Global Forest Coalition Collaboration

Brighter Green and the Global Forest Coalition (GFC) are partnering on an initiative to raise awareness of the negative impacts of rapidly expanding industrial livestock farming, large-scale cattle ranching, and production of livestock feed on the world’s forests and biodiversity. Industrial animal agriculture cuts across multiple sectors, affecting land use, water, food security, public health, animal welfare, and climate change. Too often these intersections are overlooked. Through the project, Brighter Green and GFC have produced a range of original research and documentation for use by NGOs, researchers, campaigners, policy-makers, and members of the media. We have also collaborated to raise awareness of this linked set of issues at global conferences and national and local meetings, and are partners in an emerging global alliance on unsustainable livestock and feed production. The Global Forest Coalition is an international coalition of NGOs and Indigenous Peoples’ Organizations defending social justice and the rights of forest peoples in forest policies.

As an introduction to these issues, Brighter Green and GFC produced a primer about the negative social, environmental, and animal welfare impacts of the expansion of intensive livestock farming. The primer (which is also available in Spanish and Russian) aims to raise awareness of policy-makers, social movements, and the public in general. Below you will find a collection of articles, briefings, and publications that have been released through this collaboration from 2013 to the present, as well as information about further initiatives

Incentivising Deforestation

In November 2018, Brighter Green associate Caroline Wimberly co-authored a briefing with Isis Alvarez of GFC, “Incentivising deforestation for livestock products: How support for the livestock sector in the EU and Mercosur countries is subsidising forest destruction.” The paper shines a light on perverse subsidies and support for the livestock sector in key producer countries, and how forests and other biodiverse ecosystems are being harmed because of them.