Today (17 November), high-profile supporters and visionaries have lent their names to an international open letter calling on world leaders at the COP27 climate conference to end factory farming and transform our global food system.

The open letter – signed by 208 prominent individuals, including Jane Goodall and Alan Cumming – was released on Solutions Day at the conference in Egypt.

Urgent action needed

The letter highlights the urgent need to transform our global food system and calls on world leaders to urgently take action and deliver a global agreement on food and farming.

The letter states:

The livestock sector produces more greenhouse gases than the direct emissions of all the world’s planes, trains, and cars combined. Without urgent action, intensive animal agriculture threatens our very survival. We need a food transformation. Our people, animals, and planet cannot wait any longer.

Voices of support

Some 208 people from around the world have signed the letter, including: 

• Hollywood actors Brian Cox, Alan Cumming and Steve Coogan and Eva Green
• British TV personalities Chris Packham, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Dr Amir Khan GP and actors Dame Joanna Lumley, Kate Ford and Peter Egan
• Award-winning authorsMichael Morpurgo, and Barbara Kingsolver
• Religious leaders Bishop John Arnold, Bishop of Salford, Chair of CAFOD and Rabbi David Rosen CBE, International President, The World Conference on Religion and Peace 
• Eminent experts Jane Goodall, PhD, DBE, Founder - the Jane Goodall Institute & UN Messenger of Peace; Frans B. M. de Waal, Ph. D., C. H. Candler Professor Emeritus, Primate Behaviour, Emory University; Peter Singer, AC Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics Princeton University; Carl Safina, PHD, President, The Safina Center, Endowed Professor for Nature and Humanity, Stony Brook University
• Business leaders Dale Vince OBE, owner, green electricity company Ecotricity; Julian Richer, business owner

End of The Line

This week, CIWF launched our End of the Line for Factory Farming campaign, the new global movement dedicated to ending this cruel and unnecessary practice. The campaign aims to get a global agreement to end factory farming and transform our global food system to benefit people, animals, and the planet. CIWF released new YouGov research showing that almost two-thirds of people (63%) in 13 countries polled believe factory farming puts profits ahead of climate and environment. 

Stage, TV and film actor, Alan Cumming OBE FRSE, known for roles in The Good Wife and X2:X-Men United, said:

The amount of human edible food we produce just to feed the animals we slaughter for meat is beyond wasteful – especially when millions of people around the world go hungry every day. We need a food system that is fair, kind, and sustainable. That’s why I’m supporting Compassion in World Farming’s End of the Line for Factory Farming campaign - to help change this broken system once and for all.

Ben Williamson, Compassion in World Farming’s US Director, said:

This is the first campaign action from the new End of the Line for Factory Farming global movement dedicated to ending this cruel and unnecessary practice as it’s causing a climate and nature emergency – one-third of global warming is driven by food production and consumption.

Our open letter sends a clear message to world leaders highlighting the urgent need for action. It’s quite simple – without ending factory farming and transforming our food system, it will be impossible to meet climate targets. What’s needed is for world leaders to put forward a global agreement that meets our climate and SDG commitments before it’s too late.

Be one of the first to sign our petition.