Why help one animal, when you can help thousands with the same donation?
Monday 9th September 2024, Reading time 5 minutes
Fact: Some charities help hundreds, if not thousands of animals for the same amount of money that some of the best-known animal charities need to help just one.
How is this possible?
The majority of world wide donations for animals go to cats and dogs in animal shelters, despite the fact that the scale of suffering of farm animals is much much larger and farm animals are much cheaper to help.
All animals, whatever their species, know fear, pain and suffering, and are capable of happiness. By donating to the world’s most effective charities for improving the lives of farm animals, you can help thousands of animals live a better life, for just a fraction of the cost of helping pets in shelters.
The problem with donating to animal shelters
To put the difference of cost effectiveness into perspective – it costs around 3,000 euros for a pet shelter to look after an animal for a year [1], in comparison – this same amount of money could:
Spare 3,529 chickens from lives in battery cages if donated to The Humane League [2].
Save 15,900 animals from factory farming if donated to The Good Food Institute [3].
The scale of difference may be hard to believe. The reason for this huge difference is that both The Humane League and The Good Food Institute push forward corporate commitments and policies that affect systemic change, improving the lives of millions of animals.
The scale of factory farming is difficult to comprehend
It’s estimated that three-quarters – 74% – of land livestock are factory-farmed. That means that at any given time, around 23 billion animals are on these farms [4].
Hundreds of millions of animals are slaughtered every day – more than 2,500 every second
99% of animals are factory farmed in the USA [5].
60% of animals are factory farmed in France. These animals are concentrated in just 3% of farms, showing just how intensively they are farmed [6].
Lack of awareness leads to lack of donations for farm animals
Few people realise how many animals are kept in such cruel conditions which is reflected in how donations are distributed. Only a small portion of donations for animal welfare are used to improve conditions in intensive farms despite the fact that there is overwhelming evidence showing that farmed animals like pigs, chickens, cows [7] and even fish can feel pain [8]. The experience of a pig on a factory farm is going to be pretty similar to how a dog or cat would feel in the same situation [7].
Compared to other animal welfare issues, intensive farming is therefore very neglected . The graph below shows this particularly clearly:
In the United States, over 99% of animals killed by humans are farmed animals, while only 0.007% are pets euthanized in shelters. However, 95% of animal donations go to pet organisations, while only 3% go to farmed animal organisations. Source: Animal Charity Evaluators
But is it even possible to help farm animals?
Luckily, there are highly effective charities working hard to reduce the suffering of farm animals. As a rough estimate (and very conservative), the same donation can help a single animal in a shelter live a dignified life, or improve the living conditions of thousands of animals in factory farms. Two of the most effective charities are The Humane League and The Good Food Institute:
The Humane League
Donate 200 €: Save 235 chickens from a life spent in a battery cage.
The Humane League (THL) aims to end the abuse of food animals by persuading companies to adopt higher animal welfare standards. Over the past decade, THL has successfully secured commitments from more than 400 companies to cease battery egg production. Using the success metrics of The Humane League’s corporate campaigns in 2022, we conservatively estimate that The Humane League is able to spare one chicken from a life in a battery cage for just $0.85 [2].
The Good Food Institute
Donate 200 €: Improve the well-being of 1,060 farm animals
The Good Food Institute promotes the development and marketing of alternatives to conventional meat. In order to establish these alternatives on the market, the aim is for them to be at least equal in terms of taste, price and availability. Their aim is to create a fairer, healthier food system, while reducing animal suffering and the ecological footprint of food production. The animal protection organisation, FarmKind, estimates that 5.3 animals are helped for every dollar donated to GFI [3].
Conclusion
All animals, whatever their species, know fear, pain and suffering, and are capable of happiness.
Despite the scale of suffering endured by farmed animals, only 3% of donations for animal protection goes to farmed animals, compared with 95% for companion animals.
By donating to charities that promote farm animal welfare, your donations can help thousands of times more animals than by donating to animal shelters for companion animals.
Jennifer Stretton
[1] Battersea Dogs Home [Accessed 05/09/2024]
It is hard to be precise here. The Battersea Dogs and Cats Home — one of the UK’s oldest and best known animal shelters — says it costs them £46,000 per day to look after their animals and looks after around 7,000 new cats and dogs per year. That’s ~$21.5 million USD per year, which is just over $3,000 USD per animal. Meanwhile, The Humane League can spare a chicken from a life of confinement in a battery cage for just $0.85. (To be conservative, we use a 1:1 conversion between euros and pounds in our impact calculations).
[2] How do we calculate the cost-effectiveness of The Humane League’s work?
We use calculations from animal welfare organisation, FarmKind. They have calculated the cost per animal helped by dividing the number of animals affected by commitments they achieved in that year by the cost of those campaigns. We place fair confidence in this number as it is based on past performance of THL’s work and is more conservative that the estimates of other evaluations. However it is an average estimation and the true cost could vary. Full calculations can be viewed on FarmKind’s cost effectiveness spreadsheet for The Humane League, 2024 [Accessed 04/09/2024]
[3] Cost effective analysis calculations for animal welfare organisations (FarmKind) [Accessed 11/07/2024].
Please note that 5.3 animals helped per dollar is highly uncertain and we wouldn’t be surprised if there is a magnitude of difference in the true figure. Full details of the assumptions and numbers used for FarmKinds calculations are shown in their spreadsheet.
[4] How many animals are factory-farmed? (Our World in Data, 2023) [Accessed 04/09/2024]
[5] How many animals get slaughtered every day? (Our World in Data, 2023) [Accessed 04/09/2024]
[6] INTERVIEW: Greenpeace France Explains Why Limiting ‘Factory Farms’ Would Be Beneficial (Feedinfo by expana, 2023) [Accessed 04/09/2024]
[7] Studies showing that farm animals experience pain, just like cats and dogs
(7.1) Steagall et al. (2021): “Pain Management in Farm Animals: Focus on Cattle, Sheep and Pigs” [Accessed 04/09/2024] – “Mammals generally have similar nociception across different species, and it is safe to assume that events that are painful in humans are experienced similarly in other mammals”. “As observed during dehorning, hot-iron disbudding produces severe pain for hours as evidenced by severe burns and large open wounds, changes in behavior (e.g., vocalization, kicking and falling), decreases in mechanical nociceptive thresholds, and increases in serum cortisol levels…. Pain-induced behaviors in calves after dehorning include head shaking, ear flicking, head rub against surfaces and objects, frequent changes in position, increased time lying, and vocalization up to 72 h after the procedure. The use of local anesthetics and NSAIDs before dehorning will blunt these responses”
(7.2) Ison et al. (2016): “A Review of Pain Assessment in Pigs” [Accessed 04/09/2024] – Review of 205 studies assessing the degree of pain experienced by pigs as part of farming practices
(7.3) Compassion in World Farming: Sentience in Pigs [Accessed 04/09/2024] – 22-page report summarizing the research on pigs’ capacity to suffer
(7.4) Rault et al. (2011): “Castration induced pain in pigs and other livestock” [Accessed 04/09/2024] – Summary of studies showing pigs feel pain during castration
[8] Studies showing that fish have pain receptors, make trade-offs to actively avoid pain and react to pain-relieving drugs
(8.1) Dunlop and Laming (2005): “Mechanoreceptive and nociceptive responses in the central nervous system of goldfish (Carassius auratus) and trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss)” [Accessed 04/09/2024] – “This study has shown that there is neuronal activity in all brain areas including the telencephalon, suggesting a nociceptive pathway from the periphery to the higher central nervous system of fish”
(8.2) Sneddon et al (2003): “Do fishes have nociceptors? Evidence for the evolution of a vertebrate sensory system” [Accessed 04/09/2024]– “This study provides significant evidence of nociception in teleost fishes and furthermore demonstrates that behaviour and physiology are affected over a prolonged period of time, suggesting discomfort.”
(8.3) L. Sneddon (2019): “Evolution of nociception and pain: evidence from fish models” [Accessed 04/09/2024] – “Potentially painful events result in behavioural and physiological changes such as reduced activity, guarding behaviour, suspension of normal behaviour, increased ventilation rate and abnormal behaviours which are all prevented by the use of pain-relieving drugs”.
(8.4) L. Sneddon (2015): “Pain in aquatic animals” [Accessed 04/09/2024]– “However, will fish pay a cost to accessing analgesia? If the internal experience of pain is aversive then they should sacrifice either effort or access to a resource or favourable area to obtain pain relief… Zebrafish seek to reduce their pain by forgoing the opportunity to be in a preferred area and spending time in a non-preferred chamber to access analgesia”