'Towards Holistic Paradigms and Mindsets' and 'Towards Diets Which Promote Human and Planetary Health'
An Environment Article from All-Creatures.org

FROM Rethinking Food and Agriculture: New Ways Forward
July 2021

In reality the dominant scientific paradigm is an old fashioned and out of date belief system. We need to move towards more holistic paradigms and mindsets which view nature as organic, interconnected and alive and which accommodate complexity, diversity, non-linearity and uncertainty.

Excerpts reprinted with permission from Rethinking Food and Agriculture Edited By Amir Kassam and Laila Kassam

Towards Holistic Paradigms and Mindsets

The conventional scientific paradigm is based on a materialist philosophy of nature, which places humans above and separate from nature. This paradigm has been driving science, research and economics, and by extension our food and agriculture system, for at least the past few hundred years. It elevates science and ‘rational thinking’ above other ways of knowing (e.g. traditional, indigenous, ‘non-expert’).

In reality the dominant scientific paradigm is an old fashioned and out of date belief system. We need to move towards more holistic paradigms and mindsets which view nature as organic, interconnected and alive and which accommodate complexity, diversity, non-linearity and uncertainty. This shift is needed if we are to effectively address the root causes of the complex and interconnected crises we are facing.

A key aspect of this shift is the need to reconnect with and learn from nature. The dominant Western worldview is based on the domination of nature. We need to go back to understanding ourselves as part of nature. This requires radical and fundamental changes in our anthropocentric, speciesist and human supremacist worldview and our attitudes and relationship toward the living world, including our relationships with other animals.

We cannot hope to reset our worldview and come back into right relationship with the living world and all her inhabitants, without re-evaluating and transforming our relationship with other animals and recognising them as our evolutionary kin. The moral obligation to end the exploitation and oppression of other animals that this recognition reveals requires us to forsake the ‘hubris of our unfounded human supremacy’.

This theme draws especially on Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 6 and Chapter 16 from Rethinking Food and Agriculture Edited By Amir Kassam and Laila Kassam. 

Towards Diets Which Promote Human and Planetary Health

Our current corporate food system promotes Western diet patterns high in processed food, sugar, salt, oil and animal-based foods and low in nutritious whole plant foods. This has led to the exponential rise in obesity and diet-related diseases globally, alongside high rates of chronic hunger and malnutrition. We need to move towards a food system that can provide all people with the nutritious food they need for a healthy diet, while also minimising its impact on planetary health.

There is an increasing body of scientific and clinical evidence, showing that a healthy dietary pattern is one centred on unprocessed whole plant foods. Animal flesh and secretions are not necessary for good health, especially for those of us with access to a variety of plant-based foods in Western countries. Many traditional diets before colonisation were also plant-based, e.g. in Africa and the Americas.

Industrial animal factory farming, along with the associated habitat destruction for feed production and the wildlife trade, has also led to the increasing spread of novel zoonotic diseases. COVID-19 is just one of several zoonotic infections in the last century caused by our use of other animals. Our continued destruction of natural habitats, driven mainly by intensive industrial animal agriculture, means further pandemics are inevitable. Eliminating our reliance on industrial animal agriculture would contribute enormously to both individual and public health.

This also applies to reducing, and where possible eliminating, our reliance on non-factory farmed animal agriculture which also contributes to the spread of zoonotic diseases and maintains large swathes of landscapes and watersheds in a degraded state, due to its destruction of vegetation, biodiversity and habitats.

A plant-based food and agriculture system would also be hugely beneficial for the 70 billion land animals and 1 to 3 trillion aquatic animals killed for food each year. An added bonus would be the vast amount of land that is currently used for animal agriculture (including feed crops) that could be restored to natural vegetation. Ecological restoration of this kind is currently the best option at scale for removing CO2 from the atmosphere and reaching net zero emissions by 2050, as well as halting and reversing the ecological emergency.

This theme draws especially on Chapter 8 and Chapter 15 from Rethinking Food and Agriculture Edited By Amir Kassam and Laila Kassam. 

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