Species Unite

"Vegan 1.0 Didn't get us where we needed to go. It didn't turn enough of the country on, it didn't turn enough young people on, didn't make it into… the mainstream in the way they wanted it to. …it was kind of pushed to the edge and marginalized and it was weird, the food was good, but not great and not accessible or kid-friendly. … I didn't think that was the way to capture the 97% of the world or the country that doesn't identify as vegan who would otherwise, maybe try it once in a while, but not really make a change. Where Vegan 2.0 is specifically designed to expand the tent to the 97%.." – Adam Weiss Adam Weiss is the CEO and director of Honeybee Burger, a plant-based fast-food restaurant with locations in Southern California, and more coming soon to other parts of the country, including New York City (hooray!). Honeybee's mission is to promote the benefits of plant-based food on the environment, the planet, and the animals with the most delicious food and the best plant-based proteins on the market. And, it's working - they were just named the best vegan burger in Los Angeles by Veg News. Before entering the plant-based space, Adam had a long career in finance, and I was very curious to know how he went from hedge fund guy to vegan restaurant guy. "When people come in and they're going to get a cheeseburger, fries and a shake, which is our most common order, it's not so much that they don't care about their health, but they know, "okay I'm about to indulge here." We just give them a tiny bit of good feeling, like, you know what, "you're indulging, you're going to pack on some calories, but no animals will die, you're making an impact on the future, and ultimately it's probably better for the environment than if you didn't do it…" And that resonates with consumers today unlike any time in history." – Adam Weiss Links: Honeybee Burger https://honeybeeburger.com/ Instagram https://www.instagram.com/honeybeeburger/

"Historically some of the leading airlines in the world were responsible for transporting these monkeys. So, you had national flag carrier airlines, such as such as British Airways, American Airlines - all of these big airlines were involved in transporting these monkeys in the hundreds and thousands every year on commercial passenger airlines. And, rightly the public were very concerned, there was a growing swell of, public opinion that was opposed to not just non-human primates being transported by airlines, but other animals as well. So there has certainly been a big move away from passenger airlines transporting monkeys, which has caused problems for the research industry in being able to obtain the monkeys." – Sarah Kite Sarah Kite is co-founder of Action for Primates, they campaign on behalf of non-human primates globally. Despite their status as our closest living biological relatives, non-human primates continue to suffer and be exploited by people across the globe, whether in their native habitat, in trade and transportation, in research laboratories, in private homes, in zoos, as entertainment, or as food and body parts. Sarah has been doing this work since the 80s and although much has changed since then – we no longer test on chimpanzees, much hasn't changed. According to PETA, in the US, more than 100,000 nonhuman primates (mostly monkeys) are used in research laboratories every year. These are highly intelligent, social animals and we know and have known for decades that almost every single bit of this research fails in human trials. A report from Faunalytics shows that,"approximately 100 vaccines have shown effectiveness against HIV-like animal viruses, but none prevent HIV in humans. Up to 1,000 drugs have shown effectiveness for neuroprotection in animals, but none for humans. While the biomedical research industry is quick to claim victories, the reality is less glamourous: nine out of ten drugs fail in clinical studies because they cannot predict how they will behave in people; only 8% of drugs tested on animals are deemed fit for human use; one meta-study found that animal trials overestimate the likelihood that a treatment works by 30% because negative results often go unpublished. Fortunately, using animals in scientific research is not a foregone conclusion. On the contrary, there is a burgeoning field of alternatives to animal research, and many such alternatives are already in use today." Not only are we breeding thousands of non-human primates in labs, for testing here in the USA, but we also import them from Asia and Africa by the planeload, meaning that they are in cargo holds for as long as 24 hours, some die before they make even it to the lab. As horrible as that sounds, I'm pretty sure that those are the lucky ones. For her entire career, Sarah Kite has been fighting for primates and asking humans to do and be better. I think we can.

"It's really about bringing the skills and the tools and the techniques that we've already developed and addressing other forms of transnational or international crimes - and applying them to this area that had long been forgotten." – Olivia Swaat-Goldman Olivia Swaak-Goldman is the executive director of the Wildlife Justice Commission, an organization that goes around the world fighting transnational organized crime against wildlife — like an animal-focused justice league, with a mission to disrupt and help dismantle organized transnational criminal networks that are trading in wildlife, timber, and fish. Wildlife trafficking is the fourth largest illegal trade globally, after drugs, humans, and arms. Before the Wildlife Justice Commission was formed, governments were not focused on going after the heads of these trafficking organizations. There was a lack of prioritization on wildlife crime. And since they formed in 2015, the Wildlife Justice Commission has helped to secure the arrests of 155 wildlife criminals and taken down 35 criminal networks. The Wildlife Justice Commission's work is more important now then ever, as we are losing species at alarming rates and there are so many more at risk of extinction within our lifetimes. "The Wildlife Justice Commission was created in order to go after high-level criminals. It's the same thing with drugs in a way, if you just go after the dealer on the corner, you're not going to be tremendously successful. You've got to do that but you need to go after the masterminds of the networks in order to get them arrested and successfully prosecuted and, also important… a seizure of assets… make it hurt, make them feel it. Then they're going to think twice about doing this, especially in an area where we are losing so many species and at risk of losing so many. The quicker we can get them to be doing something else, that the more biodiversity we can save." – Olivia Swaak-Goldman LINKS: Wildlife Justice Commission: https://wildlifejustice.org/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WildlifeJusticeCommission/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/WJCommission

"I think we we've prioritized certain things in education and in culture, but we're really deprioritizing curiosity. The joy of going into a research hole and just digging… I still do that every day." – Sonalie Figueiras Sonalie Figueiras is the founder and chief of Green Queen, the award-winning media impact platform advocating for social and environmental change. Green Queen started as a blog in 2011 and now it's Asia's largest plant-based media platform. She is also creating a marketplace to source organic and natural foods. She's the founder of Ekowarehouse, a global sourcing platform for certified organic products, with a mission to make safe, quality food accessible and affordable for the whole planet. I've been following Sonalie and Green Queen for years, it's one of our go-to sources for information and breaking news for all things related to the future of food. Green Queen: https://www.greenqueen.com.hk/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/GreenQueenHK Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/greenqueenhk/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GreenQueenHK/ Eko Warehouse: https://www.ekowarehouse.com/

"… a lot of the platform technologies do not make sense from a food perspective, and there's just never been a reason to do things a different way. So, for example, cell culture is very expensive and very resource intensive because the medical field doesn't really need those things to be done in a very cost-effective manner - because people, have a high cost thresh hold when it comes to paying for their own healthcare and drugs… But it's totally different when we're thinking about food." – Natalie Rubio - Natalie Rubio Natalie Rubio recently made history as the first person on the planet to complete a PhD in cellular agriculture, which is the production of animal-sourced foods from cell culture or meat that is grown in a lab without using animals. Her thesis: Entomoculture: Insect Cell Cultivation for Cellular Agriculture, makes the case for growing meat from insect cells. (Natalie also coined the term "entomoculture.") All of the above is beyond exciting for 8 million reasons, for Natalie and for all of humanity. Every milestone in the world of cellular agriculture, academically or as an industry, is a massive step toward building a food system that is sustainable and humane, a food system that does not involve factory farms, slaughterhouses, cruelty, and suffering.

"When you talk to the vegan community, you know, it's people who know exactly why they should or shouldn't purchase something. But being able to reach people through design… like why couldn't someone test veganism through fashion before they started with their diet? That's kind of my story." - Casey Dworkin Casey Dworkin is the founder and designer of plant-based luxury footwear brand Sylven NY . When I first discovered Casey's boots and shoes, they were half vegan and half animal leather, meaning half their shoes were made from animal leather and then the exact same pairs were available in apple leather. A couple of years after that, I noticed that all the animal leather shoes and boots were gone, Sylven was now a straight vegan brand. Not only did I want to know what happened and how it happened, but I also really love Sylvan's boots. So I called Casey and asked her to share her story. "For me, it started with vegan for the environment… I was already working with these plant-based, vegan leathers and wanting to make sure I can lessen my environmental impact through my shoe production. And so I was like, well, why don't I try to reduce the amount of meat and dairy that I consume? And then through that process, I was like, well, why am I consuming any meat or dairy? Why am I producing with anything leather? And, it brought me down this very positive rabbit hole." – Casey Dworkin

"So, you really want the kids to drink the cow's milk because that's the liquid that's available to them if they're thirsty. And we were also told that yeah, you really should be having the kids open up their cow's milk. I went down through all the tables and said, "open up your milk, open up your milk." Or, I was told, we just won't get our funding because this was a school that was a turnaround school, all the kids are on free lunch. And, so this is how we got our funding as a school. – Monica Chen Monica Chen is the executive director of the Factory Farming Awareness Coalition, an organization that educates and empowers individuals and communities to support just and sustainable food systems. Meaning they go into schools, colleges and universities and the truth about where their food comes from. By educating young people about factory farming and equipping them with the tools to oppose it, Factory Farming Awareness Coalition builds both an inclusive consumer base as well as an informed citizenry that supports cultural and legislative change for the benefit of all. To date, FFAC has reached over 220,000 students are building an army of kids with a mission to change food systems all over the country.

"Within a month of our investigation's release, we had some amazing news. The French government passed legislation to ban fur farms in France. In 2017, it was an issue which was not really on the public agenda, but within four years we have stopped an industry in France. Hundreds of thousands of animals don't have to be killed each year, don't have to live in these small cages going crazy each year. It's a success and it's something that we feel proud to have been part of." - Gemunu de Silva Gem is back! Gemunu de Silva is the co-founder of Tracks Investigations. He is filmmaker and an activist who's been investigating and documenting animal rights abuses since the 1980s. Tracks has just completed over 260 investigative film projects. That is an astonishing number of investigations. 35 animal rights and protection organizations have benefited from their work in 57 countries. Gem has been on the podcast before. I asked him to come back to talk about some of Track's most recent successes. There are many. The work that Gem has done for the past three and a half decades has changed laws, minds and the world for millions of animals.

"I think every time we release a story, there's this sense of like almost like legal danger, the legal implications that can come from releasing stories. We've had times wherea story has been released and we haven't slept that night because we're scared of what the repercussions are going to be." - Amy Jones, Moving Animals Amy Jones and Paul Healey are the founders of Moving Animals, a photojournalism and media project that connects the world to animals stories through photography, film, and journalism. Amy is a photojournalist and writer. Paul is a journalist and he's responsible for Moving Animals' video content. Their work has allowed people to see for themselves animal and human rights injustices that are happening globally. Only when people are made aware of injustice, do they take action to stop it. Amy and Paul have brought massive awareness to the masses who have in turn, fought injustice all over the world. What they do is not only a powerful agent for change, it's an essential one. Amy and Paul are a very essential part of the team at Species Unite. Paul is our news editor and Amy is a writer, editor, campaign manager, tech person, social media person, and any other person who we need in that moment. She wears many hats. I'm grateful every single day to have Amy and Paul on the team. There are also two of the kindest human beings that I've ever had the privilege to know.

Jane Velez Mitchell the founder of Jane Unchained, a media platform for vegan and animal rights news. Her decades long career as a broadcast journalist has focused on bringing animal rights issues to the forefront. For six years she hosted her own show on CNN Headline News, where she ran a weekly segment on animal issues. Previously, Velez-Mitchell reported for the nationally syndicated Warner Brothers/Telepictures show Celebrity Justice, where she did numerous stories on animal issues championed by celebrities. Jane's also an author of four books and a producer of the award-winning documentary Countdown to Year Zero and the vegan cooking series New Day, New Chef. Mainstream media has always skirted around animal rights issues and I wanted to hear how Jane brought them mainstream at a time when it wasn't as popular to do so. And I wanted to know what she thinks about where we're headed in the future.