Industrial meat production is showing serious signs of stress around the world. Bird flu cases are surging in China's poultry. Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus (PEDv) is spreading in the U.S. At the same time the meat industry grows more and more concentrated. China's meat and dairy sectors have undergone a massive transformation in the last thirty years from backyard farming toward a highly destructive model of industrial meat production. This transition towards "scale, standardization and consolidation" continues to unfold. IATP's first webinar in this series, along with the publication of four in-depth studies on China's meat and feed industries, will feature China's "need for feed," taking us to China and Latin America. Increased demand for animal feed is putting tremendous pressure on land and water resources.
Download the slides:
Shefali Sharma's slides
Emelie Peine's slides
Presenters:
Shefali Sharma is the Director of Agricultural Commodities and Globalization at IATP. She is leading IATP's initiative on the social and environmental impacts of an increasingly globalized and concentrated meat industry. Her work in the past year has focused on China's meat and feed industries, the culmination of which are the four IATP reports. Over the last 18 years, Shefali's work has also focused on accountability of international trade and financial institutions, international trade and agricultural policies and their implications for social justice.
Emelie Peine is an Assistant Professor in the International Political Economy Department of the University of Puget Sound. Her research focuses on the role of multinational agribusiness in the global food regime. Emelie has examined China's "go out" policy for feed grains such as soy and what this means for control of the supply chain in Brazil. Her recent publications include, "Trading on Pork and Beans: Agribusiness and the construction of the Brazil-China-soy-pork commodity complex". The Ethics and Economics of Agrifood Competition. Harvey S. James, Jr., ed. New York: Springe
Moderator Jim Harkness lived in China for 16 years, working on rural development, natural resource management and environment. Before to serving as President of IATP from 2006 -2014, he was China Country Representative for WWF and Environment and Development program officer for the Ford Foundation in Beijing.
