To Farm Without Harm and Choosing a Humane Diet: The Bioethics of Humane Sustainable Agriculture

Abstract

No other society past or present raises and kills so many animals just for their meat. No other society past or present has adopted such intensive systems of animal production and nonrenewable resource-dependent farming practices. These have evolved to make meat a dietary staple, and to meet the public expectation and demand for a ‘cheap’ and plentiful supply of meat. An agriculture that raises and slaughters billions of animals every year primarily for meat, depends on costly nonrenewable natural resources and precious farmland to raise the feed¹ for these animals to convert into flesh; land that critics now believe should instead be used more economically to feed people directly. To a hungry world, such conspicuous consumption is a poor model to emulate.