'Higher welfare'? Why we need to know more about horrifying reality of how food is produced

The lecture was from Compassion in World Farming, showing a video called, Don’t Look Now, Here Comes Your Dinner. It revealed the harsh realities of food production. The boy, who kept chickens at home, was deeply touched by the sight of commercial chickens in tiny cages so small the birds couldn’t stretch their wings.

That boy was me, more than 40 years ago. Those images stayed with me, shaping my career and mission in life.

The need for us to harness the power of education has never been greater. In every classroom lies the promise of a brighter tomorrow. Education is not just about knowledge; it's about nurturing dreams, sparking curiosity, and empowering young minds to shape a better world. As we face unprecedented global changes, the power of education has never been more vital.

For our children and future generations, education is the beacon of hope, lighting the path to a sustainable, just, and prosperous society. It equips our young people with the tools to tackle today's challenges and tomorrow's uncertainties, fostering resilience, innovation, and compassion.

Children’s voices matter

My own experience has strengthened appreciation of educational initiatives like Education Scotland’s Learning for Sustainability programme. The aim is delivering learning that will help young people care for each other and the natural world. To enable them to lead positive change in their communities, society, and the wider world.

Children and young people's voices matter. They care about climate change, equalities, and well-being, and have the right to be heard. Learning about these issues at the right age equips young people with the knowledge and empowerment needed to take better care of themselves and the world around them.

Disappointingly, plans in England for a GCSE in natural history seem to have been delayed. The idea of the subject was proposed to reconnect young people with the natural world and address critical issues like climate change, biodiversity loss, and sustainability.

Spearheaded by conservationist Mary Colwell, the qualification aims to provide students with hands-on learning experiences, such as fieldwork, to foster a deeper understanding of local and global ecosystems.

The course is designed to reconnect young people with nature, to inspire curiosity, and to give them the skills and knowledge needed to put right the environmental crises we are facing. Initially announced in 2022, the GCSE was set to be introduced by 2025 as part of the UK Government's sustainability and climate change strategy. However, political roadblocks have delayed its rollout.

Real-life learning about real-life threats

Leading environmentalists urge the government to introduce it immediately amid fears of it being postponed until 2030. Mary Colwell’s quote in The Times captures its essence: “This isn’t a GCSE about national parks or stuff you can watch on telly. This is a GCSE about the so-called weeds that grow in the gutters. It’s about the trees. It’s about the birds that come to the bird feeder. It’s about the stuff in the farmland and the woodlands. It’s the particularity of life on Earth, what it needs and how it’s connected.”

It's about real-life learning to help tackle real life threats to our society as we know it. That need for meaningful education, for information to help us take action and make the right choices in life doesn’t stop when we leave school. Lifetime learning and being informed is hugely important.

Sadly, we’re all denied the information we need to make meaningful choices in the shopping aisle of our local supermarket or corner shop.

Tell us the whole truth

The reality is that much of the meat and milk that we buy doesn’t come with clear labelling on how it’s produced. Certainly not if it’s been produced in the kinds of ways I remember seeing in that video, Don’t Look Now, Here Comes Your Dinner.

Despite decades of calls for honest labelling, the stark truth about how much of our food is produced is still missing from the packaging. Misleading terms such as ‘farm fresh’ or even ‘higher welfare’ can be applied to products from animals that have been intensively farmed indoors their entire lives, subjected to routine mutilations, or confined in narrow cages.

Having honest labelling has never been more important as the way farmed animals are reared has a big bearing on so much else, not least the health attributes of the food as well as the impact on climate and nature. Industrial animal farming is a big driver of climate and biodiversity crises.

Giving us clear, informative labelling would give us the means to make a big difference within our daily lives, which underscores the need for education to be geared towards enabling us all to do our bit. Such inspirational education is vital for young people at the right age and remains important throughout our lives.

Education is the key to a brighter future, empowering us to make choices that protect our planet, nurture our well-being, and ensure a compassionate world for all.

Philip Lymbery is chief executive of Compassion in World Farming, president of EuroGroup for Animals, and a UN Food Systems Advisory Board member. His latest book is Sixty Harvests Left: How to Reach a Nature-Friendly Future. He is on X/Twitter @philip_ciwf