Jayasimha Nuggehalli on working collaboratively with the animal agriculture industry to help animals

Jaya is a seasoned operational executive with a rich history of promoting animal welfare in the food retail sector. As the Co-founder and Chief Program Officer of Global Food Partners, a Singapore-based multinational consulting firm, he helps food and hospitality businesses implement their cage-free egg policies across Asia and reduce the cost of cage-free sourcing.

A fascinating episode as we unpick the many advantages of working collaboratively with the industry to advance animal welfare. We chat about the key challenges to this type of work right now, animal welfare challenges in Asia generally and try to understand some of the key barriers for companies implementing improved animal welfare standards for the animals in their care.

Jaya has an absolute wealth of knowledge and experience in this area so it was a real pleasure to hear about his important work and strategic approach. A great listen.

Relevant links to things mentioned throughout the show:

• Global Food Partners website
• Welfare Matters fellowship
• Ahimsa fellowship in India
• Curious Vedanth podcast
• Asia agribusiness podcast (& newsletter)
  • Global Food Partners Podcast 
• Global Food Partners Newsletter

Chapter Headers:

0:02:38 Why GFP works collaboratively with companies

0:06:10 Market forces and why they matter

0:12:01 Making progress for cage free

0:18:21 Key insights from cage free work in India and Asia

0:20:11 Reputational risk and its limitations in Asia

0:25:59 Forecasting the Asian animal movement

0:31:18 The impact of global welfare commitments on Asian companies

0:36:45 The importance of social proof

0:39:39 Consumers or companies responsibility

0:50:00 Offset credits for cage-free procurement

0:54:51 Cost implications of going cage free

1:08:46 Pushback from other animal advocacy groups

1:12:30 GFP plan for expanding in more countries

1:19:00 Cage free vs broiler commitments in Asia

1:20:22 The need for ecosystems and GFP's work

1:23:02 Career advice for advocates in Asia

1:26:20 Cultivating personal motivation

1:29:24 Closing questions

If you enjoy the show, please leave a rating and review us - we would really appreciate it! Likewise, feel free to share it with anyone who you think might enjoy it. You can send us feedback and guest recommendations via Twitter or email us at hello@howilearnedtoloveshrimp.com. Enjoy!

Transcript

Jaya: The big thing that stood out was, for the longest time I thought that one could potentially bulldoze oneself into a market, either through corporate action, shareholder action, or legislation. And I guess the biggest takeaway has been that, while there is some value in that, the whole theory of creating reputation risk is not something that's proven in Asia and what we needed was a localised solution. And I think that's what has really changed in a sense like – the theory of change that, broadly, animal groups use; that there is a possible reputation risk, the company is going to see the reputation risk that's going to have some sort of impact on the shareholders, or at least fall of face in a board meeting, in an AGM or overall on social media, whatever. And then you would have a commitment, the company's going to follow through on a commitment because they are now listed, they got to report in (broadly at least). And that would be a chain of events that does not work for Asia. And I guess the key thing for me has been that every region – I don't want to paint it as a model where everything works the same across, but I guess a big learning for me has been that as a movement, we need to be looking at localised solutions for every region or every country. 

Amy: Hi, my name is Amy.

James: And my name is James. 

Amy: And this is How I Learned to Love Shrimp, a podcast about promising ways to help animals and build the animal advocacy movement. 

James: This week we spoke with Jayashima, who's the co-founder of Global Food Partners, a consulting firm that helps food businesses implement cage-free policies in Asia. We speak about their work, which involves working closely with major food companies and egg producers, which is an approach that may not seem natural to many animal advocates. Jaya also speaks about the importance of this collaborative approach, as well as the importance of market forces in determining whether animal welfare reforms actually help. We also speak more broadly about the state of the Asian animal advocacy movement, given his extensive 20 plus years of experience in the space. 

Also, a reminder that you can now find transcripts on our website, howilearnedtoloveshrimp.com for those that find it easier or more useful to read through an episode. You can also use the chapter markers in the show notes or in some podcast players to skip forward to a certain section if you're interested. And sadly, I actually believe transcripts weren't working for Lauren's episode last week, so apologies if you're looking for it. We fixed it now and it's on the website. Without further ado, here is our conversation with Jaya. 

Amy: So today we're joined by Jayashima Nugaahali, who is a seasoned operational executive with a rich history of promoting animal welfare in the food retail sector. As the co-founder and Chief Programme Officer of Global Food Partners, a Singapore-based multinational consulting firm, he helps food and hospitality businesses implement their cage-free egg policies across Asia and reduce the cost of cage-free sourcing. Before co-founding Global Food Partners, Jayashima served as the managing director of the Humane Society International in India, where he managed programmes related to farmed animal welfare, wildlife and animals used in research. Welcome Jaya.

Jaya: Hey, thanks Amy, thanks James, for having me on this podcast. Really excited to be here. 

Amy: Sure, welcome!

James: We're excited to have you! I know it's one of the most impressive ones we've had so far. So, we're excited to talk to you and get your wisdom from the movement, particularly in Asian India. And I guess to start with, I would be curious to hear who's someone in the movement that other people may not know but you find particularly inspiring. 

Jaya: There's one person who other people might not know, but I find particularly inspiring, who is a founder of a free-range company in India, called Ashok Kannan. Ashok has a very interesting history. I think when he was really young, he was paralysed, either due to polio or some sort of a disease affecting his body from his neck down. And basically, when I met him for the first time to talk about cage-free initiatives, he was into agriculture. He looked at a picture of a cage and he's like: ‘Well, genetically, I'm in a position that I can't move, but these birds should have the opportunity to move.’ And he set up one of India's first certified, or one of the first certified free-range farms. And it's fascinating, James and Amy. And he sits on almost like a wheelbarrow and then he has people pushing him around his free-range farm to look at the birds and so on and so forth. So, you just kind of realise that people who are compassionate come in all sizes and forms and whether they fit into our ‘natural form’ as what we call an animal advocate, or not. 

Amy: Wow, thank you for sharing! That's very inspiring. 

James: Yeah, that is amazing!

Jaya: He's very inspiring. He's one of the co-founders of Happy Hens Farm and they're a certified humane, free-range operator based in India. 

Amy: Excellent. We'll certainly link the information for this individual because I'm sure others will be interested to check them out and their work. And, Jaya, so you take a different approach to helping animals. So, you're consulting directly with the food companies, with the egg producers. So, whilst most organisations take the kind of attack approach against them, you're collaborating with them, helping them implement these higher welfare practices, like moving from the cage systems to the hens being cage-free. Can you explain some of your thinking and understanding on why that particular cross section and relationship is so important to the movement? 

Jaya: Yeah, sure. Thanks, Amy. Very important question, and I think a lot of types of people do get confused. It's like: ‘Are you and animal welfare group or a consulting group? Are you with the business? Are you in cahoots with the business?’ All of these questions, pretty interesting. 

We truly believe that if there is the biggest vigilante in the world, it's the market. Like, in the sense that the market swings towards efficiency. It creates a system that is efficient. It destroys something that's not efficient. You might have a bubble, but the bubble bursts. And I think a lot of the times when we’re talking about cage-free in Asia, were fighting against the vigilante market, and were like: ‘Well, if we really have to get the cage-free as a system to win, we got to create an ecosystem – and again, we don't forecast, we cannot forecast. But when you really look at any sort of change that's kind of happened, it's primarily been when there has been an ecosystem for change, and that kind of helps the growth of the movement.

For example, look at the growth of the Silicon Valley. If it wasn't for Stanford being there, it wasn't for the initial blue-chip companies to be based there, I would be surprised if all of these companies kind of went there and they set up right? In a sense, there was an ecosystem. Taking some of these learnings and understanding that if we want cage-free to be successful, we got to not fight the vigilante market, but get the vigilante market to start seeing efficiency within a cage-free or higher welfare production system in Asia. So, we decided that it's better to set up a company that's dedicated to creating an ecosystem for cage-free KHPA production in the region. And when we mean ecosystem, it means like: Is there knowledge? Is there equipment available? Is there an efficient market system with very little friction that will make companies do this change? 

And also, while we might be pretty bullish or speak very highly about these cage-free movements or higher-welfare movements, the farmers who are in the business know the temperature of the market better than any animal advocate would, because they're in the business every day. And when they kind of touch the market and they're like: ‘Well, this seems a bit cold’, then you realise that, well, if it is cold, then we are not going to get companies to invest and so on and so forth. 

And hence, we set up Global Food Partners as a consulting company that works on an ecosystem approach to create favourable market conditions for both buyers and sellers to meet these cage-free commitments. Because we do believe that if it isn't for the market efficiencies, this movement isn't going to be successful. 

James: So, Jaya, I wanted to ask, when you mean the temperature of the market is cold, do you mean the producers feel like there isn't enough demand to actually be worth the transition; to actually switching over to higher welfare systems? Is that kind of what you mean by cold versus hot temperatures? 

Jaya: Typically, when companies do put out commitments, we kind of think like, well, that's setting out a strong market signal that the change is coming. And a lot of time what happens is the farmers are looking for something beyond just a commitment. Because when you really look at the players within this ecosystem, you have the farmer who has to do a huge amount of capital investment to transition from cage to cage-free; you have a company who has to buy cage-free eggs; and then you have the advocacy groups who put the pressure; and of course, you have the birds. If the cage-free transition fails, the birds have to lose the most. But keeping that aside, in a pure market system, between these three, the only person who has the most probable skin in the game is the egg producer. Because they have now done a transition; they've taken a loan. And if companies don't buy, they're really at the brink of being bankrupt because there isn't a market like just an open market for cage-free eggs in the region, because people aren't really asking for it yet. 

So, when I refer to the temperature, this is when a producer wants to say, well, I have $100,000 - 200,000 to invest, where do I invest? Do I expand into a new cage facility or a cage-free facility? They're going to see: ‘How much money would I possibly make? What's the risk that exists?’ And at this point, when I was working with the Humane Society – where we were on the other side of the table, working with companies, organising these meetings, so on and so forth – when we met with the producers, we realised that the producers, when they test the temperature of the waters, it's too cold. It's too cold for them to put their money to set up. And then you realise that it's cold for multiple reasons. Because, again, the market dynamics have multiple players. The cage-free commitment is just one aspect. 

For example, let's take the US. The US is probably one of the most successful markets for the cage-free transition, and you realise that there were just multiple signals that went: you had all the ballot initiatives that came in and the ballot initiatives were like: ‘Well, it's going to become illegal soon’; then you have all these companies with a major share in the egg market making these transitions; then you had a history to look back to. This transition had already happened for crates, so from the egg producer's point of view, they're like: ‘Well, it's happened for crates, it's probably going to happen for eggs as well.’ 

Now, similarly, when you look at an Asian egg producer, there isn't an ecosystem for legislation. They're almost certain that cages – maybe few countries like Taiwan and South Korea being an exception, or maybe India being an exception, where there might be some sense that there might be legislation coming. But it seems like that feedback loop isn't there, that it might get outlawed. So, if I have to future-proof, I need to invest in something that is going to be longer. Or they don't have a proof to say that these companies which have made commitments have actually placed a purchase order to make worthwhile of the commitment in terms of a business decision. 

When I mean that there isn't a temperature or there wasn't a temperature when we started, was that we had all these commitments, mostly from a producer's point of view, that were not worth the paper they were printed in. Because what they really cared was: ‘Is this transitioning into a purchase order? If I'm putting myself through all this effort to go through, do I have enough gain at the end to make it worthwhile?’ Because finally, as much as we talk ethics and everything, the hard reality is that the markets, as I keep saying, the vigilante markets only gravitate towards making money at the end of it. That's it. That's all they gravitate towards. And if they don't make money, it's really hard to push a market. And we've seen this with plant-based products, where you might have a bubble, you have a whole bunch of investments, you have a ton of companies coming in, but it just doesn't sustain. Because finally, what you really need is the investors need to see the money, the farmers need to see the money, and it needs to be economically viable. 

Amy: I think this piece is really key based on the location as well. As you were saying, the US is such a great example of there being that precedent set over many years, that we have got to a point where the transition is happening, right? There are farms moving and have been moving for a few years from cage to cage-free, and then when we pick that same tactic up and try and apply it to countries in Asia. It's also happening in Africa, where there just hasn't been that precedent set. They are nowhere near legislation on these types of things. I think as well, places in South America where there aren’t even definitions as to what the difference is between cage and cage free. So, I think this is why I'm so interested in your work, Jaya, and the work of Global Food Partners, because I think those tactics that we do so often try and pick up from one region and apply to another just don't work. They don't have that same grounding that we have had in Europe and the US. 

How early on in you working on cage-free, did you kind of understand that the way to really make a lot of progress on this issue in Asia was going to be that more sort of collaborative approach? 

Jaya: And if I may just pick up one of the comments you made on Europe, for example. Even within Europe, where there has only been a legislative push, we haven't seen the change. Like Romania is a great example in the European Union. There is a EU directive but there are within the European Union states who haven't 100% phased out cages or they've moved towards enriched cages. So, I would say the US is a great example because you saw a whole bunch of things working together: you had a food system that was extremely organised and controlled by a handful of people who had a major say in the market; you had companies, almost all of them listed, very little private holding in the US, opening up to a lot of transparency, opening up for shareholder actions on, and so forth; you had this huge concentration of animal advocacy groups and disproportionate in terms of the number of animals and the money spent in the US; then you had the legislative framework, starting from California, then Massachusetts, and so on and so forth, where you were able to outlaw; then also California's latest legislation, which said that you cannot even sell those eggs. And when you really look at all of these things, along with the fact that both on the buyer side as well as the producer side, there's a huge amount of concentration in which change happens. It is kind of – I wouldn't say easy, but it's got that volume to replicate. At any other market where that doesn't exist, the change is really hard. 

Even at the European Union, you could have places which is an Aldi-led or a Carrefour-led market space where that change is being seen. But if you were to take the EU overall, where the EU guidelines exist and so on and so forth, and then you map out the implementation of getting birds out of – and I'm not even talking about enriched cages, of just conventional cages – we still see those birds in cages because all the pieces of the ecosystem that kind of drive the change is there within that market. But to be honest, this is something that came along about maybe six, seven years ago when we started thinking about Global Food Partners where you know, we were getting all these corporate commitments and for a maximum amount of time I worked in India – where we were in a very peculiar situation: it was second of the third largest egg producers in the world, but over 99% of it was sold in black markets. So corporate commitments did not make any sense because you did not have corporates who were buying, and also the per capita consumption was so low, you were just not getting the volumes to do anything. You could work with the largest hospitality chain in India, all their eggs that they were buying in one day could be fed by like a 120,000 or 30,000 bird farm. So, you were like, well, it's really hard. And hence what we did was an overweight investment on public policy, right? So, in a sense like; ‘Okay, can we just invest tons in public policy?’ So we went completely overweight on public policy and we actually had some early wins: we had the Animal Welfare Board of India saying that you can't establish new cages; there was a litigation in the Delhi High Court – India being a Common Law country there's a whole amount of writs that we can do and so on and so forth – and so there was a Common Law Court in Delhi which said that you can't establish any new battery cages across India. And they were not getting too much legalities; even though they were in Delhi High Court, they were operating on the jurisdiction across the country because the Supreme Court of India asked him to adjudicate on this matter. But anyway, then what we saw was that the industry's agency capture was so high that all of these orders, when the political establishment tended to incline a little bit more towards the industry, they quickly started to roll back. 

So then you're like, okay, there is some scope for public policy in India, but it still is a long way because you have to fight the animal agriculture industries agency capture. And then you look at other Asian countries where there isn't even a scope for public policy – at least in India, you had some scope for public policy, however bleak it might be. And then you realise that where do I really do this investment? And then we saw that animal groups around the world had done these disproportionately overweight investments into corporate campaigns (other than maybe the Prop 12 and other initiatives where there was a huge amount of investment. But if you were to look at any one). And then we're like: ‘Okay, if that investment is already done, if we are able to do a tiny top up to do the last mile connectivity in Asia, then we might just be able to get these companies to start creating a precedence that we spoke about earlier.’ So, in a sense that there is a precedent for doing something. So, I would say it isn't something that came about for a long period of time. I would say, with privilege of hindsight, going back in India, going back to other places, I would not have been as overweight investing in public policy as we did. But I guess you live and learn. 

James: Yeah, I think this is all super interesting. I feel like I've already learned a lot about the nuances – kind of in which context to invest in public policy. And I guess how you spoke about the different dynamics of when you have legislative push and consolidated buyers and the wells, maybe more public sentiment – it's so much easier to drive corporate change. Whereas in the Asian context, you maybe have commitments coming, but some of the other pieces are kind of lacking. So, I found that super useful. 

And I guess I'd be curious to hear more broadly: what are some other key insights you think you've gained or learned over the last 15 years of working on cage-free reforms in India and Asia? Obviously, it's a big question, but any things that stand out. 

Jaya: The big thing that stood out was, for the longest time I thought that one could potentially bulldoze oneself into a market, either through corporate action, shareholder action, or legislation. And I guess the biggest takeaway has been that, while there is some value in that, the whole theory of creating reputation risk is not something that's proven in Asia and what we needed was a localised solution. And I think that's what has really changed in a sense like – the theory of change that, broadly, animal groups use; that there is a possible reputation risk, the company is going to see the reputation risk that's going to have some sort of impact on the shareholders, or at least fall of face in a board meeting, in an AGM or overall on social media, whatever. And then you would have a commitment, the company's going to follow through on a commitment because they are now listed, they got to report in (broadly at least). And that would be a chain of events that does not work for Asia. And I guess the key thing for me has been that every region – and when I say Asia again, I don't want to paint it as a model where everything works the same across, but I guess a big learning for me has been that as a movement, we need to be looking at localised solutions for every region or every country. 

James: On the reputational risk, do you think it's not as strong? Because like you said, most of the companies are privately listed rather than public, so they don't have to declare things openly. There are no shareholders as such that are evidently kind of losing out. Is that one of the main reasons why you think the reputational pressure doesn't work as much? 

Jaya: Yeah, and I think it's also culturally. For example, in Japan you're almost frowned upon if you create a reputation risk on anybody. It's a very conformist society; you have defamation laws which are very strong. In countries like Thailand, Singapore, it's really hard to make a distinction as to what's a private company and what's a state-owned company, because the sovereign funds in Singapore are huge. So, you have no idea whether it's actually a state-owned company or a private company. Or in Thailand, it's really hard to know who really owns, primarily because they're not listed. And even with them listed, what you kind of see is that the disinvestment is so low in the sense that they end up being listed but still owned by families. Like in India I think of all the companies that we work with are three listed companies who are primarily into animal agriculture. I guess all of these creates an issue on reputation risk.  

Amy: I think as well, the message of animal welfare just being less developed in those countries too. I think there's such an awareness building, as you were saying, from perhaps public policy or talking about diet change. I've certainly noticed myself in traveling through different countries in Asia that it just seems as though, especially when it comes to kind of the wet markets or street food, I think the understanding of animal welfare and what that looks like in practice also perhaps isn't as developed as it is in Europe and again, the US as those two kinds of main examples. 

And so, when we talk about reputational risk, what that needs to mean is that the consumers care enough that they would be bothered about the reputational risk of the company. So, I think if there also isn't that public awareness, then you could say: ‘Look at these conditions and isn't this awful?’ and perhaps there would be less concern from the public around those issues, anyway. So, yeah, that was just kind of a side comment. But I think this is a really interesting point and why, as you're absolutely right, we need to have a way more localised solution. 

Jaya: That’s right, Amy. Like, you know, there's this famous quote, right, that goes like: ‘Well, if the slaughterhouses had glass walls, everybody would be vegetarian.’ In India, slaughterhouses have no wall. Like, there is no glass. 

Amy: Yeah. [Laughing]

Jaya: So, most people grow, they look at a live bird in a chicken shop, select the bird that is slaughtered right in front of their eyes, dressed, put in a plastic bag, and given to them. 

So, I think, again, a lot of these sensitivities that we think that are true – similarly with relation to farmer relation, in the sense like, say: ‘Oh, industrial animal agriculture is really bad, and you have these giant companies…’ But when you look at Asia, you still have giant companies but a vast majority of Asian egg producers– and again, very different to the broiler system – are independent farmers, as in they are not small holders; they're still independent farmers who wake up in the morning not to be cruel to animals. It's not like this farmer is like: ‘Well, today is my day.’ Instead, they wake up in the morning to make ends meet, put a good meal on the table, make money. 

I lead that growth aspiration that every Asian, including I, have. In the sense that that’s all that's being done. And so, in the sense that when you go and talk to a farmer and say: ‘Well, we want you to move from cage to cage-free’, what are you really fighting? You're fighting that aspiration to grow, the aspiration to make money. And sometimes an aspiration just to ensure that their children are able to go to school and there's a meal put on the table, and they don't miss a mortgage, so on and so forth. They aren't waking in the morning and say that: ‘Well, I need to keep these birds in cages because I'm making a point.’ They're like: ‘Well, this is the most efficient system and I'm going to gravitate towards that efficiency. 

And hence, with Global Food Partners, we emphasise so much on building capacity of farmers and farm workers because cage-free can be efficient. I don't want your listeners to go back saying that ‘cage-free is inefficient’. Obviously, cage-free can be efficient. It's just that cage-free is efficient when you build a producer's capacity. Because when the farmer is a conventional cage-farmer, they're an egg farmer, and when they become a cage-free farmer, they become a hen farmer. It's just a change in the attitude and change in what the staff personship looks like, so on and so forth. And that's done with a lot of training and capacity building of the farmers. 

So again, to broadly kind of close the loop on the two learnings: one is that you need localised approaches and figure out where you would be investing and in what kind of campaigns or what kind of action. And the second important thing, for me at least, has been that farmers don't wake up in the morning saying that: ‘Well, today my life's goal is to herd animals.’

James: First of all, those two learnings are very useful. So, I think they kind of consolidate or echo what other people have said and we've heard. So, I think that's all super useful, especially some of the localised knowledge you have. 

And I was also curious to hear, I guess personally, both in your previous work in HSI India and now obviously with Global Food Partners, how do you feel the Asian cage-free movement or industry is doing now relative to maybe six years ago? And how do you feel about these prospects kind of going forward? 

Jaya: I generally don't believe in forecast, James. I know a lot of people making fun of that. 

James: That's no fun. You have to make the podcast interesting. [Laughing] Go on, Jay, go give us something. 

Amy: [Laughing]

Jaya: As in, most people who forecast don't know what they're forecasting or…

James: That’s true, fair enough. But you do know – you’re more like and expo forecaster and not just any old person. 

Jaya: I would say there are no – I know that there's like a whole forecasting community and so on and so forth. I'm not a big believer in forecast builders. Just like the market dynamics, they're just so – they pull you into different ways. So, when you say: Where's cage-free going? Cage-free is going, depending on where the war in Gaza is going; If cage-free is going, what happens with red sea? Are we able to get soy and corn to move efficiently from Latin America, South America to Asia? Cage-free is going, depending on how the tourism recap post Covid is going to happen. 

So, I guess it's just that again – and I don't want to take away the romanticism of ethics and this state of the art of the conversation. And it's easy to say: ‘Well, people are becoming more knowledgeable, the internet is penetrating, and it seems that the future is cage-free.’ In a sense that would be a boilerplate answer. 

But I do think that when you're making forecast, we don't know what the future is, but we know what the past is and we know what the present is, right? As in, I think those are three important things [for forecasting]. If we were to see, would these multinational companies who have commitments actually fulfil the commitment without some sort of help? Looking at the past, it seems unlikely; just purely based on looking at the past. And when I'm looking in the past I am looking at the cage-free commitments. What happened to great commitments?

A lot of them that were coming in 2020: what has been the implementation, has there been reporting? It's happened in Canada, it's happened a bit in the US, but if you really look at the cage-free commitments for major retailers and food businesses, we haven't really seen the continued traction beyond 2020, now 2024. So, if I were to just purely look from a cage-free commitment point of view, I would say: ‘Well, maybe there isn't a past that will show us that it will have been implemented. 

When I look at the present, am I seeing purchase orders? We're seeing a lot of interest. There's a small portion of purchase orders, but there's a case to be made that a company does not need to place its purchase order because the commitments are only due December 31, 2025. And as long as they are able to somehow get those aims by December 21, 2035, and we offer any credits and some other options (and we can talk about these a little later) to create market efficiencies, then you could say that, well, the companies are leading there. 

So, when I look at now, there's a huge amount of interest from the companies to fulfil these commitments. Now, whether that would actually translate into physical cage-free farms being set up, whether that would translate into these farms to be economically viable, not from the point of time when Compassion is going to put out its egg track on 2025, but in 2026, 2027, 2028, 2029, 2030 so on and so forth, without the legislation coming in to keep this thing afloat, is broadly going to depend on how the markets are going to react to the system. The fact is that cage-free is more expensive; the fact is this business will gravitate towards their bottom line; and the fact is that the world is a very uncertain place now with everything that's happening and in agriculture, climate change and the war and the feed prices being really high, and overproduction, and also post-Covid countries becoming more and more inward looking, so like export bats and so on and so forth. 

So, I guess I wouldn't want to make a projection saying that: ‘Well, this is what it is.’ But our hope at least is if the active leads that are there currently, if they were to be fulfilled, there is going to be some traction towards cage-free in Asia. So, I'm not sure that's the big bold forecast that you were looking, but that's what I would be confident to say at this point of time. 

Amy: I think we have to have that realistic opinion. That's why I was so interested to hear what you had to say to James's question, because I think we do sit in a rather optimistic bubble sometimes which is a bit like: ‘because there is so much progress in other regions and we think it's a formula that can just be picked up and applied to others, so we just need to do that again and then we'll have all this other progress’. I think it's really good to – I love that approach of grounding it in the past and then thinking about where we sit now in order to make a really pragmatic prediction as to how the commitments will progress and what the movement looks like there. 

When I was working in the sort of global cage-free space, there was definitely an understanding from my perspective that commitments for big players in the US, for example, would really influence other regions where the cage-free movement was less developed. So, for example, a big company would make a commitment, but then, because it was a global commitment, they had to then match the India offices, Thailand branches, so also transitioning their supply over to something from cage to cage-free. How much of an impact would you say in reality that has had? Or do you feel like, as you said before, perhaps those companies are just waiting out until that 2025 deadline and perhaps don't transition or don't move, but we maybe feel as though, because enough progress is made in the US, that's okay? Is there a kind of pressure on them to start that ball rolling? 

Jaya: When we founded Global Food Partners, the first thing that we did was we did a needs assessment survey and we spoke with farmers. So, we interviewed farmers in all the countries that we operate in, and it's actually published; peer-review published with multiple universities on board. And then we asked the farmers, both cage as well as cage-free: ‘What do you really need?’ And I think broadly, there were three things that came up from the farmers. One is: ‘Well, we need the market to actually do the transition’ which is pretty obvious. And these were open-ended questions. So, it wasn't even like we prepped them. So, we basically opened the questions and got them to be filled in. And it was also a questionnaire rather than a group discussion where you would have a dominant player who would bias the rule. So, this was like a questionnaire in a local language, in Indonesian, and so on and so forth. Then we asked both cage as well as cage-free producers. And I think the key things were cage-free producers were like: ‘Well, we are seeing a market for cage-free and we want to kind of invest, and hence we are doing that cage-free.’ We had cage producers who are like: ‘Well, we think that management is really hard in cage-free. We don't want to transition to cage-free.’ So we saw, well, if you're able to create a market and technical support, then the transition is going to happen. And hence, we set up Global Food Partners to work on both ends of the supply chain. We do supply chain assessments, offer companies different means and methods to fulfil their cage-free commitment – that could be either through physical sourcing or by buying impact incentive or bucket claim credits that we offer, where companies could largely offset their use of cage-tax by buying cage credits. And we also have a system where we provide a whole lot of technical support to farmers, a model farm in Indonesia, a model farm in China, online courses, VR, and so on and so forth. 

And all of this is back to that initial question that these global commitments do hypothetically extend to Asia. And I think these companies will fulfil these commitments if it's reasonable and seems possible for them to do. And I think what we've been successful in, is to create relatable role models for companies so they ca say: ‘Well, this company is able to do’ – for example, we work with companies like Uniliver. We've developed a roadmap for Uniliver; a roadmap to go from a very low percentile to 100% by 2025 with a combination of cage and cage-free. 

So, I think there's a huge value in these global companies who made commitments to extend to Asia. If there is an ecosystem for them to implement it. Obviously, there are multiple caveats there. So, for example, some of them would be like: ‘Well, it only is company-owned and operated.’ Then we don't know what company owned and operated is. Or you could have a used commitment that says: ‘We will meet cage-free in markets where cage-free is available’ which basically means none of Asia. And also, I think reporting can be a little bit – for example, the latest compassions extract reported very good numbers for APAC, but that's also considering Australia and New Zealand. So, you've got to kind of start peeling the onion to see what it is. Because when you're able to look at some sort of macro numbers, it might end up seeming, at least for the global companies, that they are actually making considerable amount of progress because a vast amount of their businesses might end up being in the US and Europe and Australia, New Zealand and so on and so forth. And they might have company structures that exclude India, China, because they're like completely independent subsidiaries, for which commitments don't exist, or they're a joint venture or a franchisee. For example, there's a big coffee chain in India and they are set up as a JV, so their commitment does not extend to that particular JV in India, is what they claim. 

Overall, I think if these cage free commitments were not there, I think even this one opportunity to get the birds out of cages wouldn't exist. So, I'm not undermining the value of these cage free commitments, but are these cage-free commitments somehow that magic pill to get a vast number of birds out of cages in Asia? Probably not, but it's definitely a good kickstart.

James: It seems like your kind of idea with the Unilever is using them as social proof to other companies, like: ‘Look, Unilever has done it. They're a huge conglomerate, and they've done it in a reasonable timeframe.’ 

How useful is that kind of like social proof or example to actually convincing other companies? 

Jaya: So again, it goes back, right? A purchasing manager at a hospitality chain does not wake up in the morning, saying: ‘I need to buy birds x from cages’ right? Nobody is actually making that decision saying: ‘Am I buying from cages or am I buying from cage-free?’ A purchasing manager is waking up and saying: ‘Well, this is my line item’ – and everybody has their KPI, right? What does a Marriott Hotels, or let's say any five-star hotels, just edit the name out of a company. So, let's take a hospitality company, let's say a five-star hotel in Pali. What is the purchasing manager's mandate? While one of their mandates could be that they have to purchase cage-free, their key mandate is that when the guests wake up in the morning and come to the buffet, there has to be eggs. These particular eggs have to fall within that particular line item that's been given for perishables, right? So, when we are asking them to change, they're looking for a reliable supplier, they're looking for some sort of reduced cost overall. And they also want to ensure that transition doesn't create any additional reputation risk. So, if you end up having a tiny cage-free farmer where there's a food safety issue overall on the farm, and then you kind of realise: ‘Well, I'm buying cage-free, but there's salmonella contamination because they just picked up the eggs without washing their hands, because they're a small hd farmer who is not training them for biosecurity; my reputation risk is much larger. And I think it's a real reputation risk. Like a guest gets a stomach blue for their birthday in Bali.’

Again, to go back, and I don't want to make it seem like it's all market, but for me, at least where I sit, it's all market-driven in the sense like when we are looking at the buyer’s perspective, the buyer needs a reliable supply chain with low cost, which does not create additional reputation risk. A producer wants a reliable buyer who is going to buy eggs because they are doing this whole capital chain. They want reduced friction in delivering these eggs to this particular producer or for buyers. Otherwise, small quantity transportation, so on and so forth. And what they definitely need is capacity and skills building so that they're able to run their farm as well. So, I guess if you're able to create these two, the change is going to happen. 

Amy: But where do you think that margin sits? I felt really compelled when you were talking originally about the individual farmers, and they're just trying to make ends meet. And then when we go towards the kind of company ends, definitely my impression is that we're fighting kind of like greed versus higher welfare. It certainly feels like that in Europe; that the messaging is that these corporates just want to make a ton of money, so they're using the baseline welfare in order to get the eggs as cheap as possible so that their margins are increasing. And then there's also the side of the consumer. Where should we as consumers be footing that bill for the higher welfare? Is that the responsibility of the consumer? Is it the margin at the company level? What does that look like for you? And where do you think that responsibility of footing that cost and footing that bill really lies? Is it still similarly that sense of like, there being greed at some point where we're sacrificing the increase in finance over the welfare of the animals? 

Jaya: I think greed is a strong word. Well, it might seem, but again, a company is established for a pure purpose to create maximum returns to the shareholders. And what is a company in a sense? So, a bunch of optimisation. And when we talk about reputation risk, what are we really talking about? In the sense of like: ‘Will my perceived value of the company drop because its stock value is going to drop and that's going to create – as in finally, it all boils down to the fact that whether I am able to give enough value to shareholder listed or unlisted? Finally, it all boils down to this because companies are by design set up that way. So, in that sense, companies by design – you could say that capitalism in itself is greedy. That's a way to say it. 

But I think I'm not necessarily sure that if we were to say: ‘Well, we need to fight the greed and bring in altruism within the market economy’ – I don't know; ESG is a great example. We need to see how the markets are going to respond to ESG. Is it just going to be a fat bubble? Will money actually go in? I know that there are ESG ETFs. We know that SASB is now requiring animal welfare to be reported within their reporting platform. We have mutual funds which are there. You're able to alter your pension funds towards one. And I think groups like ARE doing a fabulous work on trying to bring that conversation into the forefront of the boardrooms. But I guess there has been some amount of change, but I don't know whether that change is going to last and how long that particular change will last. So, it's going to be an interesting example. And it's not just going to be with animal welfare. I think it's generally with ESG overall. And we've seen tons, right. For example, climate financing; we have new bonds which are climate friendly bonds. You have various financing mechanisms that have kind of come in and animal welfare somehow has to sit within, and a huge shout out to ARD and groups like that for doing a good amount of work to bring this within the forefront. 

James: Asia Research and Engagement, right? I assume you're talking about them. 

Jaya: Yes, ARE is Asia Research and Engagement. Yeah, it's Kid Blessak and Cole who run the animal welfare aspect of this. And again, they would be a great guest to any podcast if you ever wanted a guest from ARE. 

To get back to the answer: in the sense, I don't think it's agreed in overall. In the sense that it finally comes down to what's your motivation? The motivation is to derive the best amount of value for your investor. And if your investor starts seeing value in animal welfare, the market will gravitate towards that. At this point of time, I know that the Jim Greenbaum Foundation is doing some amount of work in that there is some general Asia research and engagement they are doing. But I guess we need to still see how mainstream it's going to get within the board. 

And I guess finally what we believe is that if a CEO c-level compensation has to get linked to the implementation of ESG plus goals, that's when things will actually start changing; when the CEO is saying: ‘Hey, listen, at the end of the year, we are not only just going to be looking at the total number of franchisees, the total number of new footfall’… whatever might be the KPI that the CEO salary is; they say: ‘I want to see what's your ESG progress like’. And as a note, I say ‘ESG plus’ because animal welfare and everything else – a lot of things fall into that. I guess till that happens, wherein the implementation of this falls straight within a c-level officials or KPI, I don't know how it's going to tickle down. Because finally, what does the – if you really look on the pyramid of a company, right, the lowest is the purchasing officer who's front-facing with the father. But the purchasing officer does not have money to say: ‘Well, I pay 40% more for cage-free.’ There needs to be somebody at a country-level who's saying that: ‘Well, I'm going to give you that additional money.’ That additional money has to come from somebody from finance, and somebody from finance needs to be told by the CEO or CFO something like: ‘Well, we're going to authorise more money.’ So for that to happen, there has to be motivation for the CEO and CFO to actually do it. So, I think it all boils down to that; as to whether we are able to create a market case for animal welfare and say that not implementing animal welfare commitments is going to diminish the company's value. 

James: How likely is it, do you think, we'll actually be able to make a case so strong? Because that seems – I don't know the exact cost differential of cage versus cage-free eggs in the countries where you work. But yeah, maybe if you said 40%, maybe more…I guess my question is: do you think the harms to the companies of not transitioning is actually so significant it would actually outweigh the increase in cost? Like in a material way, I think. 

Jaya: It can be done. I feel like the cost is actually negligible, even though it's 40%. 

I think eggs are an interesting protein item, right? Per gram, they are the cheapest in many places. But then they also have a comparatively large footprint overall. And I guess it broadly I think – Amy I kind of started answering your question – it depends on where you find the money for implementing this. So, there are two or three ways, right? 

When we develop a roadmap for a company to implement, the one thing that you can do is just pass it on to the consumer. That's a simple thing that you do, right, as in there is this shop in Singapore where you go and say: ‘Well, a cage-free egg costs a dollar more.’ But then you're expecting the end-consumer to have enough knowledge to make that decision. There's also a case to be made that maybe you make cage-free the default. And if somebody does not want cage-free, then they say: ‘I don't want cage-free’ and you reduce the price by a dollar, or whatever. That's one model overall. 

Now there is another model where especially for a food service company, where you're able to pass it on to the client in your contracts overall. That's another option that exists. 

The third option is you just internalise it in a PNL; you find it in your marketing budget, you find your story-telling budget, you find it somewhere within your margin. Because companies do operate in margins that are thin or big, depending on what the product is and what the criteria is. 

And hence we offer different solutions, kind of bringing back to what we do at GFP. The good thing about GFP is that we probably have thought about a solution for most of these problems and in the sense of whether it's going to work or not, time will tell, not forecasting, but we hope that it will. So, we now realize that: ‘Well, there is a friction and there is a cost increase.’ Now how much that cost increase is going to be is going to depend completely on what value the company sees in meeting its cage-free commitments and the claim it wants to make. 

So, if you are a supermarket in, let's say Singapore or Indonesia, which is targeting the upwardly-mobile-income clientele, who is walking in, you want to make a claim that this particular acre is cage-free and tell a story narration. So, you get an opportunity to say: ‘Well, we're working with this farmer, we are building the capacity of a farmer, here is an egg, with good quality.’ And you pick up this egg, there's a good feeling and there's probably some sort of a sensory experience for the end consumer as well, basically because they're supporting something. So, there's that one element for that one. 

But you also might have convenience stores and people who are walking into convenience stores and picking this up, who are not looking for what the label of the egg is saying. Instead, they're literally looking for that sale and picking up the cheapest possible one. And again, not passing judgments as the people have different motivation depending on what their life situation is at that particular point of time and the choices are basically their own. And from that particular company's point of view, we are like: ‘Could you just buy an offset credit which is going to be so low in cost that it's going to be a rounding error in your general books, but you're still able to meet your cage-free commitments?’ 

So, I guess to answer your question, how likely: it's not a phenomenally large number. It is a large number; it is something that companies can do because they have made commitments. And if they know that if the signal goes from the bottom rank saying that: ‘Well, if you were to give me extra money, I can actually do it.’ companies will find the money to do it. 

Of course, with the reporting and other initiatives continuing to exist and offering companies these different traceability models where they're able to make different claims for different segments of people, be it a farm to fork segment, where you're able to make a higher claim and price it more than for the segment of people who are pretty price sensitive, buy credits and then you're able to play around the PNL to actually meet the commitments. And companies can do it with different options.

James: When you buy offset credits, can you explain what you mean by that? Because I think that's one of the services that GFP offers. Do you want to say more about how that actually works? 

Jaya: When we founded GFP, we did research on how other sustainability commitments are actually being met? And one of our biggest one was RSPO, the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil. We also saw how RTRS, that's the Roundtable on Sustainable Soy, Textile Exchange (which is for textile obviously); how are they pushing their commitments to wheat? And so, when we did the needs assessment and we did the roundtables on the buyers and the sellers, we identified some of the problems. And I guess the key issue was that, and we spoke about this earlier, a reliable supply chain costs more. The cost of logistics itself is a headache. You have very small volumes and getting these eggs is a nightmare. All of those. So, we said: ‘Well, what did these other companies do?’ And then we realised: ‘Well, offsetting could be easy.’ 

So, the way it works is when an egg farmer that's a cage-free egg farmer is selling an egg, they're selling an egg as well as a claim that it is cage-free. Our current model requires the egg and the claim to travel together in a complex supply chain to reach an end-buyer who is looking for cage-free eggs for their company. So, we said that: ‘Well, could we detach the egg in the claim that the producer made?’ So, the producer detaches the eggs in the claim, so what's left is an egg and that claim that it's cage free. Sell the egg in the open market as caged eggs because you can't sell it as cage-free because you take it the clear market. Hold on to the claim. Companies basically buy caged eggs for whoever they're buying in customer to buy and they buy the claim from this cage producer and they add the claim on their egg. So primarily you're able to meet your cage free commitment without actually changing your vendors and all of that by offsetting, by buying from a cage-free producer. And that's the lowest-friction way of meeting cage free commitments. And that's a system that we offer. It's not something that we innovated. We made it better with some side cuts. We've basically taken it from how RSPO, RTRS, Monsucro and other sustainability initiative work. 

James: And obviously that only works – the cage-free producers are often in different countries where there's sufficient supply in cage-free eggs such that it's not a sticking point. So basically, is it kind of like international offsetting? Is that often how it works? 

Jaya: So, we actually require jurisdictional offsetting. So that means that you can't just buy from a random country. One of the safeguards that we use is that you can only buy credits from a country where you could hypothetically buy physical eggs from. Because we do want companies to put out a type of bound plan to move towards a physical supply group and not stay within the realm of credits forever. And I guess there are two kinds of producers. One could be producers who currently have an overproduction. They want to supply the eggs, but then the logistics is a nightmare. 

So, Indonesia is a great example. The cage-free producers are all in the island of Java. The hospitality industry has a huge concentration in the island of Bali. The island of Bali. The land is very expensive, small island, pretty hospitality driven. So, how do you get the eggs from the island of Java? You put them in a truck, and then a boat, and a ferry to reach Bali. So, the credits are being very expensive. So, in those cases, credits are a great way. So, it could be a situation where a farmer has an excess production, wants to supply, is unable to supply primarily because of supply chain issues. 

It could be another case where the buyer wants to expand. It's their buy, but they are nervous to move towards a single supplier market because they're like: ‘Well, if there's an avian influenza out, what do I do? Where do I get my eggs from?’ So, it helps build that trust so you could have a new cage-free facility set in. It still doesn't get into your supply chain. They produce, then you build a trust, then you slowly move in. 

The third place, where the credit system works very well, is in processed eggs, where you are a processed-egg buyer, but your volume is too low for the minimum order quantity for an egg cracker to crack. So, if you want, they're not going to stop their line. Buy cage-free eggs and just crack for you because of just the volume issues in those cases, what happens is that cage-free credits are a great way. So, I guess some of these options where companies could just potentially buy cage-free credits to meet their animal wealth commitments. 

James: I've never even thought about voim issues and egg cracking and production lines. So that was a whole new world I just came into. So thank you for that very interesting fact. 

Amy: I wonder if you can speak to any other sort of cost implications. I think perhaps naive level thinking about just removing cages from a farm. There's not necessarily an implication that there's such a big cost there. We're literally talking about some cages being removed from probably an already existing barn and then the birds are able to roam free. I think perhaps for some, it feels like a very simple process and maybe they wouldn't understand necessarily the cost implications. You spoke briefly at the beginning about the loans that the farmers perhaps took out on those cages that still need to be paid back. I wonder if you can talk a little more about some of the other costs actually involved in that transition to try and help us understand what that looks like from a farmer perspective. 

Jaya: Cage free farms can be of different sizes. Farms, so it's not like one particular way. So you could have a very low tech cage free farm. So it's your traditional deep litter system. So it's just a shed, you put out some, maybe a bamboo. Basically, what we are really looking for the cage free system is you need to have access to perch. The birds need to have access to a nest box, a place for them to dust bathe broadly, and then of course, talking density and ammonia and so on and so forth. But these are the three things that we really need, right? A perch, a place to dust bathe, and a nest box to lay eggs. So there are easier, cheaper ways to do that. That means you put out like a bamboo purchase and something handmade. 

Jaya: You're either putting like urban pots and the bird can roll the eggs there. Obviously the capital expenditure is low, but the flip side of that is that the cost of production can end up being a little bit more primarily because you need labor to go and collect eggs and so on and so forth. And then also so much human interaction. You can bring in diseases and they can mortality. You end up having flow eggs because the birds are not designed, the barn is not designed. Well, you could also have heat stress if there's not enough ventilation and so on and so forth. So you can have that. 

Jaya: So in a sense, it's a trade off that the farmer has to think as to whether they can go with a higher capital expenditure on the initial side where the cost of production optimizes or you kind of go low on the capital expenditure and the cost of production is kind of increases. If that's primary. The ask now, what are the costs like when you move from a cage to cage free? Let's take a hypothetical situation where the cost of cages 100% depreciate. That means that you have recuperated the entire cost of cages and you're now willing to change. When you really pull that out, it isn't easy because a lot of times what happens is that the shed that the cage systems are built, you can't very simply retrofit a cage free into it. 

Jaya: So in the sense like the height that you need the ventilation system, so on and so forth differ a lot. And in fact, the model farm that we are building in China is one experiment where we are actually retrofitting a caged farm into cage free and documenting it to show that how. And it's a nightmare to do that because these sheds are not designed for those modern houses to just go in. So retrofitting is hard, but you can try and do it in the sense like you could try and reuse the a frames and stuff like that. And we're trying to do that in our modern farm in China at the Shanxi Agriculture University. So we're taking one of the Shanxi Agriculture university's cage farm and retrofitting that into cage free to show how it is done. 

Jaya: So the cost primarily increases on just the capital expenditure that you need in the sense like the nest boxes and the menu trays and this, that and the other. Obviously, you can reduce that over by buying cheaper one. So, for example, our Indonesia model farm is kind of built in such a way where a farmer with low capital expenditure can see and learn as well. But if you want to have a little bit more, then you have the ventilation system and control through computer, so on and so forth. I guess the big expense that is there is in terms of the capital expenditure in itself. And the reason why I say that's a big expenditure is if one were to define risk as loss of capital, right? 

Jaya: A lot of times I wouldn't define risk as the market variation of price going up and price going down. Because over a long period of time, you start seeing that equilibrium. Price goes up, price goes down, you find equilibrium. But I guess from a farmer's point of view, when they say there's a risk in going KHv, they're not talking about the price of khVX going down and the price of KHv X going up. What they're really talking about is, am I at a risk of losing my capital? And the losing of capital will happen if I don't have an end buyer to my product. So if I end up setting up a cage farm, I put these birds hoping that somebody is going to buy. And if the buyers bar and they say, sorry, not buying, we're pushing a commitment to 2030. 

Jaya: I mean, you don't really have a retail market. That's where the real risk is. So in a perfect market where the buyers keep their end, give a long term commitment of about three years to buy these kg eggs. Depending on whatever might be the capital capacity of the farmer, you are able to run a successful, economically viable kg farm. 

James: I think if only people kept true to their words and you could kind of rely on other people's commitments, then things would be much easier. But sadly, we don't live in that world. So I think it makes sense that you don't want to get into a significant financial investment without knowing fairly certainly that you're going to be made better off, at least in the long run. 

Jaya: And also, James, the reason why we emphasize so much on capacity building, because a lot of times I feel like, as Amy said, right, we oversimplify what cage three is like, oh, just go remove the barn, put the birds in and it's done. And some farmers do that. And then you realize that the birds are. Where do you get the issues? Right? Where do you get your pullets from? The pullets have to be railed in a similar environment in which they're going to be there for their laying period. So if you take a pullet. So just to kind of say for your listeners who might not know this term. 

Jaya: So most of the egg laying hens come as a day old chick, and they are railed in a raring facility where they're brooded together with like lights and heat, light and so on and so forth, till they start reach their sexual maturity, age, till they are basically called as fullocks. At that point of time where they're right about to lay eggs. And in most cases from a raiding facility, they are moved to a laying facility. There could be cases where you have all in, all out systems where you bring in the old chick and they stay in that same farm, but that's very rare, because by the time this bird comes to cull, you want to have the next bird ready. So most farms will end up having a raring facility and a laying facility. 

Jaya: Now, what's really important is that the bird needs to be familiar on the laying facility and the rearing facility has to be familiar to the bird. If it's too vastly different, the bird's like, where have you suddenly brought me? So in a sense, it has to meet the same temperature. It's an animal, right? In a sense, like, you raid this bird in, let's say, a cage, and then you suddenly brought the bird from a cage to cage free and put the bird in laying stage in a cage free system. Then the bird's like, I have no idea how to navigate this complex maze of purchase and stuff like that. So I guess it's very important. And then if farmers would simplify and they take their caged pullets, put them in a caged epicity, then you end up having issues. 

Jaya: Like, the birds don't know how to use their nest box, they don't know how to perch, they end up laying eggs on the floor. Sometimes, if there isn't enough nutrition, sort of feed that kind of matches for cage free, you might end up having feather pecking as an issue, which is there you don't have enough enrichment. There can be feather picking, and all of this can see your flock pretty quickly. You have a feather picking note. Feather picking to cannibalism is a thin line, so you never know when the behavior of feather picking can move towards cannibalism, and then that's it. And I guess the issue is this, right? 

Jaya: If you have a tHV farm, and if that particular tHV farm fails, the farmer is always going to blame the system and say that, oh, my God, there's a reason why you need to keep in cages. If there's a cage farm and the birds die, they're going to blame themselves, say that we did something wrong, right? Because that's the people's mind. So in that sense, and hence, we want to ensure that when a farmer sets up a cage, we farm they exactly know what they're getting into. It's not oversimplified for them, but again, not to make it daunting, but to build capacity and say, well, you can do this, but these are the stuff that you have to keep in mind. You've got to have great biosecurity. You'll have to ensure that there's enough birching place. 

Jaya: You need to have enrichment, not because of the birds, but just to keep the birds healthy. And then you kind of realize that farmers get it, and once they get it, they want to do it. It's just that somebody has to build that capacity. And in fact, the lay period of a cage free bird can be more than a cage bird. So it can become more profitable from a bird point of view as well, because these birds end up being more healthier, so they can lay for a longer period of time and don't have to be culled. 

Jaya: So you get even a couple of weeks, and even a one or two weeks that you get at the end of the lay period ends up being more profitable to the farmer, because then you, again, look at a bird, right, zero to 16 or 18 weeks where the bird is, pull it, you're feeding the bird and you're not getting any money out of that bird at all. Like it's just a bird. Then you bring the bird to a laying house and the bird starts to lay eggs. For now, for a couple of months, you are actually just recuperating the cost of the feed that you gave the bird when the bird was reaching its sexual maturity. Then you're paying for the capital expenditure and you're recuperating all the cost the last few weeks of the bird. Those eggs are when you're actually making money. 

Jaya: Now, if the bird dies, for whatever reason, be it cannibalism or disease outbreak or whatever, or smothering is very common on GHD farms as well, because then ventilation isn't okay, or whatever might be the reason then if the bird dies, that means that you've lost the money and you're unable to make that money. What is the real world implication of that? Cage free is more expensive because they have to do the economics on a flock size, right? And if cage free is more expensive, companies won't buy it. So there is a case to be made for optimizing cage free production without compromising the welfare of the bird. And it can be done through capacity building overall. So it's not something that. 

Jaya: It cannot be done, but it's not something that needs to be super simplified saying that, well, why don't just remove your cages, put some nest boxes and perch and leave your birds, and your birds are going to be happy. The ods are. That will be a failed flock. And then it ends up being a folklore amongst the farming community, like, oh, my God, do you know what happened to that farm? 

James: And then just to get back to the mechanics of your conversations with egg producers and the companies who have made the commitments, I'm curious, what do you hear when the other groups, or other groups in animal movements, such as whether it's the humane leaves the most animals or the synergy animals, when they actually wage these corporate campaigns against these companies? Do you hear anything from the companies saying, oh, these groups on my shoulder again, or, oh, I need to do X and Y and can you work with me? Or is that not a thing that really happens? 

Jaya: I don't think it's something that explicitly happens. I don't think. I at least haven't seen a company would be like, oh, my God, help me get Aaron off my back. In a sense. 

Amy: Aaron specifically, this guy. 

Jaya: Didn'T be like, oh, my God. So, Chris, are creating a nightmare in my inbox, like, get me out, come back. One thing that happened. But I do think companies will sometimes ask us saying that, hey, especially on our credit system, companies will ask us saying that, well, are the animal groups on board? If we buy these credits to meet our KHP commitments, will we get a flak for doing little? And I think a lot of times they want reassurance. And I guess as a consultant, one of the things that makes us at Global Food Partners attractive is also because we come from the movement and we understand what the expectation of the animal welfare community. And I think that one of the key roles that we are doing at GFP, I feel like, is bridging the communication between the animal welfare groups and the industry. 

Jaya: So I sit on the board of the National Poultry Welfare alliance, which is purely animal agriculture and welfare alliance, and I think it's a good conversation. And I feel like you give perspectives on both the sides and balance out expectations. Actually, all three sides, because we front face with the farmers, we front face with companies, we also front face with advocacy groups as well. Or at least we know the advocacy groups really well and their expectation because we come from that world. So in that sense, what I guess makes it attractive for companies to hire us as a consulting is primarily because we do bridge that expectation and reality gap amongst these different stakeholders. 

Amy: And is that true across the board, or are there some animal advocacy organizations that just aren't interested in your approach and feel like it is too sympathetic towards industry and farmers. Have you had much pushback internally from the movement? 

Jaya: A founder of one of the leading animal rights groups in the country. When I put out on LinkedIn saying that we're setting up global food partners, they said that, oh my God. Never knew you were such a big sell off, was the subject line of the email. And I do think that people feel uncomfortable saying that. Oh my God, you're like in cohorts with the industry. How could you talk about making cage free more profitable? I've also had people who are saying that, well, if cage free becomes more profitable, then companies are never going to move towards plant based. You're doing a disservice. So I wouldn't necessarily say that everybody's thrilled about the work that we are doing and I don't think that's even the expectation. I guess people do have different mindsets, I think I've heard. 

Jaya: And again, I sit on the board of GFI India, so I see the value of plant based and alternatives and so forth in terms of protein diversification. I also see the limitation there. So in the sense like from food businesses point of view, when they come in to talk to global food partners, we are able to give this multiple perspective as to where the all protein and bridging the protein gap. What's the role of eggs as real animal source protein is going to be what the expectation of the stakeholders are, especially the animal, and with the groups of stakeholders benchmark them against their own peers, but definitely wouldn't say that we have fans across. I'm sure they'll make out whole bunch of people. I think we're more probably a little bit more likable within the effect of animal ethics law films. 

James: I think it's interesting that you're also on the board of GFI India and yeah, I think I can imagine all the flak you guys get. But I guess from my little bit of reading around other issues, other social issues, whether it's like animal testing or also like climate, often it's very hard to make progress if there's no viable alternatives to what you're trying to change. And if you just say, hey, just don't use eggs, hey, just use plant based products, it's like, it's not like actually like a really viable or feasible ass. It's just not really going to happen. And of course you can say this is the moral high ground, but it's not enough to have the moral high ground, as you actually need things to change. So I think there's a really good case of Henry Spira, very famous animal rights activist. 

James: And when he was waging against animal testing, his big ask was like, I want you to fund animal testing alternatives, so then you can actually use this later, because he knew that was necessary for it to be changed fundamentally. 

Jaya: That's right. And again, I maybe overstate this. The market is a vigilante. It slays anybody. If you were to go in with a pure ethics and morality, this, that, and the other. The vigilante market does not like it. And there's nobody who has actually fought and won against the market in the history of humankind. Like, in a sense, the markets dictate. Markets know what the truth is, and if you don't make a product appealable to the markets, it's not going to survive. 

James: Yeah, I guess you can imagine that. I don't know, as many people working in the nonprofit industry, we don't have an amazing understanding of markets. So I guess I'm not too surprised that people can be skeptical of this approach. But it's like, we're the minority of the world working in the nonprofit industry. The vast majority of the world runs a different way. So, yeah, it's important to be cognizant of that. 

Amy: So thinking of that then, Jaya, thinking about how this being a kind of pragmatic approach to that challenge that we face about the markets moving and wanting to encourage more cage free, and perhaps having to get really down to that granular level on a country basis and understand how that works internally in order to aid that transition. What's your kind of global food partners plan in terms of trying to push that out to more countries? I know that you're hiring for some roles right now. Is that because the demand for your service has surpassed the resource that you currently hold? 

Jaya: We don't tend to expand beyond where we operate currently. And in fact, we're also rationalizing some of the regions. So our recent addition to the work that we work is India. We brought India into the four b, where in doing so, in terms of just like with our footprint for a comparatively small organization, we cover almost a vast majority of the egg market in the world because we have, like, China, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore. But a lot of the. We do operate here, and I think we want to continue. We do get requests on diversifying on protein as well, and say that, well, we want to work on metabolism. We don't want to do that at this point. Of time. I think there's a case for doing little and there's a case for being focused, laser focused. 

Jaya: And it's also interesting for me as a mind coming from being an ED of an organization whose byline was all animals to literally saying cage free eggs. It's a bit of a shirt overall, but I think we're not looking to expand. I think the reason why we are hiring is we are anticipating that our services, we are two capacity now, and I guess as 2025 comes closer, there'll be a lot more need for our services and hence we are staffing appropriately. And a vast majority of our work that we do also works on specialist contractors. So we build capacity of various contractors who are able to go on farm and provide support. And since we also build industry consortiums, and so a lot of times we end up being that one stop so where a farmer can come to us. 

Jaya: For example, our Indonesia model farm was built with the consortium of bencomatic as an equipment provider, Hendrix as a genetic company, Hartwe as a lighting company, Hotracko as a ventilation computer company, and many others. So when a farmer comes in, they get a whole package as to what kind of services exist. Obviously, they don't have to buy from these equipment providers, but we give them access to these classes to do what they need to do. So I guess we are anticipating the growth and starting for that, just to clarify for listeners. 

Amy: So the majority of global commitments will come into fruition at the end of 2025. So that's when companies have committed to going cage free. They have to set a timeline on when that transition will be complete. And for the majority of commitments currently, that end goal is 2025. And so that's why there'll be such an influx of companies requiring your help, companies kind of rushing to make those types of transitions. Another big point was in 2020, a lot of the original us commitments and some european commitments were made, and the deadline was that 2020. There's also some 2028 and 2030 when we start to look in markets that are less developed and that need more time to make that transition. So, yeah, I can absolutely imagine the resource that you provide being in demand and increasingly so over that towards 2025 and beyond. 

Jaya: And also in that sense, we provide a lot of hands on, like on both buyer ends. For example, when we work with a buyer to develop a roadmap, it's interviewing a sample of their buyers of their suppliers, sample of their own procurement staff, running quiz and whatever to understand what their baseline knowledge is, and then reading through all their buying requirements, their tender documents. And we provide an extensive roadmap for each market that they operate on. What would be the cost implication? Whether they should be buying credits, if they're buying credits from whom, if they should be buying physical from whom, what's the process? What are the current gaps in their supply chain? So we do a thorough analysis and give a roadmap. And similarly, when we onboard a farmer, we're helping them with their look. 

Jaya: We start off from identifying whether the location where they want to build the cage pre farm from a biosecurity point of view, how good it is, what kind of structure, single tier, multi tier system, what kind of genetics. We obviously don't prescribe a breed or a brand, but we broadly give guidelines on what kind of genetics to look for a white bird or a brown bird. What the pros and cons is feed formulation. And we take the farmers to our model farm and train them. We have scientific officers who go visit the farm and collect data and see what the issues are. So it's pretty hands on in both ends. Hence the only way we can work is our current structure is that we have program associates in every country that we operate. 

Jaya: And then we have scientific team, which is led by Kate, who is based in Australia. She's got a phd in veg and welfare, and her team overall leading the animal welfare science aspect of this. Plus we have industry partners with genetics, feed and lighting and housing and so on. 

James: Yeah, I can imagine why you need to hire more people, especially in places like China, India that are huge markets when you're providing that level of hands on support. And I wanted to ask more about the broiler work because I definitely agree that I think focus is probably underrated within non profits, especially in that lots of groups do lots of things, but actually sometimes it's prudent just to be, like you said, incredibly single minded and just do something really well. And I guess I'd be curious to get your thoughts on how big is the gap between the number of cage free commitments in Asia versus broiler commitments. Because I can imagine the broiler commitments numbers is much lower. So therefore it's just not worth your time to get that expertise and speciality in that new area. 

Jaya: I think they're also far few and I think they're still yet to come. And I guess, and I think broiler commitments is also a bit complex on what the better chicken commitment has. This one, two and three depends on what the companies opt for. I guess there's also a complex issue with relation to genetics because if you're doing the slow growing broiler, whether that slow growing broiler as a genetic exists, there are issues with relation to religious requirement of slaughter because a big chunk of the market in Asia is a halal driven market. So there's issues and I guess in terms of even the complexities of it, broilers can be a bit more complex than cage free. But I guess at this point of time we feel like it's better to focus on cage free because it's something that's coming now and again. 

Jaya: If you're able to set an example for companies to meet these commitments, it's going to be easily replicable, rather than spreading ourselves so thin and doing everything. 

Amy: I think you've explained the work of global food partners and your particular approach really well during this episode. I've certainly learned a lot more and I know James voiced that he's learnt a lot. But I think perhaps what might be useful to listeners who still feel maybe apprehensive towards this approach. Do you think you could just give us a final kind of top line pitch as to why this work in global food partners is necessary to the transition that we're looking at from cage to cage free and the kind of sustainability and long term success of the movement. 

Jaya: Look at any sort of advancement that's happened. It happened because there was an ecosystem. So I would be surprised if Apple and Microsoft would have existed today and then the scale that they are if there wasn't the Stanford ecosystem in where it was, and other companies at HP and others being there. So I guess there is a huge role for ecosystem. And we also see this in places where within our own movement, as in why is the EA movement really strong in London and others? It is an ecosystem. And where you have an ecosystem, you tend to flourish within that ecosystem. And when you really look at it, and hence clusters, right, as in why was Manchester such a huge place for textile? Primarily because there was an ecosystem where they formed a cluster. 

Jaya: And that particular cluster gives you the economies of scale and everything that is there. So I guess the big part of the work that we do is with relation to ecosystems, because markets like ecosystems and we are able to create that nurturing ecosystem for farmers to transition. And again, just to remember that, be it an egg buyer or egg producer, don't wake up in the morning and they don't say, well, I need to be cruel to animal. Like they just don't do it. They do it because they have a KPI to follow through. And at this point of time, animal welfare commitment might be perceived as in conflict with that particular KPI. And what global food partners does is makes it seem that it is not and actually make it happen that it's not, and then you kind of integrate it well. 

Jaya: So I guess in that sense there's a case for collaboration. Adversarialism can get you to one particular point of diet, but then it tends to end the conversation overall. So hence, I guess the partners ends up being the most important word in global food partners and building that partners coaching relationships where we are able to speak up for the animals, but in a way in which we are creating an ecosystem where people are able to change rather than forcing someone to change without an ecosystem. 

James: Again, for people who might be interested in maybe earlier in their career, I guess I'd be curious if someone is relatively young or new or wants to help animals and is based somewhere in Asia or lives in an asian country, I guess, what advice would you give to them to start their career to learn? What kind of experience do you think they should gain? And yeah, what kind of experience do you think is useful to help animals over the coming decade? 

Jaya: So I think the fellowships that are currently running are really useful. In fact, a big chunk of our staff come from the fellowship, so I guess there are a bunch. Now there's the South Asia Farm animal welfare fellowship, that Welfare Matter runs. Definitely look up people to do that. There's Ahimsa Fellowship India, so I guess that's a great one to look up as well and join. So I guess I would definitely say that joining a fellowship is a good one. The second is like at GFP in itself. On academy globalfoodpartners.com, we offer a bunch of courses on the primary, on what's cage free for both corporates and buyers. So I'll definitely take that. And I guess the third and the most important aspect is, I guess that two things. 

Jaya: One is to be completely close to anything that is western saying that, well, this is not going to work because it came from the west. The other end of the extreme is to say, well, because it worked in the US, it's going to work. I guess the issue is that take the good learnings from what's happened, implement it, and try and see if you're able to take evidence from other parts and make you kind of make it localized. And I guess that's very important. And most important, just learn from other sustainability initiatives from their mistakes. This isn't the first time, as in the cage free eggs, better broilers, is not the first major transformation that we are seeing in a commodity sector. This has happened in multiple commodities. 

Jaya: It's happened at soy, it's happened in cotton, it's happened with coffee, it's happened with tea, it's happened with palm. Now you could say, well, it didn't happen 100%, but it's at least some beginning is better than nothing. So I feel like there is a lot of optimism, not because I'm forecasting. Just as I said, I know what the past is, I know what the present is. When you look at the past, look at China's commodity in terms of tea, the sustainable tea that has grown up in China. Look at Malaysia and Indonesia's progress that they've done with RSPO. Look at what's happened with MSC, with aquaculture Stewardship Council and Marine Stewardship councils overall with relation to fish. The work that fair labor has done, it's not perfect, it's far from perfect, but these are steps in the right direction. 

Jaya: And I guess even with relation to the latest cop, where food systems was a part of it, where companies are looking beyond that carbon tunnel syndrome that they had, saying that only looking at carbon, they're starting to do this carbon plus esg plus model. So the changes for good and just being optimistic and trying to understand the market. And I guess my general sense for anyone is, don't try to fight the curve, ride the curve, because if you're ending up just fighting the curve, I guess you've been defeated at some point in time. 

Amy: Maybe a slightly more personal question. Obviously you've had a big transition from humane society and then working now for global food partners, founding that organization. How do you stay motivated after such a lengthy time in the movement, working on topics that we know are challenging and that kind of take their toll after a while. What is it that keeps you motivated to continue working on this topic? 

Jaya: I think my general sense of unemployed will be outside the mood when repeated by the one coming from, I respect. 

James: That, respect that. 

Amy: No one else will have you. 

Jaya: Brilliant. I could also give you, like, a really good answer, saying that, well, it keeps me awake to send the other. I think the fact is that, again, I've gained quite a bit of career capital doing this. I started doing this in a very young age, like right out of high school, working at PETA, then to the humane society and then here. So I do think that generated career capital, just from the map, would say that the next 1012 years would be the time where I'm able to use up the carrier capital. So I think from a pure compounding, it would make no sense not to continue doing at this point of time. And I'm a big believer in compounding. So I think that where I am personally in the journey, I feel like I'm in that exponential place in my journey of compounding. 

Jaya: So it might seem that the changes were small over a period of time, but it's going to compound going further. And I think that's purely the reason I keep motivated. In a sense. Like, I'm not looking at this from the point of saying nothing's happening, in a sense like, well, things have happened, things have grown better. For my own personal journey, I feel like starting off to where I am, I feel like my impact is compounding, and I just believe that it's going to compound further. So maybe some sort of self worth there. I guess those two things keep it together. 

Amy: Yeah, absolutely. I think there's so much importance in that. We had the episode with Aaron about longevity in the movement and why that's so important. I think really, we think of ourselves as quite a young movement. And actually, when there are people who've really seen this movement progress, particularly in regions like Asia, which have just started from this real lack of precedent, I think the experience that you're able to share and to plug into projects like global food partners is really integral to the future sustainability of the movement, learning from those past mistakes and challenges, and really driving the movement forward. So, yeah, I really appreciate the work that you're doing and the work of global food partners. 

Jaya: Thank you. 

James: I love that you have a, seems like a financial or market based analogy for most questions, even on how you stay motivated. That was a great answer. I've never heard someone frame it that way. But it's like, yeah, I've spent 20 years getting all this expertise and knowledge. Why the hell would I use it somewhere else? I'm good where I am. So, I mean, I certainly appreciate you keeping going. So thank you as well. 

Jaya: Cool. 

James: Maybe, yeah, we can move on to some closing questions that we like to ask everyone. And, yeah, I just be curious, what's one bit of news that you're grateful to hear or excited about recently? 

Jaya: It may not be super recent. I think one bit of news that I was really grateful to hear was the Supreme Court challenge on the California law in the US and how that wording came about. I guess that was a really big relief, because I guess if that had not necessarily gone the right way, then all the state actions would have. I guess that's a big news. Might not be recent, but I definitely think that in the past year or so, if one big has been that. 

James: Definitely, yeah, I mean, as years of state based ballot initiatives and everything. So, yeah, I think that was a huge piece of work and I think somewhat surprising to people that at least I knew. So I think I was very happy to hear that as well. 

Amy: And do you have any media recommendations for listeners? And also, I'm sure this is going to be on the top of your list, but reference back to one year's episode where she talked about your son's podcast, which we've just heard a little bit more about today, which sounds incredibly inspiring. So please do plug him while you're here. 

Jaya: Sure. As in now. My son now is like eleven years now. Started up a podcast when he was seven as a Covid project, and he's interviewed a ton of people from the movement. And it's interesting just to get it from a very child's perspective on this whole thing. I think he's interviewed Haven from Fishwell, from some of him, shrimp initiate Varun from then when he was at GFI, and a whole bunch of people. So definitely plug in. I do think that it's worth to subscribe to some of the industry podcasts. They're like a whole bunch of podcasts. Like the Asian Achievers has a newsletter which is worth to subscribe. Paul pre Asia is good. So I guess, again, not to be insulated within the movement, it's good to kind of put yourself out there. 

Jaya: I would definitely ask and encourage people to subscribe to some of the industry podcasts and newsletters to subscribe to. It's kind of good to just know and have as deep an understanding, and I wouldn't even claim that I have a deep understanding, but as deep an understanding as one could of the industry that you're hoping to change. Yeah. 

James: What was that? Is it the Asia Agribusiness podcast? 

Jaya: Is that right? Asia Agribusiness podcast? And in fact, I was on podcast recently, like talking about cage free and surprisingly put out a lot of animal welfare related content. As in companies are not opposed to animal welfare, it just has to make business sense for them, similar to an audit routine. I don't think a meat company is opposed to it, as in there is a business protein. If it makes business sense for them, they'll do it. 

James: Cool. Maria, we'll plug all that stuff below and I'll find the episode of you on that as well. And I'll share that as well as I know you did an episode with the sentient Institute a few years ago now, but I'll share that as well for austerity. And just how can people follow your work or follow the work of global food partners? What's the best way people to stay in touch? 

Jaya: Well, on LinkedIn, so if you look at global Food partners on LinkedIn, I guess that's the one. So if you have any listeners in China, we have a WeChat account for global food partners. So you can look at. Follow us on WeChat. So LinkedIn and WeChat, I would say, and we also have a newsletter, strongly suggest people to subscribe to that. And Global Food Partners has a podcast of its own where we interview people from within the food industry on their transition to cage free, how they're motivated. So it's kind of new. We had like three episodes, but it's good. It's an industry perspective on cage free, on what challenges are and how companies have moved to cage free or what they plan to do. So we've had people from somebody from Compass China talk about their journey in China. So it's an interesting industry podcast. So those two podcasts and newsletter and our LinkedIn page.

James: Our LinkedIn page, that's very cool. Yeah, we'll definitely share that. I think it'd be great. I think it's great that you were recommending so many resources that force people to take a different view the way they normally do and I guess put themselves in someone else's shoes. So, yeah, I think looking forward to listening to and sharing some of those. Most importantly, thank you so much for coming on. This has been super interesting. We learned a lot, and I learned a lot, can’t speak for you. But, yeah, appreciated all your kind of wisdom and the learnings you've had over the year and all your amazing work. So, yeah, I guess thank you for everything. 

Jaya: Yeah, thanks, Amy. Thanks, James, for having me on this podcast. It was nice to speak about all the work that we do.