CONTACTS:
Trisha Benton, President, Environmental Studies Association, Salisbury University, WorldAdvocate@aol.com
Karen Davis, United Poultry Concerns, 757-678-7875, karen@upc-online.org
Pattrice Le-Muire Jones, Global Hunger Alliance & Eastern Shore Chicken Sanctuary, 410-651-4934, info@globalhunger.net

Reducing or eliminating consumption of meat is good for people, animals, and the planet. That will be the message of the "Great American MeatOut" event to be staged by the Environmental Studies Association on March 20, 2003 from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. in Holloway Hall on the Salisbury University campus.

The event will feature free food, free literature, and inspiring and informative talks by Delmarva residents Karen Davis and Pattrice Jones. Davis and Jones both publish and speak widely outside of the Delmarva but are rarely invited to speak here in the heart of the poultry industry. Jones was scheduled to speak at a local Meat-Out event last year, only to have her speech censored in advance by Wor-Wic Community College. Both are energetic speakers who combine emotion and information to create a unique experience for the audience.

Karen Davis is President of United Poultry Concerns in Machipongo. The author of Prisoned Chickens, Poisoned Eggs: An Inside Look at the Modern Poultry Industry and More than a Meal: The Turkey in History, Myth, Ritual, and Reality, Davis is a nationally recognized expert about the uses and abuses of birds by the poultry and egg industries. Recently inducted into the Animal Rights Hall of Fame, Davis is one of the most renowned and beloved figures in the animal liberation movement. A dynamic and impassioned speaker, Davis will share vital information about the lives and deaths of chickens and other farmed animals. Davis will also share ideas about what people can do to help farmed animals.

Pattrice Jones is the co-founder of the Eastern Shore Chicken Sanctuary in Princess Anne and also coordinates the Global Hunger Alliance. Global Hunger Alliance is an international coalition of environmental, social justice, agriculture reform, and animal welfare organizations dedicated to effective, ethical and environmentally sustainable solutions to hunger and malnutrition. In the past year alone, Jones has spoken in Italy, Pakistan, and Brazil as well as in Ann Arbor, Boston, DC, Honolulu, Salt Lake City, and Trenton but she has never spoken on the Delmarva. She will talk about the detrimental impact of factory farming on farmers, workers, consumers, and the environment at home and abroad using the Delmarva poultry as an example. Jones will also share ideas about what people can do to help feed the world while preserving the planet.

This local event is only one of thousands of local events which will be staged all over the United States as part of the "Great American Meatout" organized by Farm Animal Reform Movement. This is the 18th annual observance of the Meatout, which is the world's largest grassroots diet education campaign. The date, the first day of spring, represents rebirth and renewal.

We will offer free samples of a wide variety of vegan foods as well as extensive free literature, with people on hand to answer any questions. Tables of food and literature will be open from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. Karen Davis will speak from 6:15 p.m. to 7 p.m. Pattrice Jones will speak from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. Each speaker will allow time for questions and answers from the audience.

More than 30 million Americans have already explored a meatless diet. Many do so for ethical reasons, preferring not to eat animals or products made from animals. Others choose a meatless diet for heath reasons. According to the American Dietetic Association, vegetarian diets are associated with lower risk for obesity, heart disease, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, colon cancer, lung cancer, and kidney disease. Research concerning breast cancer has shown a positive association between consumption of animal products and that disease.

This event is sponsored by the Environmental Studies Association. Recently, more and more Americans have begun choosing a meatless diet for environmental reasons. The Union of Concerned Scientists recently listed that giving up meat as the second most important thing an individual can do (behind giving up driving a car) to help the environment. A recent issue of E: The Environmental Magazine was headlined "So, you're an environmentalist... then why are you still eating meat?" This is because of the pollution caused by industrial animal agriculture and because cycling plants through animals, rather than consuming them directly, is a very inefficient way to feed people. A person eating a meat-based diet indirectly consumes as many resources as 20 people eating vegetarian diets. Such high levels of resource consumption are bad for the environment and also create inequalities in access to food. Some people are hunger and malnourished, even though we have more than enough food to feed everyone a healthy vegetarian diet, because other people consume more than their fair share of resources by eating diets heavy in meat and other animal products.

For more information:
http://www.meatout.org
http://www.globalhunger.net
http://www.bravebirds.org
http://www.upc-online.org

United Poultry Concerns is a nonprofit organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of domestic fowl. http://www.upc-online.org