since 2014 the chinese government has
been confining a minority group of
muslim people mostly oyga people in
so-called re-education camps in xinjiang
uyghur chinese
from their families 400 pages of leaked
communist party documents detail a mass
incarceration women in so-called
re-education camps are being raped and
tortured people were being sent there
against their will and suffered serious
human rights violations and as a result
in january 2021 the us accused china of
committing genocide not one not some but
every single provision in the united
nations genocide convention
violated since then many countries have
also joined them in doing so however
others despite overwhelming evidence
have opted not to declare this genocide
a genocide and among those countries
is new zealand
jacinda arden new zealand's prime
minister had at that time become a
symbol of strength in the face of
discrimination in the wake of the
christchurch mosque shootings racism
exists but it is not welcome here an
assault on the freedom of any one of us
who practices their faith or religion is
not welcome here
violence and extremism in all its forms
is not welcome here however
when it came to the genocide of the oiga
people she said this there are some
things on which china and new zealand do
not cannot and will not agree this need
not derail our relationship it is simply
a reality this need not derail our
relationship she makes it seem like
there is in fact a place for racism even
a genocide but why what is going on well
it turns out that to understand her
response we have to look into new
zealand's animal agriculture industry
it turns out that even though new
zealand is ranked 127th
when it comes to the most populated
countries in the world it is the eighth
biggest producer of dairy and the third
biggest sheep producer in the world in
fact there are six sheep for every
person in new zealand so why is a
country so small producing such a high
quantity of animal products
the answer is found in the exports new
zealand is the seventh biggest exporter
of beef the third biggest exporter of
wool the second biggest exporter of
sheep flesh and the number one exporter
of dairy products in the world with over
95 percent of the milk produced in new
zealand being exported this small
country home to nearly four million
fewer people than london just so happens
to be one of the largest global
producers and exporters of animal
products with nearly 50 percent of their
total exports being animal products
which brings us back to china because it
turns out that china is new zealand's
largest trading partner in fact in the
months leading up to jacinda arden's
speech the value of exports to china was
steadily increasing and at times even
exceeded the value of exports to new
zealand's next four largest trading
partners australia the us uk and japan
combined this could go somewhere in
explaining why in response to the
genocide of oyga muslims in china
jacinda arden responded by saying this
need not derail our relationship but how
did new zealand become so dependent on
animal farming well the story begins
250 years ago
the first sheep were brought to new
zealand in the 1770s by the british
navigator james cook and the first dairy
cows were then introduced in the early
1800s animal agriculture didn't exist
before colonization for people who don't
know the history here in altera there
were two treaties that were signed
between british settlers and indigenous
people of altera maori maori signed the
treaty which they could read which which
they believed maintained their rights
and sovereignty over altera for example
but then through the translation to a
separate treaty the british crown was
able to confiscate and take land and
make laws which enabled this industry to
have free land the story of animal
agriculture in new zealand parallels
with the story of colonization and so
these british people as they were coming
over and taking over the land were
trying to set up animal farms but they
ran into a problem
trees you see trees are nice and all but
not great if you want to graze animals
before humans lived in new zealand
around 80 percent of the land mass was
native forests now only 24
is native forests not to mention that 90
percent of new zealand's wetlands have
also been drained or filled as well and
in the place of a lot of these native
forests and wetlands there are now
pastures for animal farms in fact
according to this report from the new
zealand government 40
of the total land area of new zealand is
exotic grassland which means land
covered with non-native grasses used for
pasture including dairy sheep and beef
farming compare that to the two percent
of the land mass that is used for
horticulture and crop farming in effect
animal farmers have taken deforested
land and created a manufactured
environment using non-native grasses and
then they claim that new zealand's
climate soil and abundant water create
the perfect environment for growing
grass conveniently overlooking the fact
the land is perfectly suited to be
covered in forests and native vegetation
even more this had a devastating impact
on the environment so our industry is
perceived as being a clean green
industry because that's what our country
is known for but none of the
externalities are being paid for the
damage to our waterways
is being externalized for the taxpayers
and we produce
more methane than any any other country
of our size have a look at these two
graphs the first is greenhouse gas
emissions produced by each sector in new
zealand in 2018. as you can see
agriculture is by far the largest
emitter in new zealand and according to
the new zealand government
three-quarters of those agricultural
emissions are from methane produced by
farmed animals alone with a staggering
94.5
of all agricultural emissions coming
from dairy beef and sheep farming so
that brings us to methane emissions the
second graph here shows methane
emissions produced by each sector in
that same year agriculture produces over
seven times more methane than the second
largest emitter waste and emissions from
new zealand dairy farms have only
continued to increase since 2018 as well
but not to fear because new zealand in
2019 pledged to reduce all greenhouse
gas emissions to net zero by 2050 so
nothing to worry about right
well there was a loophole to the pledge
biogenic methane emitted by plants and
animals let me just show you those
graphs again yeah that's right that big
bar at the top of the methane graph
that's the one this loophole protects
and the other big bar on the graph
showing sector emissions well three
quarters of that big bar is also what
the loophole protects but don't be
alarmed because new zealand farmers have
an explanation for these figures you see
new zealand dairy production is among
the most carbon efficient in the world
which is all well and good except it's a
red herring so what do i mean well this
carbon efficiency is when compared to
areas of the world where agricultural
sectors are still very much in
development such as sub-saharan africa
meaning their emissions are
disproportionately higher and ultimately
this comparison is irrelevant the real
question is is dairy farming more carbon
efficient than the alternative first
let's compare plant milks to dairy
here's a graph comparing how much land
dairy oat soya almond and rice milk use
here's a graph for the same plant-based
milks but looking at greenhouse gas
emissions and here's one that looks at
fresh water use as you can see
dairy milk is the worst for all of these
things by far and when looking at
plant-based diets more broadly a study
by researchers at the university of
otago found that if new zealanders
swapped to eating plant-based diets
which also minimized food waste they
would reduce their diet related
emissions by somewhere between 42 and 58
percent but what about the animals we
are known for having high welfare
standards but like most countries
the body that looks after animal welfare
is also the body that looks after
our export products our primary
industries so there's a conflict of
interest and although we have a great
animal welfare act
there are specific codes that are
produced for each animal the codes set
the minimum standards for animals and
can be used in a defense against any
breaches of the animal welfare act and
so we have our lows
just like any other country and our
standard practices are the same as any
other western industrialized country
in the egg industry it used to be common
practice to house hens in so-called
battery cages hens would spend their
entire lives in these cages barely able
to move and lay in eggs until the point
of exhaustion it wasn't uncommon for
them to even die in these cages however
in 2012 the government ruled the battery
cages were cruel banned them and made it
so that farmers were required to phase
them out by 2022. today caged hens can
be kept in the so-called colony cages
they're slightly bigger but hens still
spend their entire lives here barely
able to move and again laying eggs to
exhaustion it's still not uncommon for
them to die in these cages in the
chicken meat industry chickens are
crammed into huge barns and bred to grow
so fast that their organs fail or they
become immobilized and unable to move
properly including even to reach food
and water points in the pig meat
industry mother pigs typically give
birth in cages like these called
farrowing crates these crates are so
small pigs can't even turn around in
them and leads to the pigs suffering
from emotional distress farrowing crates
were banned in 2020 and are due to be
phased out by 2025. however following
the ban farmers expressed concern that
this ban would increase their cost of
producing pig flesh which would make it
increasingly difficult for them to
compete with foreign pig farmers who are
not required to follow new zealand
animal welfare laws over half of the pig
meat consumed in new zealand is imported
and local farmers worry that this new
welfare standard might crush their
industry in other words the pygmy in new
zealand produced locally using farrowing
crates might soon be replaced with pig
meat produced abroad
using farrowing crates in the meantime
the government is working with farmers
to find alternatives but what this means
we still don't know and in the dairy
industry cows are forcibly impregnated
in order to make them lactate once they
give birth their babies are taken away
from them and as they share a strong
bond with their babies cows have been
documented following their babies as
they are being dragged and taken away
from them
if they are male the calves are
considered useless to the industry and
are killed in 2020 two million male
calves were killed before they were a
week old for this reason if they are
female they endure the same fate as
their mothers and are milked to
exhaustion these are just some of the
standard practices that are common on
new zealand farms but on top of that
many investigations have also found
workers treating animals just like they
are inanimate objects hitting them and
throwing them around
and at the end of the day every single
one of these animals even those in the
dairy and egg industries end up in
slaughterhouses and are killed against
their will to treat someone with
fairness and a sense of ethics and moral
consideration is to take into account
their interests their feelings their
experiences however what we do to
animals centers around what we want
we value our desire to make money off of
their exploitation as being more
important than the subjective
experiences and feelings of the animals
who are being harmed and in the case of
new zealand the profit-driven motivation
behind their exploitation of animals is
so pervasive it doesn't just mean they
turn a blind eye to the non-human
animals who are suffering it means they
also turn a blind eye to the suffering
course to humans by the country it
relies on most when it comes to
exporting its animal products
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you