(Picture taken from Sainsbury's Cromwell Road, London)
At around lunchtime on Saturday 25/2/23, supporters of Animal Rebellion peacefully occupied the egg aisle of Sainsbury’s supermarkets across multiple cities, including the capital.
This comes ahead of the 16-week DEFRA-prescribed ‘free-range grace period’ for English barn eggs ending on Monday 27th February [1].
More actions are anticipated tomorrow as the group declares a weekend of action.
In a coordinated mass action, individuals from the climate and animal group Animal Rebellion have occupied the supermarket egg aisle of Sainsbury’s in multiple cities, including London, Bristol, Manchester, and Nottingham.
They held placards calling for the UK to adopt a ‘safer, sustainable’ plant-based food system free from the spread of zoonotic diseases, animal suffering, climate breakdown, and food shortages.
Daniel Juniper, a 27-year-old Early Years Practitioner from Bristol, said:
“As a nation of animal lovers, we do not like to think of animals suffering for our food. But this is the reality for millions of chickens, and other animals, in the UK. Labels like ‘free range’ and ‘RSPCA Assured’ are deliberately misleading the consumer into thinking we are buying in line with our values, but in the egg industry RSPCA-accepted practices include gassing or grinding up day-old chicks whilst they are still alive. There is a kinder alternative, a plant-based food system." [2]
(Picture taken from Sainsbury's Fallowfield, Manchester)
The actions followed images earlier in the week showing empty supermarket shelves owing to climate-induced food shortages [3]
In 2018, comprehensive research from the University of Oxford showed that 76% of the land currently used for food production would be freed-up by a global transition to plant-based production [5]. This land could be rewilded and begin carbon drawdown, mitigating the worst impacts of climate breakdown. A 2019 Harvard University report on UK farmland and food production from Helen Harwatt and Matthew N. Hayek also concluded that the UK would be carbon-negative if it completely transitioned to a plant-based food system [6].
Animal Rebellion is urging wholesale governmental and societal support for farmers and fishing communities to transition to a plant-based food system and programme of rewilding that will secure a future for generations to come.
ENDS.
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