Denver follow-up to Dublin Declaration
Two years after the Dublin Declaration, through which more than 1,200 prominent scientists have called on policy-makers to take a science-based view of animal agriculture, a second call for action has followed.
Aims of the Dublin Declaration include stopping the “widespread discreditation of meat, dairy and eggs” so that policies on food production and consumption can return to “fully evidence-based and economically and culturally appropriate guidance”.
Signatories of the document have said they observe a trend in policymaking “to deploy patronising approaches”. They say these approaches are aimed at restricting dietary choice and often involve “nudging, pressuring, and taxing consumers away from consuming proven nutrient-dense animal-sourced foods”.
Furthermore, they say it is worrying that proposed substitutes for meat and dairy are “nutritionally incomparable” and often inadequate. These substitutes are often ultra-processed or unscalable.
Their conviction is that the Dublin Declaration has “emboldened scientists to alert policymakers and the public to the importance of basing food policy on sound scientific evidence”.
With this in mind, the core group of scientists behind the declaration chose the Second International Summit on the Societal Role of Meat and Livestock in Denver at the end of October to issue a new appeal, the Denver Call for Action.
This calls on policymakers worldwide to commit themselves “to plurality and rigour in evidence-based decision-making”.
The Denver statement says: “Meeting the massive challenge of nourishing global populations while minimising environmental harm, will only be achieved through the transparent application of the scientific method, steering clear of hubris, presumptuousness, and dogma.”
