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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Environment
Ajit Niranjan

EU pumps four times more money into farming animals than growing plants

A herd of cows on a farm field in Hottot-Les-Bagues, near Bayeux, France
A herd of cows on a farm in France. The EU spends nearly one-third of its entire budget on CAP subsidies Photograph: Artur Widak/NurPhoto/Rex/Shutterstock

The EU has made polluting diets “artificially cheap” by pumping four times more money into farming animals than growing plants, research has found.

More than 80% of the public money given to farmers through the EU’s common agriculture policy (CAP) went to animal products in 2013 despite the damage they do to society, according to a study in Nature Food. Factoring in animal feed doubled the subsidies that were embodied in a kilogram of beef, the meat with the biggest environmental footprint, from €0.71 to €1.42 (61p to £1.22).

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