How Our Daily Food Choices Affect The Environment

An Interview with Factory Farming Awareness Coalition (FFAC) executive director Katie Cantrell.

I like to start with dessert first, don't you? When you learn about how sweet something is, you can then, find out its depth of character in the savory dishes. Last week we were pleased to serve a four-course dinner to raise funds for FFAC.I'd like to thank Stephanie Frankle for the beautiful food photography and executive director Katie Cantrell to take the time to talk to me about FFAC and how our daily choices affect the welfare of animals as well as our environment.

1.  When you receive donations what does the money directly support?

The money directly supports our grassroots education program; it pays for travel costs to get to schools and community groups, and printing costs for our educational literature.

2.  What inspired you to do this line of work?

I've always loved animals (I grew up with two dogs), and when I started college I joined an animal advocacy student group. There I learned that factory farming is by far the largest source of animal suffering, with over 9 billion animals killed every year in the U.S. Once I learned that, it made sense for me to focus on factory farming.

After graduating from college, I read "Eating Animals" by Jonathan Safran Foer and was really struck by the effectiveness of taking a holistic approach - addressing not just the impacts on animals, but also on the environment, on local communities, and on public health. I wanted to get that information out there, so I began doing that in the most direct way I could think of - giving presentations to groups of people. And that's how the Factory Farming Awareness Coalition was born.

3.  What is the mission of FFAC?

Our mission is to empower people to help animals, the environment, and our own health through our daily food choices.

We achieve our mission through grassroots education, primarily by giving presentations to schools, community groups, churches/temples, businesses, and non-profits. We're trying to get the truth about where our food comes from out to consumers so that they can make informed choices.

4. How could people help your mission?

One of the best ways for people to help is to refer us to any groups they're a part of that might host the presentation. We have different versions of our presentation, focusing more on the enviornment, or social justice, or health, so we can make it relevant to a wide variety of people. Referrals are the number one way that we reach new audiences. If people know of potential presentation venues, they can e-mailpresentations@ffacoalition.org

We also have lots of volunteer opportunities, and a great local community featuring fun events like vegan potlucks and trips to animal sanctuaries. If people are interested in volunteering, they can e-mail outreach@ffacoalition.org.

Finally, we make our presentation available to anyone, anywhere who wants to use it to educate their communities. We also provide a professional public speaker training so people can learn to communicate more effectively about this critical issue. People interested in receiving a copy of the presentation or attending our speaker training can e-mail presentations@ffacoalition.org.

5. Can you give us a couple stories/anecdotes of your most powerful experiences through FFAC?

Often people will ask us, "Aren't you preaching to the choir in the Bay Area?" But recently I spoke to a class on Critical Animal Studies at UC Berkeley - certainly, if any class knows about factory farming it would be this one - and most of the students were shocked. In particular, there was one student who was really angry that he hadn't learned the truth until now. One of the most frequent comments we get is, "You opened my eyes."

It's so powerful to see how much people care when they finally learn the truth. There's a prevailing cynical attitude that people would rather be kept blissfully ignorant, but I see over and over again that that's not true. When given the opportunity to engage with the truth, people are really grateful for the opportunity to learn about ways that they can change the system (most directly through changing their diets).

6.  Can you surprise us with a couple facts?

I already mentioned this, but I think it bears repeating because it's so shocking - over 9 billion animals are killed for food every year in the U.S., and 99 percent of them come from factory farms. When I give the presentation I ask people to guess how many animals are killed for food, and people usually guess around 200 million; they're absolutely floored when I say 9 billion. I think that's a big part of the issue, people simply have no idea about the scale or scope of factory farming in the U.S.

Another surprising one, which we're advertising on the San Francisco subway system right now, is that you can save the same amount of water by skipping one gallon of milk or 27 showers. There's a lot of attention being given to ways to save water or decrease our carbon footprint, but curiously most of those resources leave out the fact that moving towards a vegan diet is the single most effective way to do both.

7.  The mission of sanctuary bistro is to help generate compassion and community.  We want this to ripple out into the world.  How does FFAC bring community and compassion to the forefront?

We have a wonderful community of compassionate volunteers and supporters who come together to educate others and also to support each other. This work can be hard and alienating, so we really strive to help create a sense of community for fellow activists.We also empower people to bring compassion into their own communities by making our presentation available to anyone across the country. Often it can be hard to talk to people about this issue because it's so sensitive. So we provide a comfortable framework in which to convey the facts in a non-judgmental way, which can really bring people together.

8. Any upcoming events we should know about?

Yes, we've got lots of exciting events coming up! Our next speaker training is on September 13th. On September 28th there's a Vegan Sammich Throwdown and $3 from each ticket sale will benefit FFAC. In November, we're co-hosting a San Francisco screening of the fantastic documentary Cowspiracy, and also hosting the second annual Vegan Mac Down mac & cheese bake-off!

9.  Final words?

People can learn more about our work, find resources for eating veg, and sign up for our mailing list at www.ffacoalition.org, and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram @ffacoalition.

From our family to yours,Chef Barry, Jennifer, Jayden and AdelineKeep an eye out for our future non-profit dinners here.You can also Follow us daily on Facebook.