Rural group slams PETA’s name for plant-based Royal Highland Present

The Countryside Alliance has slammed Folks for the Moral Remedy of Animals (PETA) for encouraging the Royal Highland Present to solely promote plant-based produce.

It known as it an try to “ravage private freedom”.

The Royal Highland Present, which is able to happen from June 22-25, is an annual occasion held in Ingliston, Edinburgh and goals to showcase the most effective of meals, farming and rural life.

PETA stated that the present includes over “6,500 non-consenting animals who’re marched, tied-up, pulled round and roughly dealt with”, and known as for the occasion’s organisers to facilitate a transition to a vegan occasion – the Royal Highland Develop.

Nevertheless, Mo Metcalf-Fisher of the Countryside Alliance has stated that the options from PETA could be “higher off ignored” by the Royal Highland Present, because the group are “infamous consideration seekers”.

“Whereas any occasion might want to provide a variety of catering choices, together with vegetarian and plant-based, nobody must be limiting the dietary preferences of the huge bulk of the UK inhabitants or browbeaten into eradicating it,” he stated.

“Pink meat produced in Britain is among the many most sustainable on this planet.

“Ruling out livestock farming wouldn’t solely take away a number of main meals sources and ravage private freedom, however would blight Scottish agriculture and its dependents as a complete.”

PETA stated the transition to a vegan occasion would profit the UK’s arable and horticultural farmers and assist shield the atmosphere, in addition to defending animals.

“Sheep are pinned down in terror and shorn as quick as doable, child geese are grabbed by youngsters, birds of prey are tethered by the legs, bulls are paraded round by ropes hooked up to painful nostril rings, and horses are compelled to compete in harmful present leaping,” the group stated.

“A vegan occasion, in distinction, might function enjoyable, family-friendly actions reminiscent of a vegan haggis–consuming contest, a turnip magnificence pageant, and a potato-sculpting competitors.

“As a substitute of outdated cow parades, merciless sheep shearing, and meals that has been minimize or expelled from an animal’s physique, the brand new Royal Highland Develop can have fun Scotland’s hard-working plant-based farmers and scrumptious, regionally produced vegan fare.”