2021 Press Releases
Ela Gandhi, Mahatma Gandhi’s granddaughter endorses the Plant Based Treaty during its official launch at COP26
Media Contact(s): [email protected]
Glasgow, UK: Stephanie Cabovianco (Plant Based Treaty Campaigner): +(44) 7526 174 619
Bournemouth, UK: Nicola Harris (Director of Communications): +(44) 7597 514 343
Canada: Anita Krajnc (Global Campaign Coordinator): +1 (416) 825 6080
Ela Gandhi calls for end to indiscriminate breeding of animals for consumption because of the harmful effects on health and the environment.
2 November, 2021
Ela Gandhi, Mahatma Gandhi’s grand-daughter, released a statement today to “fully endorse the Plant Based Treaty.”
The Plant Based Treaty is officially launching at COP26. Plant Based Treaty campaigners will be holding events inside and outside COP26 asking delegates to begin negotiations on a Plant Based Treaty as a companion to the Paris Climate Accords. The Plant Based Treaty seeks to halt the expansion of animal agriculture and deforestation, incentivize a shift to a plant based food system by redirecting subsidies, taxes and public information campaigns, and reforesting and rewilding lands.
Ela Gandhi joins celebrities including Sir Paul McCartney, his daughters Mary and Stella McCartney, actors Joaquin Phoenix, Rooney Mara and leading scientists and interfaith leaders who have teamed up to urge the UN’s COP26 to adopt the Plant Based Treaty to avert climate catastrophe.
The McCartney family — who launched the Meat Free Mondays campaign in 2009 — said: “We believe in justice for animals, the environment and people. That’s why we support the Plant Based Treaty and urge individuals and governments to sign it.”
Anita Krajnc, global campaign coordinator for Plant Based Treaty said, “We are going to hit 1.5 degrees Celsius around 2030 and 2 degrees. A Plant Based food system is a critical climate action that all nations need to adopt. If Gandhi were alive today he would be organizing communities to sustainably grow their own plants and fruit trees.”
Ela Gandhi’s statement endorsing the Plant Based Treaty:
I fully endorse the Plant Based Treaty. I believe that the indiscriminate breeding of animals for consumption is harmful both for health as well as for the environment. The animal industry has also contributed, to a large extent, to the deterioration of the fertility of our soil and thus the environment. Large forests have had to make way for cattle farmers all over the world. Gandhiji in his bid to transform his modestly affluent lifestyle in 1904 was driven by three important considerations of which one was that a life worth living is that of the tiller of the soil and the handicrafts person. Living close to nature was part of his teachings. The Plant Based Treaty is calling for just that and therefore I support it.
ENDS
Ela Gandhi is a South African peace activist and politician who was an MP for ten years and aligned with the African National Congress. In 2014, she was awarded the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman – the highest honour for overseas Indians conferred by the President of India. In 2002, she received the Community of Christ International Peace Award. In 2014, she was also honoured as a veteran of the Umkhonto we Sizwe part of the African National Congress (ANC), co-founded by Nelson Mandela in the wake of the Sharpeville massacre.
ABOUT THE PLANT BASED TREATY
As a companion to the UNFCCC/Paris Agreement, the Plant Based Treaty is a grassroots initiative calling upon national governments to negotiate a landmark international treaty—the first of its kind to put food systems at the heart of combating the climate crisis.
The Treaty aims to halt the widespread degradation of critical ecosystems caused by animal agriculture, to promote a shift to more healthy, sustainable plant-based diets and to actively reverse damage done to planetary functions, ecosystem services and biodiversity.
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Image of Ela Gandhi: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1v8FjFdLPZKwc6VcoE2yhqmrJ-xmfIiHP?usp=sharing