Love this post, I think animal welfare could benefit significantly, both from an impact perspective and in developing their funding streams by putting more effort in Measure, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) and the mission motor is working on this. I'm not sure what their funding situation is like, but it might be an area that appeals to you.

Also, up front I work at THL.

When I started reading about animal charity evaluations, I was struck by how different it was from global health & development. There's no longer RCTs and high-quality studies, no longer organizations with a long, proven track record. There's usually no clear estimate of how many animals are impacted, and where there is, the figure is speculative

I think what you are getting at here - the "professionalism" of the global health & development space vs that of the animal space, was a significant factor for me to work in the animal space rather than in the climate space, where I was currently working. It seemed work on factory farming was so neglected and with more focus and attention, significant change could be made here.

When it comes to corporate outreach work on cage-free and broilers my experience has been different to what your partner and I experienced in the climate space. I think this stems from the climate space being much more developed and it being a very 'standard' thing executives need to work on. Farm animal welfare for the most part has not been on these companies radars and the organisations doing corporate work have driven this change. For many of the companies Open Wing Alliance members work with, cage-free is often the first animal welfare policy a company ever makes and subsequent change for animals has then been easier to advocate for and in some cases has often then come from the company themself, ie Carrefour making a quail cage-free egg policy. 

With fulfilment work, my personal experience has shown that attention on the fulfilment of the commitments is definitely needed and we would not be seeing the high fulfilment rates we see in this report without this happening. 

From what I can tell the main crux here is how much the change is driven by a company and their associates vs a charity. My perspective from the inside is that there are genuinely people in these companies that care about the work we are doing, but these companies have a lot of things on their priority list and keeping animal welfare at the top of it is a task that requires a lot of effort from charities. I'm not sure how might align on that difference?

Note on the THL numbers, the reported 3.4M is the number of hen spaces that we estimate a company no longer has in cages in 2024 between their previous reported numbers. This differs from Corporate campaigns affect 9 to 120 years of chicken life per dollar where I believe it is also making an estimate of how long would it take for a company to make these changes without these campaigns "Mean years of impact". Which I think can also give some insight into the role charities play in bringing about this change.

Thanks for shining the spotlight on MEL and animal welfare charities.

Thanks! Working on cage-free and broiler campaigns, I can attest to grit being an essential ingredient for progress.

Love this!

Soldiers win wars. The most accurate map made by the most virtuous scout is worth nothing without soldiers to do something with it.

My experience in animal protection has shown me the immense value of soldiers and FWIW I think some of the most resolute soldiers I know are also the scouts I most look up to. Campaigning is probably the most mentally challenging work I have ever done. I think part of that is constantly iterating through the OODA loop, which is cycling through scout and soldier mindsets.

Most animal activists I know in the EA world, were activists first and EA second. It would be interesting to see more EAs tapping into activist actions, which often are a relatively low lift. And I think embracing the soldier mindset is part of that happening.

Thanks for writing this Jeff. You inspired Caroline and I to write this post. 

Thanks thanks for breaking it down Tyler!

In adjusting the portfolio, I think it is also important to consider how important we think US policy is in total for overall change for animals in the US vs the other areas we could dig more into. If we think it is very important, then the current situation might be the reason we need to invest more into US policy work and think more deeply about why the situation is perhaps playing out differently to Europe. FWIW I  also am optimistic about policy in the the EU.

For example, a difference I see in animal organizations in the EU compared to the US is I think many of the EU organizations are more focussed on externally appearing as politically neutral than they are in the US. And at the same time it is really interesting how you've shown how the ballot initiatives have panned out in the liberal cities here.

Personally being more focussed on corporate engagement work, I notice that US companies need more effort to be held accountable than EU companies. So the US passing legislation would probably reduce the effort needed on corporate accountability work. Whereas, EU legislation will have a smaller impact on corporate accountability work success. Probably not the strongest reason to focus on policy work, but one thing that would make me nervous about us stepping too far away from policy work in a portfolio adjustment.

This is another great piece of writing from you Engin, thanks!

Thank you for writing this, I think it was 2hrs well spent.

Agree! All exceptional activists.

Yes, I think it is exactly that sort of thing Saulius. From what I have heard it is often the research about how animals are kept that people want from their region/country.

Thank you for this write up.

Martin Balluch's writing on this topic has impacted my way of thinking a lot on this. I think his 'Balluch Curve' succintly illustrates the  problem and an approach to overcome it. 

Article is written in German and quotes are google translated

We know from vegan and vegetarian people that most of them fall back into the sink. The system is stronger. Only a perhaps 5% large group with enough pioneering spirit stays up there on the right. In other words: the vegan outreach and the revelations of eg the VGT are constantly shoveling people right up the curve, but sooner or later they roll back again. A Sisyphean task.

How could you support people so that they can stay on the top right? By making vegetarian/vegan life easier. And that's why I founded the Vegan Society Austria with my brother and my partner at the time in 1999. It awards a vegan seal so that the animal-free products are easily recognizable, it organizes vegan cooking courses for prospective chefs, it disseminates information about health aspects, arranges vegan-friendly doctors, etc. This activity can be illustrated as a small or large dent in the curve. A second dip in vegetarianism or veganism, not nearly as far down as the deepest dip, but at least providing something to hold on to, some protection against falling into the main dip. Then it will be easier for people

So we're not really getting anywhere unless we change the system. Let's imagine we shift the sink to the right! If that succeeds, then all people suddenly behave in a more animal-friendly manner, then the system forces them to do so, even if that is not their belief. But isn't it utopian to change the system? Is not it. At the beginning of the 19th century there were still no animal protection laws and instead there was a baiting theater in Vienna, where animals were set against each other, or animals were hounded by packs of dogs and humans. The "having a rush" in Viennese for having fun comes from that. So the depression was on the far left. And now it's not that anymore, there's no such thing as hate theatre, at least the status of animals has risen to such an extent that torture for fun has been outlawed.

Speaking very recently to someone involved in vegan outreach from their POV from many hours of conversations, the biggest challenge to adoption and retention is people worrying about not fitting in with those around them.

I definitely agree that veg retention is an important piece, although I think many animal organisations are dealing with limited resources and I think as a result are looking to shift society to the right, cage-free, higher welfare etc, which ultimately makes the jump/drop from veg smaller and probably supports enduring change more.  I personally, would be interested in seeing research into veg retention, but would rank it beneath research into shifting to higher welfare.