On October 10th, 2017, the Los Angeles County Democratic Party moved to pass a resolution titled, “Animal Agriculture and Our Environment," unanimously with no opposition!
The resolution was authored by 24 year old vegan activist Shawnee Badger and had the support of California State Senator Jim Beall and California State Assembly Member’s Matt Dababneh, Laura Friedman and Ash Kalra, as well as well over 100 party leaders and delegates. The resolution says that since the Los Angeles County Democratic Party stands for environmental protection, the party must recognize that adopting a plant-based diet is what is best for environmental protection. The resolution also details the animal agriculture industry's negative effects on our climate and resolves to say the following:
“THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED the Los Angeles County Democratic Party recognizes the advantages of a plant based diet, including its positive environmental impact-- specifically its value in meeting our future food supply needs and its contribution to lowering greenhouse gas emissions and freshwater consumption-- and its proven health benefits in preventing diabetes and heart disease…”
The resolution in it’s full form will be delivered to Governor Jerry Brown, Dr. Barbara Ferrer, Director of Los Angeles Department of Public Health, Karen L. Smith, MD, MPH Director & State Public Health Officer and Karen Ross, Secretary of California Department of Food and Agriculture and the State Superintendent of Public Instruction of California, Tom Torlakson.
This accomplishment is monumental and so important to the environmental protection and animal rights movements. The Los Angeles County Democratic Party is the largest Democratic Party in the United States, representing over 2.2 million Democrats. Across this country, Democrats look to Los Angeles to lead the way in protecting our planet! So not only does the resolution passing mean that the party recognizes the resolution to be true, but it also means that it is a party value!
The full resolution:
Animal Agriculture and Our Environment
WHEREAS The California Democratic Party supports preserving and protecting the environment, reversing the real and imminent threat of climate change, protecting and ensuring the health and wellbeing of all people, and showing compassion to and supporting the humane treatment of animals; and
WHEREAS animal agriculture is the leading cause of species extinction, ocean dead zones, water pollution, habitat destruction, deforestation and is responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than is emitted from all transportation, using over half the water in the US, and half the water usage of the average Californian is associated with meat and dairy products as EPA statistics show that animal agriculture consumes over 540 times as much water as fracking and a third of the world’s freshwater is consumed by the animal agriculture industry; and
WHEREAS the world population is growing by 1.10 per cent per year, yielding an additional 83 million people annually--with estimates of a population of 8.6 billion in 2030, 9.8 billion in 2050 and 11.2 billion by 2100; and the detrimental impact that animal agriculture has on our planet will only worsen due to this growing population and growing demand; and even without fossil fuels, we will exceed our CO2 limit solely as a result of animal agriculture;
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED the Los Angeles County Democratic Party recognizes the advantages of a plant based diet, including its positive environmental impact-- specifically its value in meeting our future food supply needs and its contribution to lowering greenhouse gas emissions and freshwater consumption-- and its proven health benefits in preventing diabetes and heart disease; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED to promote much needed further education on this issue we shall communicate this resolution to Governor Jerry Brown, Dr. Barbara Ferrer, Director of Los Angeles Department of Public Health, Karen L. Smith, MD, MPH Director & State Public Health Officer and Karen Ross, Secretary of California Department of Food and Agriculture and the State Superintendent of Public Instruction of California, Tom Torlakson.