Shifting Tactics: Could the fight against animal testing help farm animals?
The push to reduce the number of animals used for scientific tests and experiments is several decades in the making. The movement has found particular success with a strategy that highlights economic savings as well as the plight of animals. A number of farm animal advocates are looking to apply this tactic to farm animals . They argue the same approach to cost cutting can also be applied to the billions of dollars doled out by the USDA in the form of farm subsidies.
JESSICA SCOTT-REID: Animal advocates have long lobbied for policies to reduce the number of animals used in lab research. But the movement has found particular success in the second Trump administration with a strategy that highlights economic savings as well as the plight of animals…
The push to reduce the number of animals used for scientific tests and experiments is several decades in the making. The strategy of reduction touted by federal agencies today, known as “reduce, refine and replace,” dates at least as far back as 1959, outlined in a book on how to make lab testing more humane.
Two groups working on this issue are Humane World For Animals (formerly Humane Society of the United States and Humane Society International) and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA.
Sara Amundson, legislative fund president for Humane World for Animals, says making the case on a variety of fronts, including costs, has been key to success. “No one thing was going to create that tipping point, but the amalgamation of, ‘How do you work with industry? How do you ensure there’s funding for non animal methods and strategies? How do you change the law to actually require the uptake of these non animal methods?’” All of these helped, Amundson says…
Delcianna Winders, associate professor of law, and the Director of the Animal Law and Policy Institute at Vermont Law School is one of a number of farm animal advocates looking to apply this tactic to farm animals. Winders argues the same approach to cost cutting can also be applied to the billions of dollars doled out by the USDA in the form of farm subsidies.
“It is very explicitly identified in Project 2025 roadmap,” Winders tells Sentient, calling the subsidies “low hanging fruit if you want to cut wasteful spending.” Amundson, from Humane World for Animals, agrees, calling the idea to expand the movement’s strategy “the perfect continuum.”
Kathy Guillermo, senior vice president, laboratory investigations with PETA, expressed a similar take, writing to Sentient that “Subsidizing the production of dairy, eggs, and meat is undoubtedly a waste that harms animals and humans,” adding, “It should end”…
There are plenty of subsidies in the mix. The recent mega-bill came with a number of payouts to industrial animal agriculture and crop growers, including market protections and payouts to farmers for specific flock or herd losses. Sentient also reported in January 2025 that USDA researchers found egg industry bailouts for avian flu could also be hindering farmers from taking steps to improve their security protocols…
One strategy that may help bridge the gap for policy makers between animals used in research and farm animals, Chris Green, executive director of the Animal Legal Defense Fund, tells Sentient in an email, is the “USDA’s taxpayer-funded Wildlife Services, which slaughtered nearly 2 million wild animals last year –– many at the behest of the agricultural industry”…
Winders believes there could be opportunities to redirect some spending in better directions too. The Trump administration has shown willingness to fund some alternatives to animal testing, Winders says, so why not invest more in research and development of meat alternatives, including cultivated meat. Plant-based meat and cultivated proteins have received only a tiny amount of public funding to date. SOURCE…
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