The Case For Multi-Species Environmentalism

The first week of the Sustainability Science I and II courses at Stockholm University asked a question of critical importance: who is sustainability for? It is a great question asked in many environmental educations, but I am consistently disappointed with the answers from academics and activists alike.

The question and subsequent answer were built upon the correct belief that the Earth’s ecosystem services and resources are limited. It also correctly assumes that many individuals far exceed their rightful share of these services and resources, whilst others severely lack the resources to meet their basic needs. Additionally, those who lack a decent living standard are often those most impacted by individuals who over-consume. Consequently, the courses generally promoted a high level of redistribution, limiting the use of resources and redefining what it means to live a fulfilling life.

These are welcomed conclusions needed to create a just and sustainable human society. The assumption that sustainability is for all people based on an ethical foundation rather than free markets alone is paraded as the ultimate good within environmental circles. Whilst this argument helps to overcome arbitrary disparities in consumption and access to resources across demographic and socio-economic lines, it is a crucial flaw to believe that sustainability is a solely human affair.

Just as principles of sustainability should guide organisational practices, principles of ethics should guide sustainability. Environmental, ethical consideration has already been extended to individuals without regard for geography, sex, race and age and should now be extended to all sentient beings regardless of species. The ability to feel pain and pleasure is, after all, the single characteristic which determines whether a being is worthy of moral consideration.

Granting equal moral consideration may leave some questioning whether non-human animals deserve the same rights and access to resources as humans. It should be stressed that equal moral consideration based on sentience does not lead to equality of outcome; in fact, the opposite is often true. Equal moral consideration assesses the needs of an individual and distributes resources based on utility maximisation whilst also accepting a minimum acceptable living standard for a dignified life. Although humans and non-human animals alike share basic needs, humans have additional socio-political and physical resource requirements to live a decent life.

Applying equal moral consideration in an ideal manner suggests that all sentient beings should be free from harm and have their physical and social needs met. Even though suffering in nature is complex and warrants future discussion, the implications for animals used in food systems are clear: a truly sustainable food system must aim to maximise freedom from harm as far as is practicable and thus must be free from the consumption of animal products. It also happens that these beings are those who humans can most directly impact.

More sustainable, intensified animal agriculture practices (such as factory farming and aquaculture) are clearly opposed to an ethical future. Likewise, all existing animal agriculture should be phased out. This is not only in line with the definition of sustainability for all sentient beings but also allows for the reallocation of limited physical resources. This is because animal agriculture is significantly more land, water and energy-intensive, resulting in considerably greater greenhouse gas emissions than crop agriculture. Some of the excess resources can then be used to meet other social needs, such as electricity generation, transportation and access to education, without exceeding the ecological ceiling.

Even so, environmental scientists and activists promote the ‘sustainabilisation’ of animal agriculture as an end goal within future food systems far too often. Even with the most idealistic outcomes, animal agriculture cannot be as sustainable as plant farming and would require further decreased ethical standards within an already immoral industry. Whilst there may be specific circumstances where animal consumption is needed to meet human physical needs in the short term, the long-term goal must be to equitably redistribute plant-based foods so that all humans have access without needing to cause unnecessary harm to non-human animals.

Until the environmental movement widely accepts that animal exploitation is opposed to sustainability and even to a self-interested view of sustainability, a truly just food system transformation will not occur.