Tassie Living: Vegan Oz? It’s not on the menu

MATTHEW Evans gets his teeth stuck into the ethics of eating meat, writes SHAUN McMANUS

Gourmet Farmer Matthew Evans at his Fat Pig Farm at Glaziers Bay. Picture: LUKE BOWDEN

GOURMET Farmer Matthew Evans knows there’s virtually no chance of Australia ever becoming a vegan country.

With this in mind, his new TV series - For the Love of Meat - dissects Australian consumers’ insatiable appetite for meat and the impact this has on animals, the planet, and our health.

The Huon Valley-based former Sydney restaurant reviewer is a meat eater himself, and therein lies the problem.

Australians consume the most meat of any country in the world only behind the United States, according to OECD data.

Evans runs his own free-range Fat Pig Farm at Glaziers Bay, where a who’s who of farm animals destined for the dinner table including cows, pigs, and sheep frolic gaily in the green pastures.

In his new TV series, For the Love of Meat, Matthew Evans dissects Australians’ insatiable appetite for meat. Picture: SUPPLIED SBS

But, as he discovered during filming, the intensive factory farming of animals is often a world away from his methods.

While he acknowledges that it is not financially viable for meat to be mass-produced in the manner he practises, he was stunned by the scale of some of the operations.

“It’s startling being in a room where there’s chickens on this moving conveyor belt, going up and up and up as far as the eye can see in racks and rows,” he says, casting his towards the ceiling as if reimagining the scene.

Evans’s new series attempts to bring a voice and a new perspective to omnivores across the country who want to eat meat while causing minimal harm.

“On one side of the conversation about eating the meat, you have the intensive animal production industry, who says ‘guess what, we’re looking after animals not a problem, but you can’t see it, it’s done behind the locked farm gate, it’s nothing to do with you’,” he said.

“And on the other side of the argument, you’ve got animal welfare activists who say none of us should ever eat animals, none of us should ever eat meat, the other people are doing terrible things to animals behind those locked gates.”

“What I wanted to do as a meat eater is say: well, can I eat meat without guilt, can I eat meat and feel that I haven’t damaged my health, the environment, [and] I haven’t done unnecessary harm to the animal.”

After all, there is a deeply rooted love for meat in Australia that all the hair-curling activist footage in the world can’t seem to quell, but Evans believes that that doesn’t necessarily mean we don’t care about animal welfare.

Gourmet Farmer Matthew Evans at his Fat Pig Farm at Glaziers Bay. Picture: LUKE BOWDEN

“Let’s be real about this, Australia is not turning vegan any time soon,” he said.

“I’ve chosen to eat meat, and made a conscious decision that I’m happy to eat meat, knowing that an animal’s died, but being a meat eater doesn’t mean I can’t be an animal lover.”

Evans has a lot on his plate, but he shows no sign of slowing down, with the fourth season of his Gourmet Farmer show expected to air around Easter next year.

For The Love of Meat, SBS One, Thursday 7.30pm

For more great lifestyle and entertainment reads, pick up a copy of our new magazine Tassie Living, out weekly in the Sunday Tasmanian.

Originally published as Tassie Living: Vegan Oz? It’s not on the menu