Monday, September 20, 2021

Kranjc goes international

Anita Kranjc, the animal activist who drew attention when she faced criminal charges for delivering water to pigs being trucked into a hog-slaughtering plant at Burlington, has launched an international campaign against animal agriculture.

Kranjc, who lives in Toronto, is asking nations to negotiate a Plant Based Treaty which aims to replace meats with plant-based foods.


The idea for a treaty is modelled on the proposed fossil fuel non-proliferation treaty, which aims to end all new exploration and production of coal, oil and gas as part of a transition to clean, renewable energy, said Danny Harvey, a professor in the Department of Geography at the University of Toronto.


He was lead author of the fourth and fifth assessment reports for the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The sixth assessment report, which was released Aug. 9, said the world is close to runaway global warming, boosting the severity of things such as extreme heat waves and drought.


Krankc is the executive director of the Animal Save Movement and helped found Toronto Pig Save. Krajnc was acquitted in 2017 after being charged with criminal mischief in 2015 for offering water to pigs in a livestock truck waiting to enter the Fearman’s plant.


Events promoting the Plant Based Treaty were planned for Aug. 31 at nearly 100 city or town halls around the world ranging from India and Great Britain to at least nine locations in Canada, including Ottawa, Toronto and Edmonton, said a statement from the campaign.


Harvey estimated animal-based agriculture may emit as much as 20 to 25 percent of total world greenhouse gases, depending on how it’s calculated using factors such as methane, making it what he described as the largest single source.


The impact of consumer consumption of meat and dairy in Canada is likely somewhere between six percent and the world average when trade linkages are taken into account, he said.