The New South Wales government’s Office of Environment and Heritage has just announced the winners of its 2017 Green Globe Awards, which are supposedly designed to “showcase people and projects making real progress toward sustainability” across the state.
This is the conservative government that passed legislation in 2016 to repeal the Native Vegetation Act, with a large increase in land clearing seemingly inevitable, involving increased carbon emissions, loss of ongoing sequestration and destruction of wildlife habitat. The repeal took effect in August this year.
It was in anticipation of such law changes in NSW and Queensland (and the livestock-related clearing that would result) that the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) listed eastern Australia as one of eleven global deforestation fronts for the period to 2030.
The NSW government’s poor legislative performance in relation to the environment may be consistent with it naming Youth Food Movement Australia (YFM) and one of its co-founders, Alexandra Iljadica, as finalists in the categories of Community Leadership and Sustainability Champion, with Iljadica winning the latter.
The main driver of land clearing in Australia and around the world is livestock production. In Queensland alone, livestock-related clearing since 1988 (when detailed records began) has represented 91 per cent of total clearing. It has equated to more than 11 million rugby fields at rates of 42 per hour overall and 50 per hour in 2015/16.
Despite that appalling record, YFM supports the sector and has failed miserably to highlight its negative environmental and other impacts.
Cattle grazing on cleared and uncleared land in Queensland has also contributed massively to the ongoing demise of the Great Barrier Reef’s corals. Erosion caused by grazing has released sediment, nitrogen and phosphorus to the reef’s waters. The sediment blocks the sun and smothers coral, making it less resilient than it would otherwise have been to the impacts of other stressors, such as warming waters. [Footnote 1]
The fertilisers promote algal growth that is a food source for crown-of-thorns starfish larvae. Adult starfish eat nothing but coral, and have had a devastating impact. They were doing so decades before the first coral bleaching event in 1998, and the destruction is continuing.
As I have reported previously, YFM has collaborated with Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA) via its Target 100 “initiative” on some very questionable projects. A key output from one of those was what appeared to be an MLA promotional video, laughably described by the two organisations as a “documentary”. The video featured Iljadica’s fellow YFM co-founder, Joanna Baker. [Footnote 2]
Joanna Baker (left) and Alexandra Iljadica, YFM Australia
MLA is no mug in the PR game, and has won advertising industry awards such as Marketing Team of the Year and Advertiser of the Year. It has utilised firms with expertise in PR, branding or advertising, such as: Republic of Everyone; Totem; One Green Bean; BMF; and The Monkeys, and prefers the term “community engagement” over “PR”.
The promotional concepts have included “Bettertarian”; “#Goodmeat”; “You’re better on beef”; “Generation Lamb”; “The beef oracle”; “The Opponent”; and Australia Day campaigns such as “Richie’s BBQ” and “Boat People”.
Republic of Everyone has also been nominated for a Green Globe Award. In addition to the “Bettertarian” campaign (launched by MLA as a “counter campaign” during Meat Free Week), its work for MLA has included graphics proclaiming the supposed health benefits of eating red meat. The evidence to the contrary is overwhelming.
That’s from a firm that claims to only create projects “that make the world a better place”, where “everything is fair” and where no animals are “harmed in the making”.
Why doesn’t it tell people that forced breeding, tail docking, castration and hot iron branding (all without pain prevention or relief) are all routine aspects of beef production?
Why doesn’t it tell people about the true environmental and health impacts of the industry?
Why doesn’t YFM do the same?
MLA prefers to provide primary school children with so-called “curriculum study guides”, containing erroneous information about its members’ products.
Another YFM link with the livestock sector involves Dairy Connect, a group based in New South Wales, which describes itself as “an advocacy body, 100% focused on being the voice for all partners in the dairy industry”.
During most of 2014 and 2015, Joanna Baker was Dairy Connect’s manager for membership, communications and policy. While in that role, she was also in senior positions with YFM.
I am not in a position to explain the motivation behind the collaborations and relationships mentioned here, but I do wonder if the Green Globes are effectively nothing more than straw man awards, with some straw man nominees.
Author
Footnotes
- The Queensland government’s 2013 Scientific Consensus Statement reported that livestock grazing was responsible for 75% of sediment, 54% of phosphorus and 40% of nitrogen in the Great Barrier Reef’s waters.
- In addition to MLA, the Target 100 “initiative” involves Cattle Council of Australia, Sheepmeat Council of Australia, Australian Meat Industry Council, Australian Lot Feeders Association and Australian Meat Processing Corporation. MLA maintains copyright over the Target 100 website, and some material (e.g. the so-called “curriculum study guides”) has been released under MLA’s name.
Images
Paul Looyen | A herd of cattle in pasture, standing in early morning fog | Shutterstock
Zo Zhou | Guerrilla Dinner 2013 | Flickr | Creative Commons NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Update
Footnote 2 added 23 October 2017 with minor text amendments.
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