Books

Cultivated Meat to Secure our Future: Hope for Animals, Food Security, and the Environment

A thought-provoking new book explores the potential of cultivated meat in beating climate change and extinctions

Can cultivated meat – from stem-cells grown in a bioreactor – help us win the battle against climate change, extinction, and ill-health? Will it provide real meat but without the slaughter? And can it help save us from extinction?

These are just some of the pressing questions answered by a new book, Cultivated Meat to Secure Our Future: Hope for Animals, Food Security, and the Environment, co-edited by two of Europe’s most influential animal activists, Michel Vandenbosch and Philip Lymbery.

Bringing together an impressive group of experts, this readable and visionary book launched in the US and Canada, UK and Europe in November, 2023. It informs, inspires, and opens debates about cultivated meat which could be a game-changer in reducing animal suffering and helping solve the growing crises of climate change, biodiversity loss, and the rise of ill-health.

Sixty Harvests Left: How to Reach a Nature-Friendly Future

On 18th August 2022, Philip’s third book was launched by Bloomsbury.

It’s an agenda-setting look at how humankind and nature can survive the twenty-first century together, and why the future depends on it.

Taking its title from a chilling warning made by the United Nations that the world’s soils could be gone within a lifetime, Sixty Harvests Left uncovers how the food industry threatens our world. Put simply, without soils there will be no food: game over. And time is running out. Combining insightful analysis, storytelling and research, award-winning author Philip Lymbery demonstrates why food and future harvests matter more than ever, and shows us how we can restore our planet for a nature-friendly future. With a focus on the global food chain, Sixty Harvests Left confronts ‘Big Ag’, whose mega-farms (both on land and at sea), chemicals and animal cages are sweeping the countryside and jeopardising the very air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat and the nature we treasure. Importantly it also spotlights the pioneers who are battling to bring landscapes back to life, in a world where wildlife, hens, pigs and people thrive by protecting the very thing that our civilisation is built on: soil. Philip Lymbery presents a provocative vision for change, challenging us to think again about what we buy and eat and its impact on climate change.

All proceeds of this new book, will again go towards Compassion in World Farming.

This hardback is available from all leading book stores. The paperback was launched on 8^th June, 2023

Dead Zone: Where the Wild Things Were

Philip has always been a visionary with his writing too, always seeking new insights and helping others to learn from his international research. His second book Dead Zone: Where the wild things were has been the first book to show how factory farming is a major driver of wildlife declines worldwide: from iconic mammals, to sea life, birds, reptiles and insects and how once plentiful species now face extinction due in large part to humankind’s drive for cheap meat.

Dead Zone takes the reader on a journey around the world, from the rainforests of the Amazon to the Midwest plains of America; the palm plantations of Sumatra to the volcanic diversity of Galapagos; the grasslands of England to the Malaysian jungle. In a global safari focussing on some of the world’s most endangered species, it lays bare the myths that prop up factory farming and shows what we can do to save the planet with healthy food.

All proceeds of Philip’s books go towards Compassion in World Farming.

“A Must Read” – Daily Mail

“An honest, compelling and important account and a critical plea for a fusion of farming, food and nature to provide global ecological security” – Chris Packham

“A must-read for everyone who loves the wondrous wild creatures with whom we share our precious planet” – Joanna Lumley OBE

“Dead Zone is a very important book … Conservationists, corporations and governments must find a way to end this devastation before it is too late” – Jane Goodall, PhD, DBE

Farmageddon – The True Cost of Cheap Meat

Philip’s first book, Farmageddon: The true cost of cheap meat, was the first to show a mainstream audience that factory farming is not only the biggest cause of animal cruelty on the planet, but is also at the centre of what is wrong with our broken food system. .Published by Bloomsbury in January 2014 and written with the then Sunday Times journalist Isabel Oakeshott, it has been published in 6 languages and gained worldwide acclaim reinforcing his reputation as one of the world’s fiercest critics of industrial farming.

Described as a fascinating and terrifying investigative journey behind the closed doors of a runaway industry across the world – from the UK, Europe and the USA, to China, Argentina, Peru and Mexico, it is both a wake-up call to change our current food production and eating practices and an attempt to find a way to a better farming future. Farmageddon: The true cost of cheap meat, was chosen as one of The Times Writers’ Books of the Year in 2014 and cited by the Mail on Sunday as a compelling ‘game changer’.

“Lymbery brings to this essential subject the perspective of a seasoned campaigner – he is informed enough to be appalled, and moderate enough to persuade us to take responsibility for the system that feeds us” – Guardian Book of the Week

Farmageddon in Pictures

Published by Bloomsbury early in 2017 in response to reader demand for a pictorial version of the famous Farmageddon original.

“There’s no end to techno-idiocy in pursuit of profit. But far more concerning is Lymbery’s contention that the wastefulness of feeding human-edible plants and fish to animals is not just absurd but catastrophic. The main reason for hacking down the remaining South American forest is to grow soy to feed the pigs and chickens of China” – Evening Standard

“Farmageddon is an excellent book: a fine overview of what’s gone wrong, with case histories and possible solutions that give cause for hope” – Literary Review