Banks Urged To Stop Funding Animal Farms In New Open Letter

More than 100 civil society organizations from around the world have signed an open letter calling on US banks to stop funding animal agriculture.

The letter was delivered to Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Citibank, and others. Major US banks are funding meat and dairy businesses like Tyson Foods, Cargill, JBS, and Nestlé, despite the effect these companies have on animals, public health, and the planet.

Signatories from 105 organizations are urging these banks to stop this funding. Groups that have signed the letter include Plant-Based Health Professionals, Pro Veg, Greenpeace, Animals Asia, and more. The letter stresses the critical role that animal farms are playing in accelerating the climate crisis.

“Industrial livestock production is one of the most destructive activities for our planet,” said Monique Mikhail, agriculture & climate finance campaigns director at Friends of the Earth U.S, one of the signatories. “By continuing to finance meat, dairy, and feed corporations, banks are complicit in driving climate change and environmental degradation, undermining their own climate commitments. Halting all new financing that enables the expansion of industrial livestock production is one of the most climate-positive actions banks can take.

Banks are accelerating the climate crisis

Cows in a large green field — Adobe Stock Animal agriculture is a major driver of the climate crisis

A number of investigations have found that banks are pouring billions of dollars into the environmentally destructive meat industry.

According to a Feedback report published in March of this year, banks are giving more money than ever to animal farms. Martin Bowman, senior policy and campaigns manager at Feedback, said at the time that banks were “fuelling the expansion” of polluting meat and dairy companies. This means that banks are actively worsening the climate crisis by helping the meat industry get bigger.

Animal agriculture is responsible for at least 16.5 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. One of the biggest concerns is methane, a powerful greenhouse gas emission that’s 80 times more warming than carbon in its first 20 years in the atmosphere. Methane is emitted through the belches of ruminant animals, mostly cows. Studies have shown that animal agriculture is responsible for a third of human-caused methane emissions. Farming animals is also a leading driver of land and water use, biodiversity loss, species extinction, and water pollution.

“Banks simply cannot achieve their climate commitments without a significant reduction in their financing to meat, dairy, and feed corporations,” the open letter reads. “Halting bank financing of industrial livestock production would immediately and significantly improve banks’ emissions equation, demonstrate a commitment to addressing climate and nature-related impacts, and deliver benefits to the planet, people, and the banks. We urge banks to take immediate action.”