A research collaboration between Faunalytics and Sentient Media finds that very little media coverage of climate change focuses on animal agriculture, a major cause of the phenomenon.

Key Findings

1. Only 7% of climate articles mentioned animal agriculture and they rarely discussed its impact on climate change. Across the 1,000 articles we examined, only a handful of stories reported in depth on the connection between consuming animal products and climate change. Most articles that mentioned animal agriculture failed to discuss the emissions and environmental degradation caused by the industry, let alone the importance of reducing meat consumption or switching to a plant-based diet to fight climate change. When diets were discussed, the effectiveness of plant-based diets was sometimes downplayed or, more often than not, presented almost as an afterthought rather than a legitimate strategy to mitigate climate change.
2. The animal agriculture industry is often portrayed as a victim of climate change rather than a significant cause. Our qualitative analysis revealed that instead of citing animal agriculture’s negative environmental impact, climate articles that discussed the industry in any depth generally focused on how climate change is impacting animal agriculture. Multiple articles discussed how flooding, drought, and heatwaves have caused livestock losses both in the U.S. and abroad, and how this affects the livelihoods of farmers, while failing to mention the role that the animal agriculture industry plays in the climate crisis.
3. There are countless missed opportunities to discuss animal agriculture in the context of climate change. Energy, transportation, emissions, and fossil fuels were given the spotlight in climate coverage: These topics were mentioned in up to 68% of climate articles but were rarely tied to animal agriculture, despite the connections and parallels between them. For instance, transportation is responsible for roughly the same amount of emissions as the animal agriculture industry and is part of that industry, yet just 8% of climate articles mentioning transportation also referenced animal agriculture.
4. Impactful subsectors of animal agriculture are also not given enough attention by the media. Cattle farming is responsible for about 62% of animal agriculture emissions (FAO, 2022), yet cows were mentioned in just 30% of animal agriculture articles. Similarly, methane came up in 22% of animal agriculture articles despite accounting for 54% of the sector’s emissions.

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