BBC Sunday Morning Live Vegan Debate September 2018

now on to our first debate it was revealed this week that global office sharing company we work are going meat-free they're banning workers from claiming expenses for meals containing meat and no longer serving it at company events when you research published in the Journal of science ones that worldwide meat-eating is set to rise steeply over the coming years it says that it could lead to more illness and potentially devastating environmental issues so should we all be cutting down our question today is it wrong to eat meat we're joining us to give us their views from the Soil Association Liz Bowles author and journalist nami first a co-founder of V January Mathew Glover and still with this broadcaster and journalist Nina fer head yet well Naomi if a business wants their employees to be more healthy more environmentally friendly doing this sort of thing handling meat that's a good thing isn't it I don't think that's the role of a business to make that kind of choice for their employees you know I respect everyone's individual right I'm personally not a vegan I eat meat but and if I understand the reasons why someone might want to eliminate animal products from their diet and I respect that but I think it's very much a case of live and let live if someone doesn't want to eat meat but don't eat meat and if and if someone does they do but expenses they're eating having food on work time they're claiming expenses from the company the company said we don't want to be a part of that that's fair enough isn't it if they're allowed to read claim expenses for eating vegan food then you're basically forcing your ideology onto your employees which isn't the place of a business nanofied veganism which of course is when people don't eat any meats or any animal products and meat yeah yeah it does seem to be growing in popularity would you say that's a fad I mean we've had loads of these things everyone yeah we have yeah you've had the Paleo diet and you've had the grass only dough I mean I've there's a plethora of those kind of things but I love what Naomi said live and let live so to have a diet in which you cause no violence in which you don't allow any any any living entity to be hurt or harmed is the best thing to do and it should genuinely be the baseline for any discussion we have eating meat or cultivating me or growing me is a privilege it is not a right that we all have and if even talked about 10-15 years ago we did not have as much meat in our diets as we do now so to say that this is like a right and 2:10 we works and I commend them for what they've done to take it away it's a bad thing it's not it's not white Liz I mean you put it like that it's quite interesting isn't it we are taking a life just so that we can have steak on our table I mean put it like that you sort of think life for that isn't worth it taking it back a bit really I mean look at it in the round agriculture farmers livestock we've all evolved together and certainly our degree with Nilla food that we do need to eat less meat and certainly at the Soil Association we talk about less meat but better and by better I mean meat that's been produced with under high animal welfare systems and a thing which people don't know so much about has been produced with a minimum amount of cereals and grains in the diet because in terms of climate change that's a really significant issue and going forward we're going to be talking an awful lot more about that than even whether we eat meat or not it's about how our food is produced I'm not sure that the sheep that you that you raise would would care whether they have been raised ethically or not ethically they're still going to be killed I don't know if they have an opinion on whether it's done in there in a humane which I have a massive issue with in the first place where you're not I think for them if they're being raised not to the end of their life I mean a sheep can live for 1416 years and we killed them much earlier than that I don't think that's justifiable to the animals okay I mean I to answer that specifically I would say that I have been a sheep farmer now for 20 years and I come from a farming family so I guess you could say we've got a bit of a vested interest but having said that animals aren't humans and by treating them ethically what I mean is looking after their behavioral and welfare needs during their life whether that be 14 years or whether it be eight months they're sentient they feel pain okay let's bring matthew started v v january didn't you almost couldn't say it began yuri yes yes so i mean that's basically where you're encouraging people for the bunch of month of january to not eat any meat products to not have anything to do with animal products yeah that's just a trend isn't it no this is something that it's a social justice issue we need to move to being more civilized I think if you were to look in a hundred years time people will look back at this and and think that they won't be able to believe how inhumane it is and I think she'll civilize to eat meat yeah absolutely in the same way if you think 250 years ago if you would have asked people in the streets whether it was ok to have a slave trade ninety five percent of people would have agreed and said that that was acceptable they would have bought so we're quite we're equating the slave trade to eating meat this is something we will look back on and say how on earth did we this is a modern-day slave trade I mean these animals are forced into bath animals oh yeah they're animals we are animals well this species is a slave I mean that's a big jump isn't it at the slave trade compare the slaughter of animals for food to the slave trade I think is an extreme and quite outrageous thing to say and again I think sanella first said she sort of agreed with living at live but then he sort of went on to contradict yourself when I say live and let live I mean I respect a vegan or vegetarians choices in that they choose not to eat not the animal products and I can understand their reasons why I personally don't have a moral issue with eating meat and I think those choices should also be respected and when you have a company like wework who's effectively enforcing their ideology on people and if people you know and and vegan saying that it's equivalent to slave trade that's where you're getting into this realm if you're trying to shame other people for their choices I wouldn't change even for their choices thank you just a couple of things so firstly when some when someone else is being killed for your dietary options that's not a choice you can't have violence or death be part of a choice that you make so that's a moot point it's not a void the second thing is I made a difference with me the other main thing is is that I made an eight part series called food exposed and all I did was for a year was trace all different elements GMOs water industry the dairy industry of how food is created and how we in the first world eat it and when we understand the industrial food complex of what you're speaking about in terms of how it oppresses people how it keeps the developing world poor how it causes cancers and illnesses for thousands of farmers who don't live in Britain who live in Guatemala Argentina then we know that this isn't just we can't see this with the prism of the first world which is where we will get into many of those issues in just a moment gonna press pause in the studio for a moment let's go to cherry and some guests outside on the Piazza on my right first meat and on my left is vegan but first Craig who's got a burger van so Craig sorry hello very busy I know making burgers do you think that your customers are going to dwindle because vegan is so popular at the moment no not at all don't worry not oh not so I think people love meat and they're always but I love meat what's so good about meat it's just tastes amazing other things nothing else on the planet can replace the flavor of a good cheeseburger for example would you ever do a vegan burger we're looking into it yes we are looking it what are you gonna use I've want to say lots of cheese bacon cheeseburger all day do you miss it too much I would miss it too much I mean I don't meet me all the time that I would I need to need to have it people who say it is cruel you shouldn't eat meat I think if you're using obviously the right farming techniques that's ethically sourced it's okay I mean that's a mess that's of how we roll all right so I might come and try that later but I'm worried about getting food in my teeth so I'll come back um oh I also have Biff with me right and his girlfriend Krista you make a jackfruit okay what is a jak3 it's a big knobby thing about yay big groaning the tropics if you guys from Southeast Asia but if it's a fruit surely it's sweet right we use a young jackfruit so it hasn't sweetened yet so you can cook flavor into it so it's savory yes thanks and why did you become a vegan I think environmental reasons at first but then when you learn more and more you start exploring animal welfare health reasons lots more yes krysta was it difficult how long do you be in a vegan Julius okay and I know you've been a vegan for a really long time yeah was it difficult watching this eat meat at first yeah but we kind of I realized the best way to kind of try and convert him which I'm obviously professionally managed to do was just start engaging with him about you know my reasons for being vegan and just showing him how great the food can be and bitterly creative chef so we are a dream team so you catch more flies with vegan honey okay hi this bad yes so you can see inside the jacket it's a fantastic okay I'm just going to do a very quick taste very good thank you well I feel like I've lucked out here they both look really good back to you in studio she certainly has lucked out with Craig and Biff there look we can't agree about personal choice here on our panel but let's talk about the environment because according to a new report meat and dairy companies are on track to be the world's biggest contributors to climate change that is really shocking when you read that above the fossil fuel industry I said worry isn't illness right I think it's a really interesting report I read it last week and it does concern me it was talking about the 35 largest businesses and I would imagine they're probably responsible for a significant proportion of all the meat and dairy that we do eat in the world and I just go back to what I said before we will have to eat less meat and dairy but better going forward not know me because I would say a bit like no me living lately if people want to eat meat then why why should they be forbidden from doing so but also I'd like to bring this in because this is something the Soil Association we've been working on for a long time and it's this link of grazing livestock with soil health and also with soil organic matter if we weren't to have livestock at all especially grazing livestock what we would have to do is rely far more on inorganic sources of fertilizers in order to grow the crops that we would be eating instead that would have an impact actually on a global emissions and environment as well but whereas livestock if they're grazed actually their overall footprint is pretty neutral I mean why have more people going vegans veggie than we've had before um well I think like I said I think that there are there are valid there are valid arguments for going vegan or vegetarian and I think it it's fairly easy to understand why someone would want to but it really comes down to sort of a personal choice and a personal kind of moral choice I personally have never had a moral dilemma over eating me I think there are certainly arguments to be made about looking at farming and making sure as Liz was saying with how we can make the process better for the animals how we can make farming more sustainable like with environmental issues but also just to talk about the environmental impact you know it vegan veganism also has an environmental impact growing crops like growing replacement meats like like lens remote camera my chickpeas also has an environmental impact there there isn't so there was a study that came out two or three weeks ago it's the biggest study of farming and the environmental impact by the University of Oxford it's the most credible research that's come out it looked at 40,000 farms and what it found was that 83% of all farmland is used for animal agriculture but it's only producing 18 percent of the calories if everybody was to adopt a plant-based diet we would only need in the region of a quarter of the amount of land were currently using for farming so considering we've got species extinction we've got a loss of biodiversity this is something that urgently needs address I get ok let's find out what people are saying Thank You Sean Angie says there is real evidence of a plant-based diet being not only healthier for the individual but to the planet animals are sentient beings and should not be murdered for food or sport and John says it's a personal choice that should be respected just as it's a personal choice to be vegan or vegetarian which should be equally respected and Jonathan says I think that the mass production and killing of animals is wrong however people have the right to ultimately choose whether or not they eat meat and finally sue says if we all went vegetarian then we would all starve they would just not be enough areas to grow crops to feed us all some quite controversial points controversial really interesting points one point I just wanna ask you now me what do you think do you feel there's a lot of pressure from vegans and vegetarians for other people you've mentioned you've mentioned it yeah before but is there as sort of a vegan Lobby that's shaming people we heard Matthew say he equated it to slavery which I was quite a shocking comment I've got to say it's way out there and a lot of people will find it really difficult to take yeah but you are shaming people that's the issue I have is as I said I respect someone's personal choices what I don't like is this various or political activism side of vegan where where there's sort of an attempt to convert other people and I just can I just come back on one one thing I just want to talk about this would be better for the environment to have a plant-based diet perhaps it would I don't think it would be but perhaps let's consider it might be right that is still not a reason to give up eating meat it we forget that eating for pleasure and for enjoyment is so essentially human it's so much part of what makes us human and that isn't a good enough reason that it's important to enjoy your food isn't it's important to enjoy what you eat to take pleasure from it's a communal yeah the complaints that people feel pressure on okay so I don't think Matthew and I is saying everyone must stop eating what we're saying is we must stop eating people persons that is to say cows sheeps goes people like Matthew and I am I beg your pardon for people like Matthew and I a person is someone who is aware and sentient of itself that includes pigs who often have and this has been proven intelligence far higher than we assume sometimes as intelligent is three or four year old human children because to say that's ancient to say that they're not aware yes but that's all they can because they don't have a lovely vegan there's a vegan Lobby decided there's a vegan Lobby do you know what is a multi-billion dollar Lobby the cheese Lobby has a multi-billion dollar Lobby the dairy industry the beef industry the pork industry these are multiple names are between as well is yeah I mean I I think you're kind of the anthropomorphism is a problem for everybody other than vegans of the vegan lobbies right so making making animals people and then because you've grown up with an ideology that this is acceptable I'm not sure that's true I've worked at the Soil Association for five and actually you know our view is very much about less meat but better respect the animals welfare needs and treat it ethically and actually you know we would agree with you that we should be eating a lot less meat but not completely taking me to house we are out of time I think what we should all do is go out for lunch and I want to tell you what's on the menu thank you all very much today all right thank you

Channel: Nelufar Hedayat

Views: 157,387

Keywords: vegan, plant based, activism, vegan debate, plant based news, animal rights, wool, dairy is scary, day time show, british talk show, tv, factual

Id: R_OYRSQKwfs

Length: 15min 54sec (954 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 29 2018