Reuben Chesters,
Locavore Glasgow“Dear All,
Thanks fort taking the time to petition against the slaughter of our pigs.
Many of you have responded from around the world and I imagine you have varying degrees of knowledge about me, Locavore and our project with the pigs. Below I copied to you the email I sent out as a statement I sent out on Saturday morning. Hopefully this will give you some context on our slaughter of the pigs and allow you to see our position in a more sympathetic light.
Many thanks,
Reuben
........
Dear All,
This morning we led the pigs out of their home at The Croft and into a trailer to begin their journey to the abattoir, the butchers and then back to our shop and customers kitchens.
It's been emotional for those of us involved, we've reared and cared for these animals, feeding them daily, discovering their personalities and giving them a scratch behind the ear. I imagine everyone who has spent time around them including our staff, volunteers, urban crofters and everyone else in the local community who has visited them will be sad that they are gone.
Although I'm sad about seeing them go and it wasn't easy I feel that this was the right thing to do. I feel we have treated these animals very well while they have been with us, we've fed them good food, given them a very nice place to live, and reared them in a way which is good for them and the environment.
As controversial and provoking as this project has been we feel it is exactly the sort of thing we should be doing as a social enterprise which is working to help build a more just and sustainable local food system.
For those of you less familiar with Locavore let me give you some background to put this project in context. As a social enterprise and not-for-private-profit Community Interest Company we exist to take forward projects and initiatives which help build local food networks which are better for the environment, the local economy and local communities – all our profits must go back into this mission. In the grandest sense it's about pulling back the globalised food system from multinational companies who are driven by share values, not real values. We think that food should be a vehicle for delivering social good, not an opportunity to extract wealth from the many to the few.
Over the past two or three years we have been around we've made small but locally significant steps towards building a better food system at a local level.
We opened a tiny shop and expanded to a still small but much bigger shop within a year.
We started a veg bag deliver scheme which now provides good value organic Scottish produce to 150 households a week in Glasgow and surrounds.
We've delivered cookery and gardening workshops to many groups across the city.
We built enough demand through our shop and veg bags to take on a 2.5 acre market garden in Neilston which is producing very local vegetables in line with organic methods.
We have started work on an Urban Croft which already has provided self-employment opportunities for 5 local people as well as hosting our pigs and goats.
Through all this we support full and part time employment for 8 people as well as many volunteering, training and self-employment opportunities.
We've done this with very little funding.
So why pigs in the park?
As a social enterprise all about making sustainable local food work we need to address meat. Meat production at its current scale using commercial methods has a massive impact on the global environment, not to mention health and animal welfare issues. Depending on what numbers you quote, meat is responsible for 14-22% of all man made green house gas emissions, this in the context of foods total of around 30%. For us not to tackle meat would be grossly negligent of our aims.
With that in mind; our view is not that meat is unsustainable by definition, but rather that current consumption levels in this country need to be addressed and that the methods in which meat is produced need to be improved. We're not saying meat is wrong or right (everyone has to decide their own ethics), but in Scotland where much of our agricultural land is marginal with little use other than grazing with animals to produce food then this is logical way to produce food that can be sustainable while providing high welfare conditions for animals and livelihoods for farmers. Unfortunately the trend seems to be moving towards intensive indoor 'mega-farms'.
Through the project we've hoped to highlight issues such as the British pork industry's reliance on imported soya bean as a feedstock. This means the industry can feed more pigs by importing feed from abroad. The footprint of the area needed to grown the UK's soya demand is the size of Yorkshire. Most of the UK's soy is imported from South America where the growing demand has caused mass wildlife habitat and carbon sink destruction. In particular Brazil’s Cerado, see http://bit.ly/1tb204p, is being affected. One partial solution to this problem would be feeding waste produce such as we did at the shop and reducing the restrictions on what food waste can be fed to pigs. To find out more have a look and support http://thepigidea.org.
In the context of two pigs on the edge of a disused tennis court in the south of Glasgow we can't tackle these problems alone. However through rearing two pigs (for the most part on waste local organic produce from our shop and gardens) in a pleasant environment we will displace purchases of less sustainable, lower welfare meat and prevent that money going to the globalised food system which we have described with little affection already.
More importantly we have put many food issues in the thoughts of thousands of people (if you are still reading this then thanks, and point made). As you will see in the results of our survey below there have been really worthwhile outcomes out of this zero budget, low resource project. Outcomes that many government funded projects would love to be able to show their funders.
The project has occupied newspaper headlines, chats in the street and collectively probably tens of thousands of hours of people's time on Facebook and Twitter; from serious engaging exchanges to slanderous gibberish from those on both sides. The project even spawned an opposition campaign group which brought together people with differing views in a common cause to save the pigs from the seemingly evil, murdering, unethical, snake oil peddling and profiteering jester that is Reuben Chesters, myself. The project even reached those as far away as Mexico, South Africa and New Zealand through a global online petition to save the pigs. We will send this message back to each of them as a response. We obviously don't agree with the protest, but we hope they will have learned something from it, as we certainly have. We also hope that the momentum gathered can be used to combat bigger problems in the food system, or pro-actively on other local initiatives.
Criticisms & Responses:
The site isn't appropriate for the animals due to it being too small/in a public position/close to a main road and with litter, broken glass and potential for human interaction.
We had a really thorough clean up of the site prior to the animals being introduced, removing years worth of littler from the neglected site. On several visits from Officer Linton of the SSPCA he was very happy that it was a good site for the animals with plenty of space including an area only accessible to the animals should they want to get away from people. We did however soon find that the digging of the pigs and the rain were bringing up a lot of old rubbish including old milk bottles, beer cans, roofing tiles from a building which was formally on the site as well as quite a lot of broken glass. We removed this on a regular basis and there were no injuries to the animals as a result. The site's now in a much better condition than it was previously and the act of the site being occupied seems to have reduced littering.
Locavore hasn’t involved the community, there's not been enough educational value and the interpretation has been poor.
We think the project has had an appropriate level of community involvement. The Croft itself is in very early stages and what we could do this year was limited by our budget. We had lots of volunteers involved in the initial stage of putting in the raised beds for the nano-gardens and this was all completely open and inclusive. The pigs themselves require very little work (apart from responding to messages and writing things like this) besides quick clean ups and feeding.
Everything we've done has been on a shoe string. We would definitely like to have installed more interpretation on the pigs which couldn’t be removed or blown away. We'd have liked to have hosted a series of events and open days around it as well but the resources for this weren't available and we did our best.
As has been mentioned earlier, and outlined further below in the survey results, there have been really useful outcomes from this project and a lot of people are now thinking more about meat, the issues surrounding it and the impact their food decisions make.
The very act of seeing a pig in person has an educational value for those who wouldn't otherwise get this experience.
What Next?
We hope to document the rest of the process in the lead up to the animals coming back as meat products in our shop. As can be seen in the survey results we have had a lot of interest in purchasing the meat and won't have enough to go around but will try and share it out as best as we can.
From the sales we expect to earn around £350 profit after all the fees are paid. Part of this we will give as a donation to the SSPCA as a thank you for their support and contribution to the time they have spent checking on public concerns.
The rest of the money we will put back into projects at The Croft, in particular to improve interpretation and run some events. We're keen to do lots of exciting projects at The Croft involving other organisations and more members of the community. The ultimate idea is to develop a local food hub which demonstrates, educates and gives opportunities to get involved in building a better local food system.
To do this we really need more resources and so will be looking for some project funding over the winter. Any contributions from members of the public would also be appreciated be it unwanted timber, sheds, tools, time, skills or cold hard cash. We can do a lot with just a little support.
Our survey:
As you may know we did an online survey on the 18th of November to find out more about peoples thoughts on the pig project. The survey was posted on both our own Facebook page and that of The Pig In The Rex group which has petitioned against us. It got an exceptional uptake with 135 responses within 90 min. Without upgrading our survey account we've only been able to analyse the first 100 responses but we think this is enough of a sample to draw some thoughts from.
As you will notice, vegetarian and vegans have a high share of responses, 44% of respondents were vegetarian or vegan compared to 2-5% reported in the UK by the vegetarian society. This is one of the reasons we think it's worth showing the results for these groups separately as well as everyone collectively. The samples are as follows: Everyone 99, Meat eaters 56, Vegetarians 26, Vegans 17.
The responses:
Are you a regular customer of Locavore:
Everyone: Yes – 41%, No – 59%
Meat eaters: Yes – 41%, No – 59%
Vegetarians: Yes – 54%, No – 46%
Vegans: Yes – 18%, No – 82%
Overall have you supported our pig project and the debate it has created?
Everyone: Yes – 77%, No - 23%
Meat eaters: Yes – 95%, No - 5%
Vegetarians: Yes – 77%, No - 23%
Vegans: Yes – 18%, No – 82%
Has our pig project encouraged you to think more about how meat is produced?
Everyone: Yes – 74%, No - 26%
Meat eaters: Yes – 93%, No - 7%
Vegetarians: Yes – 62%, No – 38%
Vegans: Yes – 29%, No – 71%
Through following the debate do you think you have learned more about meat production and the issues surrounding it?
Everyone: Yes – 62%, No - 38%
Meat eaters: Yes – 82%, No - 18%
Vegetarians: Yes – 54%, No – 46%
Vegans: Yes – 12%, No – 88%
Has the project led you to change your diet at all?
Everyone: No – 62%, Yes – I've turned vegetarian or vegan 1%, Yes – I'm choosing to eat less meat – 6%, Yes – I'm choosing to eat higher welfare/organic meat – 27%, Yes – I was vegetarian/vegan and am reconsidering this - 5%
Meat eaters: No – 41%, Yes – I've turned vegetarian or vegan 0%, Yes – I'm choosing to eat less meat – 6%, Yes – I'm choosing to eat higher welfare/organic meat – 25%, Yes – I was vegetarian/vegan and am reconsidering this - 4%
Vegetarians: No – 88%, Yes – I've turned vegetarian or vegan 4%, Yes – I'm choosing to eat less meat – 0%, Yes – I'm choosing to eat higher welfare/organic meat – 0%, Yes – I was vegetarian/vegan and am reconsidering this - 8%
Vegans: No – 82%, Yes – I've turned vegetarian or vegan 0%, Yes – I'm choosing to eat less meat – 0%, Yes – I'm choosing to eat higher welfare/organic meat – 12%, Yes – I was vegetarian/vegan and am reconsidering this - 6%
Do you think we should continue with our plan to slaughter the pigs to produce meat for sale?
Everyone: Yes – 72%, No - 28%
Meat eaters: Yes – 98%, No - 2%
Vegetarians: Yes – 58%, No - 42%
Vegans: Yes – 6%, No – 94%
A member of the vegan community has offered to buy the pigs and pay for the cost of their accommodation and food in a sanctuary until they die naturally. Do you think the pigs should be sent to a sanctuary?
Everyone: Yes – 29%, No – 71%
Meat eaters: Yes – 5%, No – 95%
Vegetarians: Yes – 38%, No - 62%
Vegans: Yes – 94%, No – 6%
We're only going to slaughter the pigs if there is enough support and demand. We would sell the meat at £10/kg - the same price we currently sell pork in the shop. Do you want to be personally responsible for having the animals killed to provide you with food by reserving a meat pack?
Everyone: No – 62%, Yes - 38%
Meat eaters: No – 44%, Yes – 56%
Vegetarians: No – 96%, Yes - 4%
Vegans: Yes – 0%, No – 100%
I think the results of the survey provide some interesting food for thought.
What do you think? You can continue the conversation on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/GlasgowLocavore
All the best,
Reuben @ Locavore”
