How Anti-Hunting Groups Are Trying to Use Banks to Kill Your Way of Life

We reported recently how Citibank’s apparent reversal of its punitive policy of discriminating against companies in the firearm business was a big win for American hunters as well as all other lawful gun owners in the nation. The corporation’s announcement came amid a number of efforts at both the federal and state level to ban the practice of big financial institutions discriminating against certain industries they don’t consider to be politically correct.

Now the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), the trade association for the firearm industry, is sounding the alarm on a move by animal rights groups to weaponize banks and other financial institutions against animal agriculture businesses. With those animal rights groups also dead set against legal, regulated hunting, it’s not hard to see where this effort could go next. In fact, as we’ve chronicled here before, the war on meat is a war on hunting.

Humane World for Animals (HWA), the new name for the group Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) that spends the vast majority of its donations on fat-cat salaries for its top executives, recently posted a blog on its website describing how an effort by banks to discriminate against just about any business involved in the meat industry—from ranchers to butchers—could result in decreasing the supply of meat-based protein.

“Financial institutions, both public and private, are pivotal actors in this system,” wrote Kitty Block, HWA president and CEO. “Their decisions shape which production models thrive, which innovations are scaled, and ultimately, what kind of food system is passed on to future generations. It is therefore immensely important that considerations of animal welfare and a shift toward plant-forward food systems are integrated into core financing and investing strategies.”

In the blog, Block admits that the whole idea behind pressuring banking institutions is so that fewer animals are killed for food, resulting in less meat available for Americans.

“Our goals are clear: Improve the lives of animals currently in production and stem the growth in the number of animals kept and killed for food,” she wrote.

Since animals are killed by hunters for food, there’s little doubt Block and her cronies will be putting pressure on banks to ostracize members of the hunting industry sometime in the future. And that would be devastating to hunters and wildlife populations, many of which are managed through hunters’ dollars.

Also in the blog, Block brags about how HWS staffers were included on a panel titled “How Can IFC (International Finance Corporation) Support the Shift to Sustainable Food Systems” at the World Bank meetings this spring.

“During the panel, IFC’s head of global agribusiness outlined several animal production practices the institution no longer finances … ,” Block wrote. “These exclusions, while not comprehensive, go further than many other financial institutions, over 100 of which reference IFC’s Environmental and Social Performance Standards in their own frameworks, which guide risk and impact assessments.”

Ultimately, Block and the HWA want banks and other financial institutions to take action to hurt the meat industry so that fewer animals are raised and killed for their meat.

“Financial institutions have a choice,” she wrote. “They can continue to fund systems that harm animals, people and the planet, or they can lead the transition to a more humane and sustainable future.” She underscored how this means incentivizing higher-welfare systems, disincentivizing harmful ones and shifting capital toward plant-forward food systems.

“We at Humane World for Animals are here to forge this path,” she concluded. “We will continue to engage in the IFC’s sustainability framework consultation to advocate for stronger animal welfare standards.”