By Jewel Omollo, Environmental Policy Officer, World Federation for Animals, and Francheska Tacke, International Policy Advisor for Biodiversity and Climate, Animal Protection Denmark
As governments gather in Nairobi for the seventh session of the UN Environment Assembly (UNEA-7), they confront a world deep in an interlinked triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution.
At the intersection of these is animal welfare. The 2022 UNEA resolution on the Animal Welfare-Environment-Sustainable Development Nexus was historic – the first to explicitly acknowledge that “animal welfare can contribute to addressing environmental challenges” and achieving the SDGs. However, implementation of this resolution has stalled. At UNEA-7, advancing action acknowledging the links between animal welfare, environmental health, and human well-being is essential to guide the world through these crises.
How industrial animal agriculture is harming the planet – and its people
The links between animal welfare and environmental change become starkly visible when looking at global food systems. Held in Belém, Brazil, the 2025 UN Climate Change Conference (UNFCCC COP 30) highlighted how global demand for animal protein reshapes entire landscapes in the Amazon. During the conference, a field visit to Santarém revealed how a once biodiverse Amazon rainforest has been transformed into “soy deserts”: vast monocultures supplying livestock feed. Communities now live boxed in by soy fields, exposed to pesticide drift and extreme heat, with rising health concerns. This is occurring in a region containing around 10% of known species and storing around 71.5 billion metric tons of carbon.
The drivers of this shift extend far beyond Brazil’s borders. Roughly 76% of soy produced worldwide is used as animal feed, and soybean production is projected to reach around 425 million tonnes by 2025-2026, with Brazil supplying almost 40%. These trends position soy as one of the largest drivers of tropical deforestation, second only to cattle ranching, in stark contradiction to SDG 15 (life on land).
The consequences are far-reaching. Forest loss disrupts regional rainfall patterns, degrades soils, and alters freshwater cycles, weakening the Amazon’s capacity to regulate climate, support biodiversity, and sustain local livelihoods. Wildlife face shrinking, contaminated habitats; rural and Indigenous communities experience heightened exposure to pesticides and intensified land conflicts; and fragmented ecosystems increase interactions between wildlife, livestock, and people, raising zoonotic spillover risks. Simultaneously, agriculture is a major contributor to anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and increasingly vulnerable to the very climatic changes it exacerbates.
These destructive shifts are linked to consumption patterns in the Global North. For example, Denmark imports 1.2-1.7 million tonnes of soymeal annually, requiring about 600,000 hectares of land abroad – more than the 400,000 hectares designated for national nature restoration. Danish soy imports generate an estimated 2.1 million tonnes of CO2 annually, exceeding projected emissions reductions from its national climate targets, while sustaining one of the world’s most intensive pig industries. These systems require substantial quantities of feed and pose persistent animal welfare issues, highlighting how Brazil’s deforestation remains linked to industrial livestock production in the Global North.
These dynamics reveal that today’s food systems are profoundly transboundary, linking the environmental and social outcomes of countries situated in opposite regions of the globe. Recognizing these linkages is essential for addressing unequal environmental and social costs and identifying solutions that extend across borders.
We need UNEA more than ever
The threats of climate change, pollution, and biodiversity loss demand an urgent, coordinated response. These crises are deeply intertwined, each exacerbating the others and complicating efforts to find effective solutions. However, the intertwined nature of the polycrisis also reveals the opportunity of single-point interventions that can have rippling positive impacts.
Shifting the way we produce and consume food away from high-input, feed-reliant, intensive systems toward more ecologically sustainable production systems and consumption levels can improve the management of natural resources, reduce land use change, and create opportunities for restoration. Such systems, which are also likely to generate less pollution, have the potential to stem biodiversity loss, which, in turn, supports climate mitigation efforts. Further, these systems positively impact humans by addressing some of the key drivers of zoonotic disease emergence and limiting the devastating experience of communities such as those living in the soy deserts of Santarém. Transforming global food systems to lower-input, higher-welfare ones responds not only to SDGs 12 (responsible consumption and production) and 13 (climate action), but also 3, benefiting health and well-being.
Encouragingly, international bodies are recognizing these interconnections and taking action. At the 2024 UN Biodiversity Conference (CBD COP 16), parties adopted the Global Action Plan on Biodiversity and Health, acknowledging the role of animal welfare in reducing zoonotic risk. Further, the COP 16 decision on biodiversity and climate change recognizes that protecting animals is essential for effective climate action.
A recent resolution by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO) recognizes FAO’s role in driving the sustainable transformation of agrifood systems and the contribution of animal health and welfare to this effort.
A UN General Assembly (UNGA) resolution adopted this year reiterates the call to “strengthen global efforts to ensure that animal health and welfare can contribute to addressing challenges and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.”
The Wildlife for Climate Declaration, championed by African leaders and gaining momentum ahead of UNFCCC COP 31, represents another crucial development. This decision reflects growing recognition that protecting wildlife and restoring habitats is a cost-effective, nature-based solution (NbS) to climate change, directly supporting the Paris Agreement.
UNEA: A critical opportunity for synergistic action
Member States at UNEA-7 have an opportunity to translate recognition into transformative action. Current discussions span crucial environmental challenges – from combating environmental crimes and wildlife trafficking to addressing the environmental dimensions of antimicrobial resistance.
Animal welfare offers concrete solutions across these challenges. UNEA stands uniquely positioned to guide countries in leveraging animal welfare to advance environmental goals. The World Federation for Animals (WFA) 2023 report, ‘Unveiling the Nexus,’ examines animal welfare’s potential to create positive ripple effects across biodiversity conservation, climate mitigation, pollution reduction, food security, and human health. Research findings such as those within the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) Nexus Assessment Report and the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) study, ‘Integrating Animal Health and Welfare in Sustainable Development: The 2030 Agenda and Beyond,’ further support these findings.
UNEA-7 presents a timely moment to catalyze discussions on multilateral environmental agreement (MEA) synergies. Rather than addressing climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution in silos, Member States can leverage the interconnections between animal welfare and environmental outcomes to strengthen cooperation across the Rio Conventions (UNFCCC, CBD, and UNCCD) and other frameworks. This integrated approach is precisely the kind of synergistic thinking needed to tackle the triple planetary crisis effectively.