The 2017 Chicken Marketing Summit in North Carolina involved hundreds of leaders from fast-food chains, marketing agencies and poultry production companies discussing the fact that Americans are eating less poultry—and what to do about it. Richard Kottmeyer, a senior managing partner at Fork to Farm Advisory Services, explained that Millennials need to be “inspired and coached” to consume more animal products, according to an article published on WattAgNet.com, an industry website.

“Compared to their parents, Millennials are more likely to believe in evolution and accept that climate change is occurring. They seek out facts and science to better understand a complex world, but the poultry industry doesn’t have any fact-based information to defend its cruel, unsanitary practices,” states animal rights advocate Nathan Runkle via EcoWatch.com. The majority of chickens raised for meat have been bred to grow so large so quickly that they collapse under their own unnatural weight. North Carolina has enacted an “ag-gag” bill, making it illegal to photograph or videotape animal abuse.

This article appears in the January 2018 issue of Natural Awakenings.