Guardian Columnist Says End of Animal Farming is Near

Longtime British columnist George Monbiot recently penned a feature for media outlet The Guardian entitled “Goodbye—and good riddance—livestock farming.” The columnist posed that animal-agriculture will soon be regarded as an obscene way to produce food. “While we call ourselves animal lovers,” Monbiot wrote, “and lavish kindness on our dogs and cats, we inflict brutal deprivations on billions of animals that are just as capable of suffering. The hypocrisy is so rank that future generations will marvel at how we could have failed to see it.” Monbiot explained that animal agriculture is on its way to becoming obsolete, backing his opinion with several recent events, including China’s $300 million deal with Israel to license its upcoming cultured meat technologies and the development of meat alternatives, such as those made by Quorn, that are practically indistinguishable to their animal counterparts. “The end of animal farming might be hard to swallow,” Monbiot wrote. “But we are a resilient and adaptable species. We have undergone a series of astonishing changes: the adoption of sedentarism, of agriculture, of cities, of industry. Now it is time for a new revolution, almost as profound as those other great shifts: the switch to a plant-based diet.” Monbiot’s belief is upheld by billionaire Richard Branson, who in an August interview with Bloomberg News predicted a meat-free world in 30 years.