Farmers' beef with the new curriculum

Vegetarian virtues will be taught in Australian schools, and the farmers are pissed.

Vegetarian virtues will be taught in Australian schools, and the farmers are pissed.

The nation’s steadfast graziers, who fatten cows for the dinner table, are miffed.

Australia’s new school curriculum, released on Monday, encourages students to avoid red meat, and praises vegetarianism.

While People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) say this change could curb "catastrophic climate change," the cattle farmers aren't happy.

“For hundreds of thousands of years we’ve been eating red meat,’’ Australian Beef Sustainability Framework chairman Mark Davie told The Australian.

“People can have the choice (not to eat meat) but the idea of schools pushing this, I find a bit upsetting.”

Mark Davie. Picture: Meat and Livestock Australia.

Davie said iron deficiency in “young developing women is a huge issue” which he said would be exacerbated by the new syllabus.

“I find it disappointing that kids are spun this story about going vegetarian,” he said. 

“I would want to understand how the curriculum is educating children on potential vitamin and mineral deficiencies, given it is recommending a vegetarian or vegan diet over vitamin and mineral-rich red meat.’’

One physical education assignment is for students to study “serving and eating food that has been prepared sustainably". Perhaps by “using vegetables and/or meat that is more sustainable (vegetarian/vegan dishes or kangaroo)”, the curriculum states.

The beef industry set a challenge in 2017 to be carbon neutral by 2030, and to have offset emissions by 57%.

Davie said livestock farmers helped care for the environment by reducing the fuel load for bushfires, managing weeds and feral animals, and improving biodiversity. Meat was important to stop world hunger.

Queensland cattle farmer Adam Coffey, said his six-year-old son “came home from school devastated because he was told cows were ruining the planet’’.

Queensland cattle farmers, from left, Will, Jacynta, Adam and Sam Coffey. Picture: Supplied.

Meanwhile, PETA are all for the updated curriculum, saying changes like this can help stop us "hurtling toward irreversible and catastrophic climate change".

"It’s clear, even to children, that we must take personal responsibility and alter our lifestyles – and that the simplest and most effective way to do so is to choose plant-based foods and materials,"  PETA's outreach and partnerships manager Emily Rice said.

"If we’re uncomfortable with children knowing that meat comes from sensitive individuals who suffered (while emitting huge amounts of planet-warming methane)... then it’s time to end the cruelty, not the curriculum."

Agribusiness specialist Dr Elizabeth Jackson said children, and all Australians, need to know our food production mechanisms are already the most sustainable in the world.

"The farming sector - from start to finish - has never been as responsible as it is now. Never has science been involved in every element of primary production all the way to the finished product," Dr Jackson said.

"Consumers and kids should be sleeping soundly at night with the knowledge that meat is responsibility produced and sold through official Australian supply chains."

Dr Jackson, who is also lecturer at Curtin University's acclaimed school of management, said animal welfare and reducing the carbon footprint makes good business sense.

"Whatever side of the fence you’re on. Whether you're a capitalist who just wants to make money or an animal activist - the well being of animals is in your best interests. It’s in everyone’s best interest."

She said food security and environmental sustainability are compatible, but nutrition must be included in those lesson plans too.

"The world produces enough food, it's just it's poorly distributed. We don’t have food issues, we have nutrition issues, which is why diabetes and obesity rates are cause for concern," Dr Jackson said.  

"Other than their personal hygiene, nothing is more important than talking to kids about food in the context of health. Teaching them how they can keep themselves healthy because raising a generation that understands the importance of, and knows how to harness, nutritious safe food, well, that’s a type of sustainability too."