.png)
There are countless ways to address an issue as vast as meat consumption and industrial agriculture. To categorize these approaches, fisheries expert Daniel Pauly splits them up into horizontal and vertical approaches. Horizontal methods occur more on the personal level and do not enact systemic changes on a large scale. For example, choosing to go vegan would be a horizontal method to mitigate the effects of meat consumption. Going vegan is a personal decision and mostly affects the individual. Drafting legislation to ban industrial meat operations would be an example of a vertical method, because it directly attempts to reform a system, rather than make an alteration to a single person’s lifestyle.
Methods, however, often do not fit cleanly into either vertical or horizontal. For example, one could argue that while going vegan has the greatest impact on the individual, if enough people did it and meat operations shuttered, then that horizontal, personal change would have had vertical implications. Pauly’s method of categorization is in no way meant to be perfect, it is simply a way to think about addressing an issue.
Different people are able to address issues in many different ways. For example, a policy maker is in a very strong position to enact vertical change. They have the voice and the power to reform a system. However, a child is not in that position. A child may be best suited to perform a horizontal method, by going vegan or simply by discussing these issues with their parents.
On Plant Based Equity, I hope to give you the resources to distinguish these different methods of mitigation, realize which one is most suitable for you, and give you the tools to pursue it. If you feel most comfortable with a horizontal method, I encourage you to check out my affordable vegan recipes blog, and if you hope to effect systemic change, I encourage you to check out some of my posts on issues in the plant based sector, so that you can reach out to lawmakers and encourage them to address these issues.
Comments