leaving the area and in the end the entire ecosystem changes. For example, researchers found that sea birds leave areas with coconut palms because they can’t nest in these new trees. When they’ve left, the soil quality is greatly reduced as sea birds feces no longer adds nutrients to the soil. According to the Dutch Voedingscentrum (food advisory committee), coconuts have a medium to high climate impact, especially because of deforestation and the high usage of pesticides to prevent insect plagues. In addition, the water usage for growing coconuts is also quite high.

Are coconuts vegan?

Coconut products are vegan when they are produced without using monkey labour. The problem is that it’s not mentioned on the package of a product whether this is the case and it’s hard if not impossible to find out whether a coconut product has been made without using monkeys. Below you can find a list of brands that say they don’t use monkeys for the harvesting of their coconuts. However, it’s unclear how reliable this list is, no brand admits that they use or could be using coconuts harvested by monkeys. In addition, many of the brands in the list use coconuts from Thailand, while someone from the Thai coconut industry said 99 percent of coconuts there are harvested by monkeys. Furthermore, most coconuts are grown by small farmers. It is therefore extremely hard and pretty much impossible for companies to be sure none of their many farmers keeps one or several monkeys. Therefore they mostly seem to rely on the farmer’s word and in most cases do not seem to have any policy specifically against their farmers using monkeys. However, as one in every twenty supermarket products contains a coconut derived ingredient, avoiding all coconut products can be difficult.

Companies that say their coconut products are not made with the help of monkey labour:

3 Buddhas Coconut Water

Abbot Kinney’s

Alaffia

Alpro

Amy & Brian

Aunt Patty’s

Ayam

Artisana Organics

Better Body Foods

Big Tree Farms

Bio today/Smaak

Biona

Califa farms

Carrington Farms

Coconut Bliss Coconut Magic (Australia)

Coconut Secret

Daiya

De witte Parel

Dr. Bronner’s

Earth Circle Organics

Earth Conscious

Fairtrade Original

Essential Trading Company

Harmless Harvest

Kaskade

La Tourangelle  Artisan Oils

Maison Orphee

Mama Nature (Aldi)

Naked Coconuts

Native Pacific “Banaban” (Queensland)

Nutiva

Ojio (Ultimate Superfoods)

Organicfarm

Sanso-Boeki LLC (Japan)

So Delicious

Silk

Spectrum Organics

Trader Joe’s

Tropical Traditions

Vita Coco

(Note: While these companies have themselves said that they do not use monkey labour, this is hard to check and enforce, and in addition most of these companies don’t have any official company statements or supplier requirements that specifically state that using monkey labour or other animal labour is forbidden. Therefore I’d like to note that there is no 100% guarantee that none of their suppliers uses monkey labour. However, if you do decide to consume coconut products, these companies are probably the best option) 

Companies that did not give a (clear) answer to the question of whether they (may) use monkey labour and therefore it’s unclear whether they use monkey labour:

Coconut Oil Supreme

Mercola

Blue Diamond

Better Body Foods

Native Forest

Nature’s Way

Thai Kitchen

Trident (Australia)

Bio Foods

Chaokoh

Coconut Beach

Harvest Bay

LouAna

Nature’s Bounty

Nature’s Charm

Safeway

Spiral Foods

Taste of Thai

Sources:

https://www.voedingscentrum.nl/encyclopedie/kokos-en-kokosvet.aspx 

http://pin.primate.wisc.edu/factsheets/entry/pigtail_macaque/behav

https://www.oneworld.nl/video/koken-met-kokos/

https://www.animalstoday.nl/wie-plukte-jouw-kokosnoot-mak/

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/nathan-j-winograd/did-an-abused-monkey-pick_b_8341554.html

https://programma.bnnvara.nl/groenlicht/artikelen/is-kokosmelk-duurzaam

https://www.bangkokpost.com/news/special-reports/681936/pay-coconuts-get-monkeys 

https://mediapermata.com.bn/monyet-macaque-diberi-latihan-secukupnya/ 

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/322917884_Monkey_school_Training_phases_for_coconut-picking_macaques_Macaca_nemestrina 

https://www.vegansociety.com/resources/general-faqs 

https://www.hmetro.com.my/mutakhir/2018/01/303427/ini-sekolah-beruk 

https://www.benarnews.org/indonesian/slide-show/beruk-pemetik-kelapa-10302017162219.html

https://news.stanford.edu/news/2010/january18/birddrop-palm-trees-012110.html 

hhttps://www.onegreenplanet.org/environment/is-your-obsession-with-coconuts-harming-the-environment/

en https://animalplace.org/did-a-monkey-pick-your-coconuts/

hhttps://vatdblog.wordpress.com/2015/11/20/kokosnoten-en-slavenarbeid

Every year more than 50 million animals are bred and killed for the production of fur in the EU. Worldwide, more than one billion rabbits and 100 million other animals are killed for this purpose every year. About 90 percent of fur is produced on fur farms. While more and more people are against fur farming, in recent years an increasing number of fur products are sold with a faux fur label, misleading consumers. The fur industry is unfortunately still very profitable.

Animals in the fur industry often find it hard to adjust to live in a cage and are kept in horrible conditions. Animals are forced to live in small wire cages until it’s time to be killed. Health problems are common, such as untreated infections and wounds, missing limbs, cannibalism, dead animals left to rot between living animals and lack of (clean) drinking water. These animals are often scared and show disturbing behaviour as they’re unable to behave naturally in their cages. In the end, they’re often either gassed or electrocuted. Gassing takes quite a long time and is very painful. Electrocuting animals is also quite problematic, as it’s risky and when not done correctly it can cause a lot of pain as well. That’s why electrocuting foxes is now forbidden in some places such as New York.

In some countries, breeding animals for the fur industry is no longer allowed. One of these countries is the United Kingdom, which banned fur farming in England in Wales in 2000 and in the rest of the UK in 2002. Several other EU countries are in the process of banning fur farms. The Netherlands still has 160 mink farms, killing 6 million mink every year, but this will be banned in 2024. Some countries like Germany continue to increase welfare regulations for fur farms, making it harder to them to continue existing.

Mink

The American mink is bred on a large scale for its fur. They’re kept in small, empty cages and mostly get waste from slaughterhouses as food. They’re usually killed by gassing. Undercover footage in the Netherlands from Animal Rights showed that mink are often treated brutally when being thrown into the gas chamber. In addition, footage showed that it takes quite long for them to be gassed, which means they suffer a lot.

Rabbits

Rabbits are bred the most for the fur industry, in total more than one billion rabbits every year. Rabbit fur is often used for cheaper clothing, as it’s cheaper than most other types of fur. Many people believe rabbit fur is not so bad, as it’s thought to be a byproduct of meat production. Unfortunately, that’s not true. Many rabbits are bred and killed for meat (more than 340 million in the EU alone), but this is another breed of rabbit. Rabbits for meat are bred to grow fast and are slaughtered when they’re only 10 weeks old and their fur has not developed properly yet. The fur of these rabbits is usually not used in the fur industry. Another one billion rabbits of other breeds are bred for fur. These rabbits are kept for longer, usually about half a year, to make sure their fur is at its best. As they live longer, their meat is not as tasty and is often not used for human consumption.

In addition, there is a third type of rabbit that’s bred to make angora wool. This wool comes from special rabbits that have very long hair. Angora rabbits have been bred by humans to increase the length of the hair and can’t survive in the wild. The wool is used a lot to make clothing and is mostly produced in China. Usually the female rabbits are used to make this product, as the male rabbits produce less wool. For this reason, most of the male angora rabbits are killed shortly after birth. To get angora wool, rabbits don’t need to be killed, but their fate is still horrible. The hair is literally pulled out of their skin, which is extremely painful and often results in the rabbits screaming in agony. This happens every three months for about two to five years, when the rabbits are slaughtered.

Raccoon dog

Raccoon dogs are slightly bigger than raccoons and live in forests near water. The fur of these animals is often used on coats. Raccoon dogs are mostly bred in Scandinavia and Asia and their lives are filled with suffering. Research in Finland showed that at raccoon dogs at fur farms regularly miss limbs and have untreated infected wounds. In China, film footage showed that raccoon dogs are sometimes skinned alive.

Cats and dogs

Every year, around 2 million cats and dogs are bred and killed by the fur industry, most of them in China. These animals are often kept in small cages in horrible conditions. Even though it’s illegal, undercover footage has shown that these cats and dogs are sometimes skinned alive.

The EU has banned the import of cat and dog fur since 2008. Unfortunately, this hasn’t stopped the sale of these types of fur in Europe. Fur from cats and dogs that have not been killed specifically for their fur can still be imported legally (so fur from cats and dogs that have been killed for meat instead those coming from fur farms). In addition, it’s also very hard to stop cat and dog fur from being imported. Customs doesn’t have the time and capacity to check all fur items and it’s impossible to find out if a product contains cat or dog fur without doing a DNA test or microscope research. Therefore, it still regularly happens that products containing cat or dog fur are sold within the EU. Sometimes these products don’t contain labels saying what type of fur it is, but it’s also sold with false labels (saying it’s fur from another label) or even with labels saying its faux fur. Therefore, even faux fur isn’t always safe to buy.

Interestingly, the import of dog leather is allowed in the EU without any restrictions. It’s not known what products this is used for and it doesn’t need to be mentioned on the product what type of leather is used. Therefore, leather items in the EU can be made from dog leather and only a DNA test can reveal whether this is the case or not. Dog leather is regularly used to make gloves and for leather patches on clothing and accessories.

Coyotes

Coyotes are not bred at fur farms. They’re predators that live in North America. They’re mainly hunted for their fur, as it’s quite profitable. Every year in the US and Canada almost half a million coyotes are killed. Most of them are caught with a leg-hold trap, which consists of two metal parts coming together, trapping the animal’s leg. It often takes a long time before a hunter finally comes to kill the animal, sometimes several days. During this time the animal suffers a lot and sometimes even dies of hunger or thirst before the hunter arrives. In addition, animals sometimes manage to escape from the traps, but as they are badly injured, sometimes even having lost a leg, they mostly die later anyway.

Another problem with leg-hold traps is that other animals often get caught in them. It’s been estimated that for every coyote that’s caught, one to four other animals die in the leg-hold trap. Sometimes these include endangered species. Leg-hold traps are banned in Europe since 1995, because of the animal suffering they cause. Interestingly, fur from animals caught with leg-hold traps can be sold in the EU and an estimated 75% of all leg-hold trap fur is sold in Europe. Therefore, Europe ironically still greatly contributes to the continuation of this cruel hunting practice by supporting the fur industry.

Chinchillas

Chinchillas are often bred for their fur. They’re kept in small cages and are known to become scared and aggressive in captivity. It happens regularly that they harm themselves or others and even cannibalism isn’t uncommon. Mothers often kill their own babies, which together with other problems has led to more than 25 percent of young chinchillas dying in fur farms. Chinchillas are mostly bred in China and Russia.

Seals

Seals are not bred for their fur, but hunted. Every year, a few hundred thousand seals are killed for fur, mostly in Canada, Greenland and Namibia. Seals are also hunted on a smaller scale in Norway, but luckily the government there has stopped subsidizing seal hunts in 2015, which led to a decrease in seal hunts. Especially young seals are often killed and they’re mostly clubbed to death or shot. Unfortunately, hunters usually don’t check whether the animal is dead, which according to vets regularly leads to seals being skinned alive. Furthermore, wounded seals are often left behind.

In Canada and Greenland, seal hunts aren’t profitable anymore and can only continue to exists because of the millions of dollars worth of subsidies from the governments. In Namibia, it’s still profitable, but less profitable than seal tourism there. An increasing number of countries, including the US and Russia, have banned the import of seal products in recent years, which has greatly decreased the number of seals being killed. The EU also has a seal import ban, but this excludes seal products from indigenous people in Greenland and Canada. In Canada, indigenous people only have small-scale hunts, but in Greenland, most of the inhabitants are indigenous people and many of them hunt seals for a living, killing 80.000 seals every year. Unfortunately, about half of all wounded seals escape and die later, meaning that the death toll from hunting is at least double. As they’re mostly killed for their fur, many carcasses are dumped in sea as there is no demand for seal meat. Therefore, the EU’s limited ban on seal products contributes to the continuation of these large-scale commercial hunting practices.

Karakul sheep

Karakul sheep are a specific type of sheep from Central Asia. The wool from the adult sheep is quite sturdy and often used to make clothing. The baby sheep, however, are known for their fine soft fur. They keep this fur for three days after birth before getting a coat similar to their parents. Therefore, these baby sheep are often killed when they’re between 1 and 3 days old. Their fur is even softer before they’re born, so sometimes the mothers are killed so the unborn lams can be skinned for their fur. This means two animals are killed for just a small amount of fur. As the lams are still so small, it takes about 30 lams (and 60 lives) just to make one coat of this type of fur.

This fur is sold under various names such as karakul, karakulcha, qaraqul, swakara, Persian lam, persianer, astrakan, breitschwanz and broadtail. It’s mostly used by famous brands, such as Gucci, Michael Kors, Ralph Lauren and Dolce & Gabana.

Red lynx

Fur from the red lynx is very rare and therefore extremely profitable. Sadly, this is the reason why these animals are hunted in the US and Canada, where they live in the wild. They’re mostly hunted with leghold traps, which kill about 50.000 red lynx every year. The lynx often suffer for a long time in these traps before being killed by hunters. There are also other reasons why these leghold traps are extremely cruel, which are mentioned in the paragraph about coyotes. Lynx are often killed by strangulation with a metal wire so as not to damage the fur.

Foxes

Foxes are bred for their fur in fur farms and hunted in the wild as well. In fur farms, they often get very stressed as they’re not domesticated animals. They make repetitive movements and often bite themselves, causing wounds. In some countries, such as Finland, they’re bred to become unnaturally big and overfed in order to produce more fur per animal. Unfortunately, this harms their health and makes their lives even more miserable.

Another problem with foxes in captivity is that spontaneous abortions are a regular occurrence and mothers sometimes kill their babies. Because of these reasons, half of all baby foxes in the fur industry die. Foxes are mostly bred in Scandinavia, North America and China and they’re also hunted in most of these areas. Finland also has a lot of fur farms, where more than 2.5 million foxes are bred and killed every year.

Environmental impact

Fur is regularly promoted as a natural and sustainable product, as opposed to the more unnatural faux fur. However, fur is processed and treated with chemicals before it’s used in clothing or other products. Therefore, it’s definitely not a natural or environmentally friendly product and the fur industry is quite polluting.

The first environmental problems related to fur production involve the breeding and keeping of the animals. Just as with animal agriculture, this requires a lot of land, water, feed, energie and other resources. All these resources can also be used for other purposes, often more efficiently. In addition, keeping millions and millions of animals also produces a lot of pollution, especially manure. When hunting animals for fur, the usage of leg-hold traps contributes to a decrease in biodiversity and threatens endangered species.

After an animal is skinned, the fur has to be treated with a variety of chemicals. If this is not done, the fur simply rots away. Just as with the processing of leather, this involves very poisonous chemicals and heavy metals. These chemicals contribute considerably to water and air pollution. For that reason, in recent years, most fur factories have moved to third world countries, where pollution regulation is much less strict. These chemicals are not only bad for the environment, they’re a threat to human health as well. People working in fur factories are known to often have health problems related to working with these chemicals, including skin and eye problems and an increased cancer risk. The ‘Industrial Pollution Projection System’ of the World Bank analysed which industries cause most heavy metal pollution and concluded that the fur industry belonged in the top 5. The poisonous chemicals can also be damaging to fur wearers. Research in the Netherlands showed that some fur items contain residu from these chemicals that are poisonous and contain carcinogens. Research in Germany and Denmark showed that this was also the case in those country and harmful substances were even found on children’s coats that contained fur.

Compared to other textiles, fur is quite bad for the environment. The production of fur requires much more energy and resources, and causes the emission of more greenhouse gasses and other pollution. Dutch research organisation CE-Delft analysed the environmental impact of the production of mink fur compared to textiles such as cotton, acryl and polyester. Fur scored worse on almost all types of environmental impact. The emission of greenhouse gasses was even more than 10 times higher than those of plant-based textiles. Another study by CE-Delft showed that the production of faux fur is also more environmentally friendly than real fur. Faux fur scored better on all 18 types of environmental impact, often even 3 to 10 times better than real fur. Textiles are more environmentally friendly than faux fur, but if someone wants to wear fur, faux fur is a much more environmentally friendly choice than real fur.

Sources:

Bont voor Dieren & PETA

CE Delft (2011). The Environmental Impact of Mink Fur Production, https://www.ce.nl/publicaties [Accessed on 18-05-2018].

CE Delft (2013). Natural Mink Fur and Faux Fur Products, An Environmental Comparison. https://www.ce.nl/publicaties [Accessed on 18-05-2018].

http://www.cryoftheinnocent.com/facts/

http://thefurbearers.com/the-issues/trapping/canadian-statistics

https://www.onthewingphotography.com/wings/2012/11/02/an-estimated-400000-coyotes-are-killed-a-year/

http://www.truthaboutfur.com/en/fox-farming

https://www.peta.org/blog/undercover-photos-arctic-foxes-finland-fur-farms/

https://www.animalrights.nl/1-op-de-3-gecontroleerde-nertsenfokkers-betrapt-op-illegale-uitbreidingen

https://kassa.bnnvara.nl/data/files/1099069284.pdf

There are about 1.8 million dairy cows living in the UK, each producing around 8000 liters of milk every year. The life of a dairy cow isn’t easy, as they need to work extremely hard to produce so much milk. On top of that, the dairy industry causes all sorts of suffering for these cows. Dairy is also very bad for the environment. In this blog we discuss the details of the suffering behind dairy production.

Fertility hormones and artificial insemination

In order to produce milk, cows first need to give birth. Like humans and other mammals that produce milk, cows only give milk during a period after giving birth to a baby. Therefore, the first step in ‘making’ a dairy cow is often giving her fertility hormones. While the usage of growth hormones in animal agriculture has been banned in the EU for years, there are no restrictions on the usage of fertility hormones. Dairy cows are now being bred to increase their milk production, but a downside of this development is that this has also increasingly led to fertility problems in cows. To solve this problem, the usage of fertility hormones is widespread.

In addition, the usage of fertility hormones also increases efficiency, as a farmer can choose more precisely when he wants his cows to become pregnant and he can more easily make sure that a whole group of cows becomes pregnant at exactly the same time, making the milking more efficient. A veterinary organisation and several animal welfare organisations in the Netherlands have voiced concerns about the increasing usage, as there are few rules and barely any oversight in the EU regarding the usage of these hormones.

Almost all dairy cows are impregnated with artificial insemination. Special bulls are kept at special farms in order to produce sperm for this purpose. Young bulls at these farms are often encouraged to rape each other to practise their main task in life. When they are a bit older, sometimes a fake cow is used, but sometimes they are still forced to rape each other and the sperm from the other bull’s anus is used to send to dairy farms to impregnate the cows there.

Calves

After a pregnancy of 9 months, the calves are born. They are almost always separated from their mothers on the first day of their lives. Nowadays cows give an unnaturally large amount of milk, which means they could feed their calves and most of the milk would still be left for human consumption. However, almost all farmers take the dairy calves away on the first day, so there is even more milk to sell. Under natural circumstances, calves stay with their mothers for at least the first 8 to 9 months of their lives. Therefore, it is not surprising that both cows and calves react to this separation. Cows often become aggressive and try to follow their calves if they get the chance. They also call for their calves for days or weeks on end and show signs of stress. Of course that is not very surprising, considering they carry their children for 9 months just like humans do, with many of the same hormones causing a bond and mother feelings.

Female calves are raised to become dairy calves themselves. Male calves are raised to become veal. Almost all calves (male and female) are dehorned at a young age. This is done to prevent them hurting each other in the small stables in which they are kept. This is usually done with anaesthesia but this only helps for a limited amount of time which means that calves often still suffer for several days after this procedure.

2 million calves are born in the UK every year. About half of those are male and they are mostly raised for veal. Some calves are also exported to the EU, about 11.000 in 2011. For the first eight weeks calves are kept in individual crates. This is mostly done to prevent them from sucking the urine from other calves, as they look for something to suck in the absence of their mum. After that they are housed in groups with little space, where they are kept for a few months. In most of the EU, such as in the Netherlands, the calves get an iron deficient diet to give them anaemia, as this gives the veal a white colour. In the UK, most calves are raised for rose veal and get a slightly more normal diet. Most calves never get a chance to go outside and restricting their movement in small stables supposedly increases the quality of the veal. Calves are often kept for veal as they have been bred specifically for high milk production. These male calves don’t grow as fast or become as unnaturally big and fat as calves bred for meat production. Therefore, the quality and quantity of their meat makes raising them until adulthood wouldn’t be as profitable.

Unfortunately, the veal industry is highly subsidized by the EU, adding another reason to kill the calves when they are young. Research in the Netherlands showed that 80 percent of the income of farmers who kept calves for veal came from EU subsidies.

Milk production

After the calf is taken away, a cow can be used for her milk. Normally, a calf drinks his mother’s milk for about 10 months and then the milk production stops. Sometimes farmers manage to increase that period a little bit, but most of the time it is necessary to artificially inseminate the cow again after about 10 months to start the milk production again.

About a century ago, the average dairy cow produced 2500 kilos of milk every year. Nowadays, the average is 8000 kilo, more than 3 times as much. This amount is still increasing and there are even cows that already produce 16.000 kilos of milk per year. At organic dairy production, the average is 7300 kilo, but there are also organic dairy cows giving 11.000 kilos per year. It shouldn’t be surprising that this is extremely hard work for the cows and they need a lot of food to be able to do this. Their body has to work so hard that they are exhausted all day long. Producing 8000 kilos of milk every year for a cow requires about as much energy as it would be for a human to run for 8 hours every single day. It should therefore not be surprising that this often leads to health problems. According to the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), the fact that dairy cows are bred selectively to continue increasing the milk production is an important cause of their suffering. This often leads to lameness, mastitis and digestive problems because of the unnatural food. In addition, cows are often kept in small crates or stables, which according to the EFSA also contributes to their suffering.

In the UK, 20 percent of all dairy cows never get the chance to go outside. In the Netherlands this is even 35 percent. The majority of cows do get to go outside, but there are big differences between farms in how often and how long they are allowed to go outside. For their welfare, it’s better for cows to spend time outdoors. This gives them much more space and the opportunity to follow their instincts by grazing. In addition, cows that spend time outdoors have less chance to get common health problems such as mastitis, lameness and other leg problems.

The slaughterhouse

Normally, cows can easily become 20 years old. In the dairy industry, their productivity decreases after a few years because they are utterly exhausted and their body is worn out. People who would run 8 hours a day every single day also wouldn’t last long without ever having a rest. Therefore, most dairy cows are sent to the slaughterhouse when they are about 5 years old. Other reasons to send dairy cows to the slaughterhouse around this age or even earlier are because of infertility, lameness or mastitis. Organic cows are usually allowed to live about one year longer, but then they end up at the same slaughterhouses as the non-organic cows. Cows are often stunned by shooting a metal pin into their heads. Calves are stunned with this method as well or sometimes by using electric shocks. Unfortunately, this isn’t always done properly which means sometimes cows get their throat slashed and bleed to death without having been stunned.

Environment

Dairy is also very bad for the environment. Cows contribute significantly to the emission of greenhouse gases. Because of this, every liter of milk causes the emission of 1,2 kg CO2-eq. For soy milk this is only half, 0,6 kg CO2-eq. Cheese is even worse for the environment, namely 8,9 kg CO2-eq per kilogram of cheese. Worldwide, the production of dairy products is even responsible for 4 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions.

Furthermore, the production of dairy requires a lot of water. 1050 liters of water are needed to make 1 liter of milk. In order to make one liter of soy milk, only 297 liters of water are needed. One kilogram of cheese even requires 10,500 liter of water. As there is already water scarcity in almost two thirds of the world, this is not only bad for the environment, but also contributes to human suffering.

Another problem with milk production is that it requires a lot of land. Not just land to raise cows on, but also to produce animal feed. While some cows spend time outdoors, they will still get fed special food as well. A dairy cow eats around 70 kilos of feed every day. To make 1 liter of milk requires 0,9 m2 of land to produce animal feed, and for cheese this is 7,1 m2. Part of this feed comes from abroad, such as soy from South America. In addition, fields are used to produce grass. This means there is less land left for other purposes, such as giving more land back to nature. Furthermore, fertilizer is often used on these fields which contributes to extra greenhouse gas emissions and water pollution.

Alternatives

Unfortunately, organic milk and milk with other certifications are also really bad for the environment and still cause a lot of animal suffering. With these kinds of dairy, the calf is still taken away immediately after birth and cows are still forced to produce an unnatural amount of milk before being sent to the slaughterhouse at a young age.

In addition, dairy is sometimes also made from goat or sheep milk. Unfortunately, the animal suffering that this causes is usually even worse than with the production of cow’s milk. (We’re planning to make a separate blog about this soon).

Luckily it’s possible to live more environmentally and animal friendly without having to miss dairy products. Nowadays there are many different types of plant-based milks (such as soy milk, oat milk, almond milk, spelt milk, rice milk and coconut milk). In addition, there are also many different types of plant-based butter and plant-based cheese and the number of these products is only increasing. This way you can still eat a sandwich with butter and cheese or drink a glass of milk without animals needing to suffer for it.

Sources:

Blonk Milieu Advies (2008). “Milieueffecten van Nederlandse Consumptie van Eiwitrijke Producten: Gevolgen van Vervanging van Dierlijke Eiwitten Anno 2008”. https://www.partijvoordedieren.nl/download/Definitief_rapport_vs_8okt2008.pdf [Accessed on 04-04-2018].

CBS (2001). “Vroeger en Nu: Druk op de Grasmat”.  https://www.cbs.nl/NR/rdonlyres/28A50F1C-92FB-40D2-A563-7D821E0B9C9B/0/index1228.pdf [Accessed on 04-04-2018].

Ercin, A Ertug ; Aldaya, Maite M. & Hoekstra, Arjen Y. (2012), “The Water Footprint of Soy Milk and Soy Burger and Equivalent Animal Products”, Ecological Indicators, Vol. 18, pp. 392-402.

FAO (2006). Livestocks’ Long Shadow: Environmental Issues and Options http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.HTM [Accessed on 05-04-2018].

LEI Wageningen UR (2012). “Concurrentiemonitor Blank Kalfsvlees”. http://edepot.wur.nl/199119 [Accessed on 04-04-2018]

Webster, J. (1993). Understanding the Dairy Cow. Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford.

Wakker Dier, Voedingscentrum & PETA

http://www.boerderij.nl/Rundveehouderij/Blogs/2012/8/Het-kan-11000-kilo-biologische-melk-per-koe-1056638W/

https://www.levendehave.nl/dierenwikis/runderen/leeftijd-van-koeien

http://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0006805/2001-09-14

https://vroegevogels.bnnvara.nl/nieuws/reclame-code-commisie-bevestigt-ziekte-blanke-kalveren

https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/nieuws/2012/39/aantal-koeien-in-de-wei-neemt-af

http://www.clo.nl/indicatoren/nl0099-emissies-naar-lucht-door-de-land–en-tuinbouw?ond=20888

https://www.levendehave.nl/

https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2016/04/29/kalverboeren-voor-92-procent-afhankelijk-van-euro-1615079-a115801

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/28/free-range-milk-asda-dairy-farming-cows-in-fields-pasture-promise

The coffee industry has a long history of colonialism and the exploitation of human beings. However, some people might be surprised that nowadays coffee is still heavily linked to slavery, child labour and other forms of exploitation. Coffee is one of the most tradable commodities in the world and is often produced in poor countries. Today, it’s being produced in 80 tropical countries and employs 125 million workers in Latin America, Africa and Asia. The main coffee producers are Brazil, Vietnam and Colombia. Because of the huge scale of coffee production and the long supply chains, it’s virtually impossible for big companies to know where their coffee comes from, let alone under what conditions it was produced. This lack of transparency makes it especially difficult for consumers to make ethical choices, as there is little information on which to base your decision. In this blog we discuss the problems in the coffee industry.

Slavery

Slavery is not unusual in the coffee industry. In many coffee-producing areas, the elite owns large plantations. Many workers are enslaved there through debt and are forced to continue working to repay these debts. They often receive less than minimum wage and are forced to buy their food and other products at the estate shop, as the long hours of work and lack of transportation doesn’t allow them to shop elsewhere. As the prices at estate shops are often high, this way they become indebted to the plantation. Also the costs of renting land or loans for medical care can indebt families, forcing them to continue working on the plantation for decades.

Big coffee companies such as Douwe Egberts and Nestlé, who sell 40 percent of all coffee, admit that they don’t know exactly where their coffee comes from. They also admitted that it’s possible that their coffee is produced on plantations that use slave labour. According to the Danish research organisation DanWatch, slavery on coffee plantations is very common, especially in Brazil. The Brazilian government saves hundreds of enslaved workers every year, but it’s unclear how many people are still enslaved. Research from DanWatch showed that workers were tied up and exposed to dangerous pesticides without protection. On some plantations workers were forced to live between rubbish and were only allowed to drink water from the same buckets as animals. Some reports also state that at some coffee estates, workers are supervised by armed guards and threatened and physically abused when trying to leave.

While most information about slavery in the coffee industry comes from Brazil, this is still very significant, as Brazil is the largest producer and exporter of coffee, producing 30% of all coffee and employing 8 million people in the coffee industry. While the Brazilian government frequently saves enslaved workers, they are still unable to say on what scale slavery occurs in this industry. However, slavery is definitely not limited to Brazil alone. For example, according to the United States Department of Labor, forced labour is also common in Ivory Coast.

Some coffee companies such as Starbucks and Illy say they know at which plantations their coffee is produced and that they avoid plantations that are known to use slaves. However, as there are so many plantations, this still does not guarantee that no slaves are used for their coffee. In addition, Nestlé has stated that no company can guarantee that their coffee is 100% slave free, because of the long supply chain and lack of transparency and inspections.

Child labour

Child labour is also common in areas where coffee is being cultivated, even though most coffee-producing countries have regulations against child labour. Poverty often means that children are unable to go to school or are taken out of school in order to work. This helps to keep families in a cycle of poverty. In Brazil, researchers found that child labour rates were 37 percent higher in areas where coffee was produced. School enrolment was 3 percent less in these areas. 40 percent of coffee harvesters in Honduras are children and they are often hired as temporary workers for a wage that is even lower than that for adult workers. The conditions in which children work are also far from safe, being exposed to dangerous levels of sun, poisoning from chemicals and injuries and often being forced to work for eight to ten hours a day.

Research in Ivory Coast has shown that child labour is also very common there, often related to cocoa production. Cocoa and coffee are often grown on the same farms there, with coffee growing in the shade of the cacao trees. On some of these farms, children are kept as slaves and forced to both harvest cocao and coffee beans. Research by Finnwatch in Honduras showed that child labour was widespread on coffee plantations there, with the youngest child workers being only 5 to 6 years old. In addition, the United States Department of Labor states that child labour is also used in the coffee industry in Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Guinea, Kenya and Mexico.

Other human rights violations

Even when coffee is produced without slaves or child labour, that doesn’t mean it’s produced fairly and under normal conditions. Extremely low wages, high recruitment fees, discrimination and unsafe working conditions are the standard. According to DanWatch and Finnwatch, not only are slaves and child labour often used in the coffee industry in Brazil, but bad living conditions, discrimination against women, working without a contract and working with dangerous chemicals without protection are also common, even at certified farms. In addition, research by Finnwatch in India showed that most workers had to pay up to a third of their already meagre wage to person who had recruited them, which also contributes to causing debt bondage.

A study in Guatamala showed that most coffee workers did not get paid for overtime nor did they get employee benefits, even though these are required by law. More than half of the workers got paid less than minimum wage. Other problems were unsanitary living environments, discrimination against women, no access to education and companies did not adhere to the required health and safety regulations.

The low wages in the coffee industry are especially appalling as CEOs of coffee companies often earn ridiculously high amounts. An average worker in the coffee industry is lucky to earn a few hundred dollars per year if he or she gets paid at all, while the CEO of Starbucks earns 30 million dollar per year and the CEO of Douwe Egberts earns 7 million per year. With the wages of CEOs being so high, the problem is not that coffee companies can’t afford to pay their workers fair wages, but that they don’t want to. This is particularly unfortunate as a small increase in salary could already help prevent most slavery and child labour. And while it’s nothing compared to the suffering in the coffee growing countries, let’s not forget that many coffee companies such as Starbucks are also known for exploiting their workers who work in coffee shops.

Environmental impact

Under natural circumstances, coffee plants grow in the shade of bigger trees in tropical and subtropical forests. At coffee plantations, coffee can either be grown in the shade of other trees or in the sun in monocultures. While most coffee is grown in these sunny monocultures, this is actually much worse for the environment. Therefore, if you buy coffee, it’s better to go for shade-grown coffee. Shade-grown coffee prevents soil erosion, maintains more biodiversity in both plant and animal species, reduces water consumption and causes less run-off of harmful chemicals into nearby eco-systems. In addition, farmers on shade-grown coffee plantations often have a more stable income. Coffee prices can change fast and often, leaving farmers vulnerable, but at shade-grown coffee plantations, farmers can grow other plants to supplement their coffee income. Unfortunately, sun-grown coffee monocultures are more profitable as more coffee can be cultivated on the same area of land, which means an increasing number of shade-grown plantations is being converted to these monocultures.

However, another problem with sun-grown coffee production is that it depletes the soil, which means that productivity decreases after a while. Often after about 15 years these plantations are so depleted of nutrients that they are often abandoned and a new area is cleared to make space for coffee plants. This is not only disastrous as nature is destroyed to make space for coffee production, but the abandoned area is now even more vulnerable to soil erosion and other ecological problems and can no longer be used for agriculture. According to an report from the WWF, coffee production is a major contributor to deforestation, especially for sun-grown monocultures. In Central America alone, 2.5 million acres of forest have been cut down to make extra space for coffee production in recent years and 37 of the 50 countries that have the highest deforestation rates are major coffee producers.

An additional problem with the monocultures and the use of a limited number of coffee species is that many coffee species are slowly becoming extinct. While there are more than 125 species of coffee, the overwhelming majority of coffee production consists of only two species. Researchers believe this may become a considerable problem in the future, threatening the livelihoods of coffee growers. The use of limited coffee species means that it’s much more difficult for farmers to adapt to climate change, fight off pests and diseases and to deal with increasing droughts. With coffee plants being particularly sensitive to changes in climate, this is likely to become a problem. Some researchers believe that about 65 to 100 percent of the area currently being used for growing Arabica coffee will no longer be suitable for growing this most popular coffee species by 2080.

Another problem with coffee is that it requires a lot of chemical fertilizer (at sun-grown coffee plantations) and pesticides. Coffee is even the third most heavily sprayed crop in the world. Besides the fact that this is likely not very healthy, it also causes a lot of pollution and the run-off of chemicals can cause environmental disasters in a wide area around the plantation.

During the processing of coffee, the environment is also harmed. Most coffee is processed using the ‘wet’ processing procedure, especially for Arabica coffee beans. This requires an enormous amount of water and generates a lot of polluted waste water. This is a major source of river pollution in coffee producing countries, causing eutrophication. In addition to polluting waste water, coffee processing also causes a lot of other waste. The beans have to be separated from the coffee cherries, which generates huge amounts of pulp, residual matter and parchment. During 6 months in 1988, the processing of coffee in Central America created 1.1 million tons of pulp and polluted 110,000 cubic metres of water every single day. With coffee production also taking place in other countries and having increased greatly since 1988, the amount of waste and pollution caused by this industry has likely only become worse. While nowadays this waste is sometimes used to make biogas or animal feed, most of it is still being dumped in nearby waterways.

Research in Brazil showed that 1000 kg of coffee required 11,400 kg of water, 94 kg of diesel, 900 kg of fertilizers, 620 kg of correctives (like limestone to correct soil acidity) and 10 kg of pesticides. While there are also other products that require a lot of resources and cause a lot of pollution, it’s important to remember that coffee is a luxury product, with the overwhelming majority of coffee being sold in only 17 percent of the world’s countries and a product that we can easily live without.

Animal Impact

Coffee production is not only bad for the environment, it’s also bad for many animals. As mentioned in above, coffee production is a significant contributor to deforestation, which causes many animals to die and leads to a decrease in biodiversity. The focus on sun-grown coffee cultivation also doesn’t help to keep up biodiversity. In addition, the pollution caused by coffee production also harms a lot of animals.

However, with specific types of coffee, animals are used in a more direct way. For example, kopi luwak is an Indonesian coffee. It’s made by feeding coffee beans to an Asian palm civet, a jungle animal, and then making coffee of the excreted beans. Apparently the coffee gains in flavour when it’s being digested by the civet, but of course keeping civets in captivity for this purpose is not exactly animal friendly. Similarly, in Thailand elephants are fed coffee beans in order to make Black Ivory Coffee. It’s been reported that even some elephant sanctuaries use their elephants to make this type of coffee as they claim it doesn’t harm the animals. However, it remains a type of animal exploitation.

Certifications

As coffee production is causing so much suffering and destruction, you may be wondering if there are any coffee brands that produce their coffee in a more ethical way. Here we will discuss the fair trade, Rainforest Alliance and organic certifications and whether they make a difference.

Fairtrade

The idea behind Fairtrade is to give farmers a fairer price for their products so they can have a more dignified life and about 30 percent of all coffee is Fairtrade. According to Fairtrade, their procedures help farmers towards more development projects, healthcare services and quality improvement training, and it should protect them against market fluctuations. However, as the price of coffee has decreased over the last few decades, reports have shown that the extra money farmers get from Fairtrade certification is often not enough. Farmers often have to work together in cooperatives in order to get the Fairtrade certification in the first place, but they often struggle to pay off their debt to these cooperatives, especially with rising production costs and decreasing wages. Therefore, Fairtrade does not guarantee that a farmer can actually live off his wage. In addition, as with cocoa, Fairtrade coffee is actually a mix of fair trade and ‘normal’ coffee. While Fairtrade can be seen as a step in the right directions, researchers believe that it is not the solution to overcoming the cycle of indebtedness of farmers in the coffee industry.

Rainforest Alliance certification

The Rainforest Alliance certification is not concerned with the human conditions during the coffee production, but with its environmental impact. There is no fixed price for the growers. The organisations aims to improve the land use practices and conserve biodiversity. To get certified, growers need to adhere certain principles, such as no deforestation, developing shade-grown coffee and partial re-forestation. However, just as with Fairtrade, this can be a bit misleading, as companies can use the certification on their products, even when their coffee only consists of 30 percent of certified Rainforest Alliance coffee beans. In addition, many have criticized the Rainforest Alliance for having really low environmental standards and not being very strict, making the certification almost meaningless.

Organic coffee

To become organic-certified, coffee needs to be produced without using synthetic pesticides or chemical fertilizer. However, as mentioned in the blog about organic food, that isn’t necessarily better for the environment. In addition, the yields from organic cultivation are much lower, meaning more land is needed to produce the same amount of coffee. It is also usually not more profitable for farmers. While they get more money for organic coffee, they also need as their harvest is now considerably less and to invest in the necessary natural pesticides.

Recommendations

Clearly of Fairtrade, Rainforest Alliance and organic-certified coffee isn’t much better than non-certified coffee and many problems remain. So what is a more ethical choice? Some people decide to buy coffee from small roasting companies who buy coffee directly from the farmers that grow their coffee beans. However, a report by Finnwatch showed that while many consumers believe this type coffee to be more ethical, it is often based on trust and unverified assumptions and is regularly not produced under better circumstances. Buying more expensive brands is also no guarantee for better circumstances. In addition, some researchers worry that if the coffee price goes up in the future, that will be an environmental disaster, giving people in coffee producing countries more incentive to destroy even more nature to create more coffee plantations. Therefore, the best thing to do would be to stop buying and consuming coffee. As it is a luxury product, we can easily live without. Is your daily cup of coffee really worth all the human and animal suffering and the environmental damage it does?

Would you like to limit your coffee intake or even stop drinking it entirely? Please join our coffee challenge and refrain from drinking coffee in April.

https://www.facebook.com/events/190200701765142/

Sources:

https://books.google.nl/books?id=BbGTuQEQ0kMC&pg=PA366&lpg=PA366&dq=coffee+justo&source=bl&ots=G0rv8tlxmN&sig=GNmUfXX-8Wf8HjANJxgvLFVWko0&hl=nl&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiV_ObDgPTZAhVLJ1AKHYlmA-k4ChDoAQhlMAs#v=onepage&q=coffee%20justo&f=false

https://www.ad.nl/economie/douwe-egberts-koopt-mogelijk-slavenkoffie~a3f9072a/

http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/04/13/in-brazils-coffee-industry-some-workers-face-conditions-analogous-to-slavery/

http://environmentalscience.oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780199389414.001.0001/acrefore-9780199389414-e-224

https://www.finnwatch.org/en/news/412-child-labour-and-low-wages-still-common-in-coffee-cultivation

https://dailycoffeenews.com/2015/08/20/can-the-coffee-industry-afford-to-address-child-labor-and-forced-labor/

https://www.sustainablebusinesstoolkit.com/environmental-impact-coffee-trade/

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2011/oct/04/green-coffee

https://www.onegreenplanet.org/animalsandnature/coffee-and-its-impact-on-people-animals-and-the-planet/

https://www.dol.gov/ilab/reports/child-labor/list-of-goods/

Food Empowerment Project

Associated Press, “Coffee from an elephant’s gut fills a $50 cup,” USA Today, December 7, 2012.

Bacon, C. (2005). “Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Can Fair Trade, Organic, and Specialty Coffees Reduce Small-Scale Farmer Vulnerability in Northern Nicaragua?”. World Development, 33(3): pp. 497-511.

Beyene, A., et al. (2012). “The Impact of Traditional Coffee Processing on River Water Quality in Ethiopia and the Urgency of Adopting Sound Environmental Practices”. Environmental Monitoring and Assessment. 184(11): pp. 7053-7063.

Blackman, A., et al. (2005). “Deforestation and Shade Coffee in Oaxaca, Mexico: Key Research Findings. Resources for the Future Discussion Paper” 39. 1-12. http://www.rff.org/RFF/documents/RFF-DP-05-39.pdf (5/27/14)

Chanakya H.N. & De Alwis A. A. P. (2004). “Environmental Issues and Management in Primary Coffee Processing”. Process Safety and Environmental Protection 82(B4): pp. 291-300.

COVERCO. (2003). “The Culture of Coffee in Guatemala”. http://www.coverco.org.gt/e_coffeinguatemala.html (5/27/14)

FAO Commodities and Trade Division. (2004). “Voluntary Standards and Certification for Environmentally and Socially Responsible Agricultural Production and Trade”. Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. http://www.fao.org/docrep/007/y5763e/y5763e00.htm#Contents(6/5/14)

Farm Certification. (n.d.). Retrieved December 05, 2017, from https://www.rainforest-alliance.org/business/sas/how-certification-works/farm-certification/ 

Gaveau, D.L.A., et al. (2009). “Three decades of deforestation in southwest Sumatra: effects of coffee prices, law enforcement and rural poverty”. Biological Conservation 142 (3): pp. 597-605.

International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (2004). “Safety and Health Fact Sheet: Coffee. Geneva: International Labour Organization”. http://www.ilo.org/ipecinfo/product/download.do?type=document&id=5708 (5/27/14)

Kaye, M. (2008). “Arrested Development: Discrimination and Slavery in the 21st Century”. London: Anti- Slavery International. http://www.antislavery.org/includes/documents/cm_docs/2009/a/arresteddevelopment.pdf (5/27/14)

Kruger, D. I. (2007). “Coffee Production Effects on Child Labor and Schooling in Rural Brazil. Journal of Development Economics”. 82(2), pp. 448-463.

Lynn, G., Rogers, C., “Civet cat coffee’s animal cruelty secrets,” BBC News, September 13, 2013.

Person, L. (2008). “Ethics and Environment in the Coffee Sector – Linking CSR to the Consumer’s Power in the Context of Sustainable Development”. http://hj.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:5391/FULLTEXT01.pdf (5/27/14)

Valkila, J. (2009). “Fair Trade Organic Coffee Production in Nicaragua – Sustainable Development or a Poverty Trap?” Ecological Economics. doi:10.1016/j.ecolecon.2009.07.002

Wilson, B.R. (2010). “Indebted to Fair Trade? Coffee and Crisis in Nicaragua”. Geoforum 41(1): pp. 84- 92.

When you decide to live more environmentally and animal friendly, your bank may not be the first thing you think about. However, which bank you choose can have a significant impact. Banks use your money to invest in companies and projects. Unfortunately, most banks invest in fossil fuels, factory farms, weapons or projects that involve cutting down forests. In addition, many banks don’t have many requirements regarding human rights, the environment or animal welfare that companies have to meet in order to get funding. If you don’t want your money being used for projects that harm humans and animals, it may be worth checking what your bank invests in and change to another bank. Unfortunately, we haven’t been able to find as much information about banks in the UK as we have for banks in the Netherlands, but the information we did find should be helpful in deciding whether your bank is pretty ethical or not.

80 percent of people in the UK have a bank account at one of five banks: HSBC, Lloyds, RBS, Barclays and Santander. However, these banks get very bad ratings when it comes to ethics. All these banks are known  for tax avoidance, using tax havens and excessively high salaries of millions of pounds for directors. They are also some of the biggest investors in fossil fuels and therefore play a major role in causing climate change. For example, Lloyds Banking Group invested $10.047 billion in fossil fuel companies in 2015. These banks also invest in other unethical companies. For example, HSBC is infamous for giving loans to a dozen nuclear weapons manufacturers.

So what are some of the more ethical banks?

Co-op bank

Co-op bank refuses to do business with companies that breach human rights or that test on animals. They also invest in renewable energy and have committed to not investing in fossil fuels.

Triodos bank

Triodos is a Dutch bank and is also one of the most ethical banks in the Netherlands. They only invest in environmentally friendly organisations and in clean energy. They don’t invest in the fur industry or industries that use animals for entertainment and have strict requirements for animal testing. They also don’t invest in factory farms. In addition, they have strict rules regarding human rights for companies who want funding and don’t invest in weapons.

Charity bank

Charity bank has received the Social Enterprise Mark, given to companies who put the interests of the planet before profit and the interests of their shareholders. They give loans to domestic violence victims, low-income housing and eductation for excluded young people.

Reliance bank

Founded by the Salvation Army, the church receives 75 percent of the bank’s profits. However, the bank is committed to ethical banking and managers only receive small bonuses.

The Move your Money scorecard gives an indication of how ethical different banks are. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find any detailed information about investments in industries that use animals and the environmental impact of different banks (cutting down forests, mining, fishing etc), except for Triodos as there is a Dutch organisation that publishes detailed research on different ethical aspects of banks. However, as most big banks invest in factory farms, fossil fuels and weapons and changing to another bank is really easy nowadays, it’s definitely worth changing looking into and changing to a more environmentally and animal friendly bank.

Sources:

Consumentenbond

https://eerlijkegeldwijzer.nl/

http://sourced.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2017/08/10/is-it-ever-possible-to-bank-ethically/

http://www.ethicalconsumer.org/ethicalcampaigns/moveyourmoney/ourresearch.aspx

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2013/oct/23/ethical-alternatives-co-operative-bank

https://friendsoftheearth.uk/about-us/our-partner-triodos-bank?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI9sfZlO3S2QIVB40bCh1gMQkWEAAYAyAAEgJQmPD_BwE

http://www.ethicalconsumer.org/buyersguides/money/bankingcurrentaccounts.aspx

Products containing cocoa such as chocolate are regularly consumed by many people nowadays and some people even eat them daily. While cocoa used to be a luxury product, today that’s no longer the case and production has increased dramatically. Since the ’60s the demand for cocoa has trippled and in the last twenty years it has increased by 91%. The overwhelming majority of cocoa is produced in West Africa, about 70 percent of all cocoa.  For many countries such as Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon and Sierra Leone, cocoa is the most important export product and millions of people work to produce it. Since the ’90s the production of cocoa in Africa has even increased by 894 percent.

The cocoa cultivation in South America and Asia has also increased in recent years. In Asia, cocoa production has increased by 337 percent since the ’90s. Latin America is the region where cocoa originates from. In many South American countries there are huge cocoa plantations and many of these countries also depend largely on  the export cocoa for foreign currency.

The processing of cocoa mostly happens in the EU and North America, where cocoa is made into chocolate and other products. For example, the port of Amsterdam imports about 20 percent of the cocoa produced worldwide every year.

Cocoa may be really delicious, its production causes a lot of suffering. Slavery and child labour are very common. Workers are also exploited in other ways and are often forced to work with dangerous chemicals. This also means that the production of cocoa is not very environmentally friendly. In this blog we discuss the downsides of cocoa production.

Slavery

15 years ago there was a lot of media attention for the fact that slaves are widely used to produce cocoa. Several documentaries were made and there was a public outcry when it was reported in the news. The brad Tony’s Chocolonely was made to try to produce slave-free chocolate. While almost everyone claims to be opposed to slavery, this does not seem to stop them from buying chocolate. Governments and organisations like the Fair Labour Association and International Cocoa Initiative work together to try and stop slavery in the cocoa industry.

Now, 15 years later, slavery is still a huge problem in the cocoa industry and it seems all the attempts to solve this have not made any progress. The use of child labour has even increased. Tony’s Chocolonely has admitted that they have not reached their goal and that even they can’t guarantee that their chocolate is 100% slave-free. According to their own research, there are more than 90.000 slaves used in cocoa production in Ghana and Ivory Coast alone, of which the majority are children.

As the world market for cocoa is dominated by a few big companies such as Mars and Nestlé, it is better for them to keep the cocoa price low. This puts a lot of pressure on cocoa farmers. They often don’t have any other choice than to use slaves to work for them, as they don’t earn enough to use paid labour. These children are taken from their families, don’t go to school and are forced to pick cocoa beans. They’re send ito the woods with machetes and forced to climb trees to get to the cocoa beans. In exchange, they often don’t receive any compensation or only a very small sum of money.

Certified cocoa is no guarantee that it’s slave-free. Most certified cocoa, such as Fairtrade and UTZ Certified, consist of a mix of different types of cocoa, as it’s pretty much impossible to keep cocoa seperate. That is why certified cocoa is a mixture of slave-free cocoa and cocoa that was produced by slaves. Cocoa without any certification usually certainly contains cocoa harvested with slave labour. Even for companies such as Tony’s Chocolonely, it is impossible to produce 100% slave-free chocolate. It is pretty much impossible for companies to trace the origin of all their cocoa and even when they can trace it, it’s no guarantee that slaves aren’t used. After all, it’s impossible to check the labourers of millions of farmers.

Child labour and exploitation

Even when slaves aren’t used, that doesn’t mean that cocoa is then produced in an ethical way. For example, child labour is also a big problem. According to research by Tony’s Chocolonely, there are at least 2,1 million children illegally working for the cocoa industry in Ghana and Ivory Coast alone. This often happens in small family farms, where children work up to 50 hours a week.

In addition, labourers often get paid very little and family members are often forced to do unpaid labour. Workers for Nestlé are allowed to work up to 60 hours a week, but certain times of the year they are known to work even more hours than that. Accidents occur frequently and there is often little help for the victims. A research by the FLA showed that 72 percent of the accidents was caused by the use of machetes.

Farmers with the Fairtrade certificate often get paid a bit more. Unfortunately, it’s pretty much impossible to get this certificate if you’re a poor farmer. There are many requirements a farmer has to meet before being able to get a certificate and they often have to guarantee a minimum amount of produced cocoa. That’s why only richer farmers with more land are able to get such a certificate. Sometimes small farmers can get a certificate by working together under a richer farmer, but then they often still don’t profit from it due to mismanagement and fraud.

Dangerous and unhealthy work

While slavery does not seem to be common in South America, the cocoa production there still causes a lot of human suffering. Cocoa is mostly produced on huge plantations there. For example, in Brazil, only 19 percent of cocoa is produced by small farmers. There is also a lot of poverty among farmers and it is often dangerous work. A lot of dangerous chemicals are used as pesticides and herbicides, often substances that are forbidden in the EU and the United States because they are so dangerous. Both on big plantations and among small farmers, the people who work with these chemicals often don’t have any knowledge of how to use them properly and how dangerous they are. Most labourers are illiterate so they can’t read the information on the bottles. In addition, they usually don’t get protective clothing, which causes them to breath in the toxic substances and often have dangerous chemicals fall on their skin. Poison related health problems, such as throat and lung problems, skin irritations, coughing up blood, headaches, heartproblems, eyeproblems and aplastic anemia are all very common. A survey in 1987 revealed that 77 percent of cocoa workers had symptoms related to poisoning.

More problems

While lots of cocoa farmers and labourers are already having a hard time, it’s likely the situation is only going to get worse for them. There are already problems with older plantations, as older trees produce less cocoa after a while. In addition, it’becoming increasingly hard for small farmers to live off cocoa production, as the price of cocoa is very low and the price for fertilizer and tools are often very high. It’s also very difficult for small farmers to get help or technical knowledge about how to work more efficient.

Climate change is also likely to make things worse for people in the cocoa industry. While it is difficult to guess how the weather is going to change and how this will effect cocoa production, the effect is likely to be negative. Big parts of West Africa have a long dry season. Experts estimate that climate change will only lengthen these dry seasons, making certain areas no longer suitable for cocoa production. While researchers have come up with solutions to these problems, it is doubtful that these useful suggestions will actually reach the farmers and that they will have the means to put those suggestions into practice.

Impact on the environment

Cocoa products are also not very environmentally friendly, especially the cultivation of cocoa and the processing of cocoa in factories. Some of the problems are resource depletion, high energy usage, eutrophication and photochemical oxidation. In addition, the transportation and packaging of the cocoa beans also contributes significantly to the emission of greenhouse gasses. The transportation alone causes the emission of 0,22 to 0,39 kg CO2eq. per kilo of cocoa beans. The packaging is responsible for 0,28 to 1,91 kg CO2eq per kilo of cocoa beans.

Another problem is that the increasing demand for cocoa products has led to a lot of deforestation in rainforest areas. Especially in West Africa this is a problem, where a lot of protected rain forests are illegally cut down for this purpose. This is not only bad for the environment, but also for the endangered species living there. Between November 2017 and November 2018, 13.700 hectares of rainforest in Ivory Coast were destroyed to make space for new cocoa plantations. This happened despite the fact that all the big cocoaproducers and processors and the governments of countries such as Ivory Coast and Ghana had agreed to stop this deforestation.

Health

The usage of dangerous pesticides is not only bad for the people working with them, but also for the environment and the health of consumers. While it is checked that cocoa does not contain too many harmful substances, small amounts of pesticides and chemicals are allowed. Another health problem can be the heavy metals in cocoa, especially cadmium. In 2014 the EU has set a maximum amount of cadmium allowed in cocoa, as too much cadmium can lead to kidney stones, other kidney problems and all sorts of other health problems. Especially in cocoa from South America high amounts of cadmium are regularly found, even in organic cocoa. A research checking the cadmium amounts of different cocoa beans showed that a little less than 40 percent contained too much cadmium.

The cocoa challenge

Unfortunately, there is no chocolate for sale that is guaranteed free from human suffering and environmentally friendly. To make people more aware of this problem, we organise a cocoa challenge in march. The idea is to avoid buying and consuming any products containing cocoa for one month, beginning at the first of March. At the end of the month you can then decide whether you wish to continue boycotting cocoa or not. If you’re interested, you can also join our cocoa challenge event on facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/189994205101852/

Sources:

Arévalo-Gardini, Enrique; Arévalo-Hernández, O.; Baligar, Virupax C. & He, Zhenli (2017). “Heavy Metal Accumulation in Leaves and Beans of Cacao (Theobroma cacao L.) in Major Cacao Growing Regions in Peru”. The Science of the Total Environment, Vol. 605-606, pp. 792-800.

Schroth, Götz; Läderach, Peter; Martinez-Valle, Armando Isaac; Bunn, Christian & Jassogne, Laurence (2016). “Vulnerability to Climate Change of Cocoa in West Africa: Patterns, Opportunities and Limits to Adaptation”. The Science of the Total Environment, Vol. 556, pp. 231-241.

Gramlich, A.; Tandy, S.; Andres, C.; Paniagua, Chincheros; Armengot, L.; Schneider, M. & Schulin, G. (2017). “Cadmium Uptake by Cocoa Trees in Agroforestry and Monoculture Systems Under Conventional and Organic Management”. The Science of the Total Environment, Vol. 580, pp. 677-686.

Hay, Alastair (1991). “A Recent Assessment of Cocao and Pesticides in Brazil: An Unhealthy Blend for Plantation Workers”. The Science of the Total Environment, Vol. 106, pp. 97-109.

Higgs, Catherine (2013). Chocolate Islands: Cocoa, Slavery, and Colonial Africa. Ohio University Press, Athens OH.

Recanati, Francesca; Marveggio, Davide & Dotelli, Giovanni (2018). “From Beans to Bar: A Life Cycle Assessment Towards Sustainable Chocolate Supply Chain”. The Science of the Total Environment, Vol. 613-614, pp. 1013-1023.

https://www.ftm.nl/artikelen/het-geweten-van-de-chocoladeconsument?share=1

http://www.fairlabor.org/blog/entry/fla-highlights-underlying-challenges-child-labor-after-extensive-investigation-nestl%C3%A9

http://www.cocoainitiative.org/

https://www.oneworld.nl/mensenrechten/hoe-fair-fair-trade/

https://tonyschocolonely.com/nl/nl/onze-missie/jaarfairslag/slavernij-en-uitbuiting-bestaat-nog-steeds

https://foodispower.org/chocolate-list/ 

Manure causes different kinds of pollution and other environmental problems. In this blog we discuss these problems and possible alternatives for animal manure as a fertilizer.

Pollution

Greenhouse gases

According to research by the FAO, animal manure is responsible for 37 percent of the anthropogenic methane emissions. In addition, 65 percent of nitrous oxide emissions and 64 percent of ammonia emissions are caused by manure from animal agriculture. These emissions are not only a problem because of the global warming and other climate related problems they are causing. They also cause other environmental problems. For example, the ammonia emissions are an important cause of acid rain and therefore greatly contribute to the acidification of ecosystems. In addition, these gases can also cause health problems for people working in animal agriculture or living near large-scale farms.

Soil pollution 

By using manure as a fertilizer or by dumping manure on empty pieces of land, the soil does not only absorb useful nutrients. The soil also becomes polluted by harmful chemicals and the balance of different nutrients can become severely disrupted.

For example, fertilizing soil with animal manure often leads to a surplus of nitrogen and phosphate. Nitrogen from animal manure is not absorbed by plants very well compared to nitrogen from chemical fertilizer, which means much more nitrogen is left in the soil or ends up in surrounding waterways. Furthermore, in many places severe problems are caused because too much animal manure is used to fertilize a piece of land in an attempt to get rid of surplus manure. Together, this results in millions of tonnes of nitrogen from manure ending up in rivers and nature, disturbing the nutrient balance and seriously damaging ecosystems. High doses of certain nutrients can cause the soil to become less fertile.

In addition, there are also other substances in animal manure that are a threat to the environment and to human health. For example, parasites, viruses and other pathogenic bacteria are common in manure and can become a threat to human health, especially when they end up in waterways. Furthermore, part of medicines and antibiotics are also excreted by animals. About 40 to 90 percent of antibiotics are excreted and end up in manure. By using this manure as fertilizer, antibiotics are not only absorbed by plants (including vegetables we then eat), but antibiotics are also spread throughout nature and the world around us, increasing the chance of antibiotic resistant bacteria. It also pollutes waterways, which is a big problem in countries where drinking water is not filtered and cleaned very well.

Furthermore, heavy metals are often added to animal feed in small quantities to keep them healthier or help them grow faster. A big part of these heavy metals is excreted again and ends up in the environment through animal manure.

Water pollution 

Some types of pollution by manure, such as the emission of greenhouse gases, are unavoidable when you have billions of farm animals. Other types of pollution are mainly caused by manure being dumped in the environment and bad manure management. This is often the case with water pollution. Manure is often dumped in rivers or reaches rivers after being used as fertilizer or dumped on land and moved away by the rain. Because manure contains high concentrations of nitrogen and phosphate, the concentrations of these nutrients are also high in water that has been polluted with manure. This can lead to eutrophication. This means that high concentrations of especially nitrogen cause extreme algae growth, which in turn deteriorates the water quality, making it harder for fish and other animals to live in that environment. This can even result in waterways being almost entirely devoid of animal and most plant life. Other harmful substances, such as the ones mentioned earlier like antibiotics, also end up in water. All of this leads to a decrease in biodiversity, both in the water and in the areas surrounding it.

The deterioration of the quality of water is also worrying for our own fresh water supply. Even in a country with relatively clean water and good purification facilities such as the Netherlands, this is becoming a problem. Of the two hundred areas that are used to extract fresh water from, in 89 of them high concentrations of manure have been discovered in the last few years. These concentrations are much higher than is legally allowed, which is why 21 of them have been closed. The others are still being used but the costs to make this water safe enough are greatly increasing.

Manure policy 

To limit the pollution from manure, the EU has established rules. There are, for example, limits for the concentration of nitrogen that is allowed in soil and water. To continue to adhere to these rules, animal agriculture in for example the Netherlands can’t just expand. As the Netherlands has the highest density of farm animals, strict rules are needed to enforce environmental laws. An example of this is that dairy farmers are no longer allowed to increase the number of dairy cows since 2015. If they want more cows, they have to buy the right to have more cows from another dairy farmer who has decided to have less cows. They also have to pay a certain amount of money for every cow they own towards environmental solutions.

However, not surprisingly considering the huge number of violations in animal agriculture, many farmers do not stick to these government regulations. Farmers pay much less environmental tax for every young dairy cow that has never given birth and is therefore not giving milk yet. Recently, it was revealed that many dairy farmers register newborn calves from these young dairy cows as being calfs from older dairy cows (causing a huge rise in the registered twins and multiple births at dairy farms). Further research showed that many dairy farms used this method to evade paying for the environmental damage they are causing (and even when they do pay, it’s not anywhere near enough to cover all environmental damage caused by the dairy industry or animal agriculture more generally).

In addition, only a small part of all the manure can be used to fertilize fields, as there is just way too much manure. In the Netherlands, part of the manure is being exported. In 2015 1,7 billion euros worth of manure were exported to other EU countries. The majority has to be processed by manure processing companies. This can be done by fermentation or by burning the manure. This way the government tries to prevent too much manure ending up in the environment.

Manure fraud

Unfortunately, the processing of manure doesn’t always happen as it should, which is why manure fraud is a big problem. That shouldn’t be surprising, as correctly processing manure costs farmers, truck drivers and manure processors a lot of money. By just dumping the manure somewhere, they can save huge amounts of money and therefore make more profit. Research has shown that two thirds of people involved in transporting and processing manure in the southeast of the Netherlands is suspected of or has been convicted for manure fraud. In the first half of 2017 16 manure processing companies in the Netherlands were convicted for large scale manure fraud and on top of that, another 1316 fines were given to other companies and employees for manure fraud and false administrations. Therefore, it is not surprising that manure pollution goes beyond the limits set by EU laws.

In the UK, it’s not much better. Research by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism found that manure is regularly dumped in the UK, contributing significantly to soil and water pollution. In addition, not much action is taken against companies and farms that conduct these illegal actions. Even repeat offenders still continued to receive huge amounts of government subsidies.

Plant-based fertilizer and other animal and environmentally friendly options 

People often think that we can’t live without animal manure, or that doing so would mean we would have to use more chemical fertilizer, which is also not very environmentally friendly. However, people often forget that until about a century ago, there were never enough farm animals to solely rely on animal manure for fertilizer. Human manure was often used (and still is in some countries) to fertilize agricultural land. Of course human manure has many of the same problems as animal manure (medicines, antibiotics etc.), but if we want, it would be possible in the future to separate and process human manure to make it suitable as  for use as fertilizer.

In addition, plant-based fertilizers are also a great alternative and have been used for centuries to supplement animal and human manure. Research on plant-based manure has shown that it is possible to create a good fertilizer with the right amounts of different nutrients. This works just as well as animal manure and chemical fertilizer, but causing less pollution. After all, the important nutrients in manure originate from plants, so we might as well get them directly from the plants.

In the Netherlands, there are already some farmers working without animal manure or chemical fertilizer. They do this by rotating crops and using fruit, vegetable and garden waste to make a plant-based fertilizer. Unfortunately, farmers still get an extra subsidy for using animal manure, so it’s much more profitable to use that. Only organic farmers have to pay for their organic manure, so it’s mostly organic farmers who are experimenting with plant-based fertilizer to save costs.

Sources:

FAO (2006), Livestocks’ Long Shadow: Environmental Issues and Options

http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.HTM

May, Sara; Romberger, Debra J & Poole, Jill A. (2012). “Respiratory Health Effects of Large Animal Farming Environments”. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, 15(8), pp. 524-541.

Nygaard Sorensen, J. and Thorup-Kristensen, K. (2011). “Plant-based Fertilizers for Organic Vegetable Production”. Journal of Plant Nutrition and Soil Science, 174, pp. 321–332.

https://www.trouw.nl/home/waterbedrijven-slaan-alarm-mest-bedreigt-drinkwaterwinning~a1446e04/

https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2017-08-21/farming-pollution-fish-uk

https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2017/11/10/het-mestcomplot-a1580703

https://www.volkskrant.nl/binnenland/ministerie-van-economische-zaken-wist-al-1-5-jaar-van-mestfraude-veehouders~a4558668/

RVO, CBS & Foodlog