Is our food really vegan?

[Trisolo]

This has crossed my mind in the past, but i've been able to brush it off without actually going into it... but...

Nearly all vegetables, conventional and organic, are grown using fertilizer products from enslaved animals! Manure, urine and often slaughter house by-products in the case of conventional farming practices.

So how can I call myself an ethical vegan, how can i even BE vegan? Unless i grow my own food with green fertilizers.

There are a few no-stock organic vegetable farms like Tolhurst... http://veganorganic.net/producer-directory/ so if you live in the UK near one of them you can buy vegan produce.

I'd be glad to know what other think about this... it seems the revolution needs to start on the farms, not on our plates because how can food be truly vegan if it is produced using animal products...

I'm feeling rather distressed about this.

[Andy_T]

Hello Trisolo

don't fall into that trap cleverly prepared by omnis.

They are out to give you a bad feeling in order to justify their own shortcomings ... "What, you want to be a vegan? But you have a car ... and you drive on the road ... and the road is made from [insert grisly animal product here] ... so how can you claim to be a vegan???"

I absolutely agree ... I would prefer to eat fruits and veggies not contaminated with animal excrement ... but I do not see myself as a non-vegan because it is nearly impossible to get such.

Best regards,
Andy

[harpy]

I agree with Andy, good to encourage stock-free farming and horticulture if you can (or grow your own if you're into that) but no reason to starve meantime. The Vegan Society here is trying to draw the government's attention to the environmental/"food security" benefits of stock-free farming, guess it might catch on for "green" reasons sooner rather than later http://www.vegansociety.com/hubpage.aspx?id=678389

[Trisolo]

I wasn't 'trapped' by an omni... i trapped myself! Surprisingly, i've never been confronted by a meat-eater by the fact that i call myself a vegan and eat and shop like a vegan, but the food i eat is not vegan!

Maybe we need to rise up and let it be know that we want vegan food. If farmers knew there was a sizable market for vegan vegetables, maybe more would use green fertilizers.

Harpy, do you have access to any of the growers listed in the vegan organic website? I can't find anything here in Germany. I've read lots of vegan literature and loads of websites, but i've never seen mention of this. It doesn't seem there's much awareness that we are eating non-vegan food amongst vegans.. but it seems really important to me.

[harpy]

I agree it's important and that it is a good idea to campaign for more stock-free agriculture (like the vegan society is doing). Nonetheless vegan food (in the sense of food made out of plants) definitely is vegan, I'd say. The fact that other people aren't vegan is the reason why there is so much manure etc around and therefore it is used in growing plants.

If you search the forum there are a few threads about this and related topics, including ones about whether it's preferable to buy organic or non-organic food if you can't get stock-free e.g. http://www.veganforum.com/forums/sho...=vegan+organic

Last time I checked the VON-listed producers didn't seem to sell their stuff in London but I should check again.

[Andy_T]

Trisolo,

from the top of my head, I can only tell you about http://www.lebegesund.de/gemuese-obs...t-ohne-guelle/ in Germany.

However, these have other issues - the "Universelles Leben" sect is the driving force behind the companies providing these products, and there is quite a bit of criticism of them around.

Best regards,
Andy

[Trisolo]

Harpy,

thanks for the link, i'd searched, but hadn't found that thread. It mainly discusses nutrients and taste, but did raise something interesting in me: that perhaps food grown with synthetic fertilizers would actually be vegan, where as food grown from animal by-products would not. Just as shoes made from animal by-products are not vegan and shoes made from synthetics are. Put another way, if i feed my children animal products they would not be vegan, so if i feed my plants animal products, how can they be vegan?

So this is what i'm struggling with. I'm not trying to be negative or argumentative, though it may seem that way. I am firmly committed to veganism and animal rights.
I think we would need to start, or build on, a movement for green food, if farmers saw a market for food grown with green manures, etc. more would do it. Just as the organic food market developed. Of course, the organic farming industry has been co-opted by capitalism, but that's another story (or is it?). Petitioning the government will do little or no good at this point, although it's good the VS has brought it up... the animal products industry is too strong.

Any_T,

thanks for the link... i think i'll give them a try. They seem to be a crazy, new christian sect, but their ideas and methods of land use and animal rights seem to be right on!

[Trisolo]

Been thinking about this a bit more, and...

Of course plants in the wild depend on nutrients in the soil a part of which is naturally of animal origin. And i wouldn't think of wild plants as non-vegan. It's just the use of enslaved farm animals that i object to i guess.