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Still Butchering the Planet (Feedback)

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

KEY FINDINGS:

SUMMARY OF FINDINGS:

This report maps the global financial flows to the world's largest 55 industrial livestock companies – spanning the beef, dairy, pork, poultry, and animal feed sectors – as an update to Feedback's 2020 report, Butchering the Planet. These 55 companies, which represent approximately a fifth of global livestock slaughter, are some of the food system's largest drivers of climate change, deforestation, human rights and labour violations, pandemic risks, and animal welfare abuses. Our findings, based on data from financial databases, are alarming.

Globally since the Paris agreement was signed, over half a trillion dollars in credit were provided to the world's largest 55 big livestock companies – $615.0 billion between 2015-22. This included many types of finance, with major financial institutions lending $89.0 billion in corporate loans, underwriting $247.7 billion in bond issuances and $23.9 billion in share issuances, and providing approximately $254.4 billion in revolving credit facilities. As of March 2023, a total of $287.8 billion in shareholdings and $35.5 billion in bondholdings were invested in the world's largest 55 big livestock companies.

Credit is designed to help companies expand – and has helped drive a huge and unsustainable increase in global meat and dairy production. Between 2015-21, total global meat production increased by 9% from 325.31 to 354.82 million tonnes – an increase of 29.51 million tonnes³ – and global milk production increased by 13% from 814.51 million tonnes to 918.16 million tonnes – an increase of 103.65 million tonnes⁴. This follows a long-term trend – roughly five times more meat was produced globally in 2021 compared to 1961⁵, and nearly three times more milk⁶ – and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) projects that demand for animal-based foods will increase by a further 20% by 2050 compared to 2020 on a Business-As-Usual trajectory⁷.

This finance-fuelled growth in the livestock industry is driving a global crisis. An average $76.9 billion per year was poured into the world's 55 largest big livestock companies between 2015-22 – whilst the global livestock sector as a whole causes an estimated $8.5 trillion annually in externalised health and climate costs⁸.

Despite the urgent need to reduce global livestock numbers, finance for big livestock companies is on the rise. In the four years between 2019-22, there was an overall 15% increase in credit to the 55 big livestock companies compared to 2015-18 – with an 87% increase in underwriting bond issuances, an 11% increase in corporate loans, and a 225% increase in share issuances. Only revolving credit facilities declined, with a 33% decrease in 2019-22 compared to 2015-18.

The damaging effects of climate change will be disproportionately experienced by the Global South. Yet the climate assistance that the Global South is receiving from rich countries pales in comparison with the average $76.9 billion per year we have calculated is being poured into industrial livestock companies: Oxfam has estimated that climate-specific net assistance (CSNA) to the Global South was just $21-24.5 billion in 2020⁹ᵃ.

This report sets out to name and shame the worst offenders. Overall, the biggest creditors to the top 55 big livestock companies were Bank of America ($28.8 billion), followed shortly by Barclays ($28.2 billion) and JPMorgan Chase ($26.7 billion). For specific types of credit, the biggest global underwriter of bond issuances to the 55 big livestock companies was HSBC ($11.6 billion), the biggest provider of corporate loans was Rabobank ($5.7 billion), the biggest provider of revolving credit facilities was Bank of America ($15.7 billion), and the biggest underwriter of share issuances was China Merchants Bank ($4.4 billion). The biggest investors in the top 55 big livestock companies were BlackRock ($37.8 billion), Vanguard ($24.4 billion) and Capital Group ($21.4 billion).

We also reveal the largest financiers of some of the largest and most destructive industrial livestock companies. For instance, Barclays is the largest global creditor to JBS, Morgan Stanley is the largest global creditor to Tyson Foods, and BNP Paribas is the largest global creditor to Cargill.

HALL OF SHAME: THE WORLD'S BIGGEST FINANCIERS OF 55 BIG LIVESTOCK COMPANIES 2015-22

Biggest creditors

  1. Bank of America: $28.8 billion
  2. Barclays: $28.2 billion
  3. JPMorgan Chase: $26.7 billion

Biggest investors

  1. BlackRock: $37.8 billion
  2. Vanguard: $24.4 billion
  3. Capital Group: $21.4 billion

ᵃ Whilst Global North countries claim they are close to meeting the $100 billion per year target for climate finance to the Global South, Oxfam find many accounting tricks through which these numbers are inflated, such as counting loans with no concessionary terms which cannot be considered "assistance" in any meaningful sense.

PER DAY, THE LARGEST MEAT AND DAIRY COMPANIES IN EACH SECTOR HAVE CAPACITY TO SLAUGHTER APPROXIMATELY:

Feedback estimate that this is approximately one fifth of the cattle, pigs and chickens slaughtered globally per year.

BIG LIVESTOCK'S BIG CLIMATE IMPACT

Urgently restricting and reversing the growth of the livestock sector is not an optional bolt-on to our efforts to transition away from fossil fuels – it is essential for us to stay within safe levels of climate change. Prof Hans Pörtner, scientist and co-chair of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has said: “Without reducing and cutting down on meat consumption and the associated high-intensity agriculture systems, we will not be able to keep global warming to 1.5 degrees”, in line with the Paris commitment¹².

Livestock contribute to climate change through enteric fermentation (burps and farts from ruminant livestock), land use change (like deforestation), feed production, manure, and processing and transport. The global livestock sector is already responsible for about 16.5% of the total anthropogenic (human-caused) emissions globally¹³, and if current trends continue, it will be using up almost half the world's 1.5°C emissions budget by 2030¹⁴ – that is, the amount of emissions we can safely emit to stay within 1.5°C of climate change. This is projected to rise even further to 81% by 2050¹⁵.

The need to control livestock-related emissions has become even more urgent, because the world recently breached the 1.5°C degrees warming limit for an entire year for the first time¹⁶. Global livestock emissions need to peak by 2025 and be reduced by 50% by 2030 and 61% by 2035, with faster and deeper reductions in higher-income countries, in order to limit global warming in line with the Paris agreement – this is the finding of a survey of over two hundred climate scientists and food and agriculture experts, over half of whom have authored IPCC reports¹⁷. 78% of the experts surveyed said that absolute global livestock numbers also need to peak by 2025 – with 85% agreeing that dietary shifts to less livestock-derived foods were required, particularly in high and middle-income countries¹⁸. The experts viewed reducing human consumption of livestock products and reducing the number of livestock animals as having the biggest potential to reducing livestock emissions¹⁹.

Consistent with this, the IPCC found, with high confidence, that a shift to more plant-based diets could mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by between 0.7 – 8 GtCO₂eq per year, with higher reductions in meat and dairy leading to greater emission reductions²⁰. For instance, the IPCC estimate that global adoption of a flexitarian diet (75% of meat and dairy replaced by cereals and pulses, with only one portion of red meat a week) would reduce global emissions by approximately 5 GtCO₂eq per year²¹. This is equivalent to a 54% reduction in the 9.3 Gt CO₂eq of 2018 global agricultural emissions²².

In addition to these direct emissions savings, reduction in livestock numbers would result in significant potential for carbon sequestration from nature restoration, and increased biodiversity. Meat, aquaculture, eggs, and dairy production already uses 83% of the world's farmland²³, mainly driven by the unsustainable overconsumption of meat in high-income countries and the growing demand for meat in upper-middle income countries. If every country in the world adopted the UK's high-meat diet, global land use by agriculture would have to nearly double²⁴, causing catastrophic habitat destruction. Conversely, reduction in meat consumption could result in significant nature restoration – a recent study found that the potential carbon sequestration through ecosystem restoration on land spared from alignment of global diets with the Eat-Lancet diet by 2050 could lead to sequestration of 210-459GtCO₂ equivalent to the nine years of global fossil fuel emissions between 2012-20²⁵.

Total credit provided by global financial institutions to 55 largest industrial livestock and animal feed companies 2015-22 (billions US dollars)

Total investments by global financial institutions in 55 largest industrial livestock and animal feed companies as of filing date March 2023 (billions US dollars)