Rune-Christoffer Dragsdahl on winning the largest government investment in plant-based foods Artwork

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How I Learned to Love Shrimp

Rune-Christoffer Dragsdahl on winning the largest government investment in plant-based foods

October 08, 2024 • Amy Odene & James Ozden

Rune-Christoffer is an impressive person. In addition to being almost 10ft tall, he led the Vegetarian Society of Denmark’s efforts in getting the Danish government to invest over 110 million Euros in plant-based foods and develop an Action Plan to boost plant-based foods in the country.

Given this is one of the most significant policy wins the animal advocacy and plant-based movement has seen in recent years, we chat about how they built the political will to achieve this. We speak about the importance of building coalitions, developing relationships with politicians, and even engaging with the animal agriculture industry. We also speak about their plans to scale this work in the EU so stick around to the end if you want some optimistic and ambitious next steps.

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Rune-Christoffer: Patience is really important. And the things I've said. Yeah, be fact based, be pragmatic and more patience. Also we've had politicians that we try to invite ourselves for a meeting or invite them to a panel debate. For years there was this guy from a centre right, it's a libertarian party.

James: Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: For years he never responded to the emails or once in a while he responded saying, no, sorry, I can't participate in your debate. And then finally last year he said, yeah, sure, let's take a meeting, let's take a cup of coffee. And he remembered that we'd been approaching him for so many years. So somehow, while this was our first meeting with him, at least he knew that we'd been out there asking for a meeting. And now he was warming up to be more interested in the agenda.

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: Rune-Christoffer is an impressive person. In addition to being almost 10ft tall, he led the Vegetarian Society of Denmark's efforts in getting the Danish government to invest over 110 million euros in plant based foods and also develop an action plan to boost plant based foods in the country. Given that this is one of the most significant policy wins the animal advocacy and plant based movement has seen in recent years, we spoke about how they built the political will to achieve this. Within that, we speak about the importance of building coalitions, developing good relationships with politicians and even engaging with the animal agriculture industry. We also spoke about their plans to scale this work in the EU. So stick around to the end if you want some optimistic and ambitious next steps from them.

James: Sadly, Amy couldn't make this episode, so it's just Rune-Christoffer and I. Without further ado, hope you enjoy the episode. Hey everyone. We are joined today by Rune-Christoffer Dragsdahl, the Secretary General of the Vegetarian Society of Denmark. Rune-Christoffer and his colleagues work with transforming the Danish food system towards more plants and less animals. And their work includes having collaborated with politicians across several parties to create the world's first national action plan for plant based foods, accompanied by funding structure which is called the Plant Based Food Grant and has 110 million euros to distribute. So yeah, welcome Rune-Christoffer.

Rune-Christoffer: Thank you so much, James.

James: Yes, so much to talk about. But we like to start people off with our first question being about a mistake you made. What's a mistake you made recently, and something that other people can learn from?

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, so I think there was a meeting we had recently with our friends at the Plant Based Business Association. We had planned it for one hour and I've been wondering whether- I think the real mistake was that the meeting should have been planned for two hours because we had so much on the agenda that what really happened during that meeting was that I probably talked for 75% of the time. And afterwards I apologised. I sent an email to them saying I'm really sorry I talked so much. But we had extremely- so much to cover during the meeting. And it was- a lot of it was something we had to share with them. But I still felt bad about talking that much because, you know, you want it to be equitable, you want to have a real dialogue.

Rune-Christoffer: So none of this means- I was taking up too much space.

James: I think it definitely- I try to push everything towards shorter and shorter, but yes, in some cases it's different. And so was this like- who is the audience and who are the stakeholders involved, I guess?

Rune-Christoffer: No, no, it was just a closed meeting. We were just sitting for people behind closed doors, two of us and two from the other side. But there was a lot of talking for us related to some of the current and upcoming negotiations in Denmark. And there was a lot about specific ads for specific newspapers, specific meetings with specific politicians. Lots of it high priority, and lots of stuff where we actually needed to talk it through. So one hour was just completely underestimating.

James: This is for the plant based, this is for the fund that you're on the board of. Is that right?

Rune-Christoffer: Wait, so this meeting was actually related to getting even more funding possibly to the fund. That's what we're working on right now because there are some current negotiations where politicians will need to- once again you might say is a deal that the bigger picture of things is not very convincing. That will still maintain quite animal production. But as part of a larger compromise regarding that, it seems very likely that we'll get substantial additional funding and possibly some more action of some sort.

James: It's very cool. Fingers crossed.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, definitely.

James: Well, I guess maybe then let's kind of dive into that action plan for plant based foods that obviously you guys have been quite instrumental in making happen. Can you just talk us through, I guess, what is the essence of the win you've secured? Secured in terms of both the financial component of it and also what that means in terms of the other instruments, whether it's like procurements or labelling or advertising and everything else.

Rune-Christoffer: There are actually several components to what has happened in Denmark. I guess we could mention separately, Denmark got some dietary guidelines three years ago, which were aligned with the EAT-Lancet Commission, which is this average diet on how much should be eaten of different food categories on average across the world. Of course there's huge variety across regions and countries. That is kind of separate from it, but it still plays together with the other initiatives. The fact that we do have some dietary guidelines now, we're quite plant- strongly plant forward. Apart from that, they also did put an incentive in for farmers to grow more plant based crops. But if the farmers cannot sell them, you know, for human consumption, they can still feed it to animals.

Rune-Christoffer: So that is not a scheme we are telling a lot about because it's nice they made it, but it's not, it's really inefficient if, if things cannot actually be exported or consumed in Denmark for human consumption. So that goes back to the two core things they did, was to establish this fund with 110 million euros total funding over eight years, which can support all sorts of activities. You know, you have to send in product applications. So it can be for training chefs, it can be for n experiments, it can be for R&D, working to improve the taste and the texture of meat replacements, it can be developing seeds linking the farmers with processors who then manage to export a product. It can also be export, promotion activities abroad because Denmark is- 85% is exports here.

Rune-Christoffer: So, you know, if you really want to change things here, we need to also change what people in other parts of the world eat. So, a big range of activities can be supported through this grant. And then that's accompanied by a national action plan for plant based foods, which you can say, it lists a lot of actions that the government has already taken in the past. It also refers to the plant based food grant, which is separate, but then it also does list the government's intentions forward, the weaknesses. There's no, you know, there are no quantitative targets in the action plan. So that's why we're now working to see if we can get a version 2.0 with qualitative targets.

James: In terms of like a plant protein versus animal protein target. Is that, would that be like for public procurement or kind of for the country more broadly?

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, so actually what we and others submitted some years ago as an inspiration for the government was a target for hectares, acres cultivated, target for public sector consumption, target for how much research money should be invested each year, target for, you know. Yeah, various things actually. A long list of targets that should ideally be there. But at least they could start with perhaps. So we'll see if we can get that there. But of course, targets itself is also not enough. You need actual action. So. So let's say if they could decide this time in the current negotiations, for example, that all public sector kitchens should follow the dietary guidelines, that in itself would shift diets in all the public sector kitchens much more towards plants.

Rune-Christoffer: So that's better that they make that decision, that they have to do this rather than just setting a target if they're not showing how to reach the target. But overall, still the nice thing about the action plan is, you know, it's entirely positive, visionary language. It does- would like to invest more in research and development. We would like to train our public sector professionals. So you know, it says things that although they aren't necessarily measurable, at least you can measure them with a yes or a no. And you can follow up and say to the government, look, the government promised to do this, so you should keep focusing on this so it can be used to somehow keep different departments of government on track, you can say.

James: Makes sense. I'm curious about the plant based. Yeah, I'll try to get the term knowledge right. Plant Based Food Grant, that's the name of the fund, right?

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah.

James: Yeah, because you said it seems very broad from all across the supply chain. Could be anything from farmers to innovate in terms of crops or production, all the way to delivery of the food, I guess. How do you guys prioritise? Because that could, you could spend all that on R and D, you can spend all of it on the other end. How is that kind of prioritised across the value chain?

Rune-Christoffer: What happened in the first round, there was only like 8 million euros available, but in the second round around 15 million euros. So in the first round everyone have been agreeing, you know, like the demand side is too weak. So you know, to really get. We do have already some good startups. There is farmers who say they want to cultivate it, so at least we have to get to increase demand. So in the first round was a strategical decision that in this round we will support mostly demand side applications, but people could still apply for other projects, but we might not prioritise them. So in the first round most applications were on demand side measures. You know, that is any especially we said like training professionals because that's how you get some volume.

Rune-Christoffer: If you can train kitchen professionals, whether they're from the public sector or the private sector, it can be anything from takeaway restaurants to festivals to hospitals. You know, if you train professionals broadly you should be able to increase the volume that makes it more sustainable overall for the sector, whoever engages in it.

James: And is the idea there, like if you train professionals to cook plant based food or they're more accustomed to it, they'll actually order more in terms of a food service setting, they'll want to procure more plant based foods rather than meat based.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, what you can say is like training here can be. Training is not just how to cook a dish, but you know, it's also, you know, it can be how to name a dish properly or it can be how to use default setups, you know. So your training can be probably understood using nudging or using default. But you serve plant based and people have to opt in for meat. You know that there are different ways of. Okay, it's a. Training should be understood really broadly here, you know, but anything where it's a professional who is preparing, serving, listing the food, because if they're lifted up, it lifts much larger volumes than reaching out to individuals. So institutional change, you can say but, but in a broad sense.

Rune-Christoffer: But that could be both, of course, knowing how to cook a proper dahl with legumes grown in Denmark, but can also be knowing how to use proper, some specific meat substitutes in dishes. How to make a tikka masala with a meat substitute, for example. Because I need training in what are the proper meat substitutes that can be used in this and that dish, for example. So this is just one example. In the second round of the grant which was here recently over the summer, decided then it was open for the whole value chain. And what happened there was like 100 applications received. I'm a board member, as you mentioned earlier, there. We have 11 board members. 10 of them are appointed or suggested, nominated by 10 different organisations. And you can nominate someone from your own organisation or someone external.

Rune-Christoffer: So some have nominated like people internally like me, like we did with me. Also others have nominated, for example, the climate movement nominated a researcher from the University of Copenhagen. So then these 10 board members, plus a chair of the board, nominated directly by the minister, simply sit and have a democratic vote, eventually consensus decisions or a democratic vote if there's disagreement about them. And then we process them topic by topic. So first went through all maybe 15 applications related to R&D, all 10 or 15 applications related to other types of research. All of it was actually quite well distributed, I think. Within eight different categories, there were around 15 applications within each category approximately. And then initially we go through all of them and then we put them in green, yellow or red.

Rune-Christoffer: And you know, if actually we get put more in green than there's funding, then we would have to go through it all again. But what has happened is actually that those which end up in green are a bit less than the funding available or quite a bit less. And then we start discussing those in yellow. There are some quick initial placement and colours and then later on in depth. If the best applications are on R&D, then all the funding could go to R&D. If the best applications are in public procurement, then a lot of the funnel will go there.

James: Yeah, that makes sense.

Rune-Christoffer: In the second round there was substantially more for research and R&D.

James: Nice. And I'm curious to hear more about the makeup of that board. So who are the other 10 members? Or like, if you can chat, why did those 10 people get to have a say in this board?

Rune-Christoffer: That's- I think this is a really important question and also one you want to learn from for other countries if they try to set up the same. Or we'll get back later to the thing, let's say if the EU could set up a similar mechanism in the future, it definitely matters who's there. And by the way, who has the power? Is it just a board that will provide a rubber stamp instead of like an administration who's actually doing the work? And then the board is just saying yes or no. In this case, in the Danish model here, the administration does some administrative work, but it is really the board that qualitatively goes into it. So these 11 people. So the organisations are: The main Conventional Farmers Association can appoint one. The main Organic Farmers Association can appoint one.

Rune-Christoffer: The main Food Labor Union can appoint one. Consumer Council can appoint one. The Confederation of Danish Industries can appoint one. The Danish Chamber of Commerce can appoint one. The Climate can appoint one. We at the Vegetarian Society of Denmark can appoint one. Then the Plant Based Business association can appoint one. I'm forgetting who's number 10.

James: We won't tell them that you forgot one person.

Rune-Christoffer: And then the head of the board who is nominated by the minister, but she's heading a think tank called Fry, which working has a good connection with many young farmers here and also many young students, agricultural students.

James: Interesting.

Rune-Christoffer: So it's a nice broad composition and I would also say it's pretty balanced in terms of, I would say like, you know, there's certain strategical questions where it's just almost 50/50.

James: The make up of the board. It's almost like quite, you know, conventional, you know, many farming groups, you know, the Chamber of Commerce, not traditionally like very progressive on plant based foods. Actually it seems like the majority is there. So do you feel like you have to do a bit of like educating throughout the process if people aren't familiar with some of the proposals or the people that they send are just actually already quite well skilled up?

Rune-Christoffer: I would say the way I think it's fair to say that there are few of us who are, you can say the experts in plant based foods, but then some of the other board members have 30 years in food or in agriculture and industry in processing. And that's of course also extremely relevant. So I think we complement each other. I'm not just saying that diplomatically. I really think it's true. You have, you have a retail expert there who knows how the retail world works. For example, he was nominated by the Danish Chamber of Commerce. There are some other Danish agricultural funds that have existed for many years. They're almost entirely nominated by the farmers associations.

Rune-Christoffer: So this is quite revolutionary, the setup here and the fact that the climate movement, the consumer council, the organic farmers and we and the plant based business association, they're quite progressive entities. And the board, the chair of the board is also a young woman from- related to many growing up on a farm, but progressive in her thoughts. So I think it's a healthy balance that, and maybe that in itself is important that the fact that while the board from the conventional farmers will look much more progressive than what they're used to, this still has a healthy dose of, you can say the usual. More the people who know the food and agriculture industry and the conventional industry from within makes it politically valid.

Rune-Christoffer: So suppose if we shifted to a more right wing government in the future, they would still see several people who somehow more represent maybe where they are at the board. So I think that's important also to give it long term legitimacy.

James: Was that one of the key, almost like compromises or things you needed to include for this to be politically palatable is actually it's made up of a group of people that it's not just, you know, our side of the bubble, the plant based people. Actually it's fairly representative. It includes the kind of commercial industry as well.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah. At the board. So this is a political decision. It was a minister who chose the board members. But I think the balance that has resulted, I feel, is a balance that we like, which is because we're used to having these boards strongly influenced by conventional animal producers or animal feed producers. So I think compared to that this is really forward looking what we have here. And it's a nice balance between these organisations and some of them, as you said, the Danish Chamber of Commerce here, as you mentioned, they're actually quite green and forward looking here. They're strongly into alternative proteins. So it's cool.

James: Maybe zooming out, I guess I'm kind of interested to know more about like, you know, what do you think are the key things that you did, you know well or maybe you did at all in this case that you think it made it politically possible and you built the right coalitions and you found the right people to actually execute on this? I guess, yeah, is there anything you pull out like in hindsight saying, oh yeah, I think this was a really important part of our work. I'm glad we did this.

Rune-Christoffer: Fundamentally collaborating with a lot of different stakeholders and being open to that has really been important. We set up this thing called Danish Network for Plant Proteins four and a half years ago, which is just, you know, network events. People come and hear some presentations, network, eat some food, hear some more presentations or debates, go home. You can do that all over the world. But we did it and we've done something out of making this a long term network. So we still have it now, right? That is a structure. There's a mailing list, there are professionals who come and meet. There will be political debates once in a while. And having that network of professionals has helped.

James: Who's in the network? Is it like anyone can join? Are you targeting certain people?

Rune-Christoffer: Anyone who's a professional working on food. It will be, usually there will definitely be all sorts of relevant lobby organisations or interest organisations, but also researchers, companies, startups, established companies.

James: I guess like civil servants or policymakers that are working in relevant departments.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, there are few, there are not so many policymakers or those who are permanent members of it. But we generally invite, provide broadly to these events. Even though people are not formal- maybe some who don't want to say they're a formal member, but that's- they like to attend the events still.

James: Got it. Yeah, yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: But the fact, you know, being an organisation that started this network that quickly managed to get. There are technically 250 members on the list and then each event will have anything from 50 to 150, 170 participants.

James: Right. Wow, it's pretty big.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah. The fact that we have the structure, a sense of people know there is this network coordinator working for us who will send out a calendar which also lists events organised by others. So, you know, we're not competing, we're showing, embracing others and saying look, these guys also do this and this. Sending out some relevant links and reports inviting to events that you know secures that there is a long term forum where people know that everyone who's interested in plant based is always welcome. It's free, you don't have to pay anything. That's how we can have these members. Because it's funded, initially we had partly funded. It has been more or less stably funded with some different small or medium grads here. But having that forum I think has helped give us some authority that people-

Rune-Christoffer: Because people think we create a friendly and professional atmosphere at these events. They also, it seems to me, they generally trust us and then they start collaborating with us and then they want to collaborate more with us and that in turn gives more political legitimacy.

James: I guess, how do you navigate the more tricky stuff when- obviously I think it's good to have diverse viewpoints but sometimes that can actually be quite hard to organise an event or maybe the event goes a bit askew. I guess how do you actually, I guess, are you fairly careful in the people you invite in the debate to moderate because obviously you don't want it to be too combative. So how do you manage that?

Rune-Christoffer: For many of the events I have been the moderator because we don't have a lot of funding to hire an external expensive moderator. But sometimes we also have others moderate. But when I do it, what I do is that if people say something where I think yeah, that's just another viewpoint that's a disagreement. We let them say it and see if someone else counter it in a panel or someone else from the audience or I leave it and let people say it. If there is direct disinformation then I will once in a while say like for example there's something, you know about the whole nutrition. There's still some protein myths and stuff like that. So usually people say that I would actually say sorry but I have to correct you on that one. That is not true.

Rune-Christoffer: Or ask someone knowledgeable to say please can you just comment on that. So I would make sure that it's not. We don't allow- we can't be derailed by completely strange-

James: Made up information.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, information. But we do have to keep a wide high open ceiling. So like if the farmers association are there they will say things and we can't correct everything they're saying. As long as it's not. As long as they're just their arguments, as long as it's not misinformation, then that's a way to get them into the space and actually inviting them to one of the events some years ago made them later invite us to make a joint R&D strategy for plant based foods. And you know, and that's a big farmers union who is representing the pig producers, the dairy producers.

Rune-Christoffer: So getting them to invite us to do that, obviously that only happened because they felt they could somehow trust us. So while they know that we strongly disagree on the future of animal production, they still felt they could trust us on a plant positive message.

James: Yeah, yeah. I think the art of like disagreeing respectfully and calling out stuff I think is super useful. And I actually had an incident literally yesterday where a similar small roundtable and people have different views in terms of the future of animal production. So I was like, oh, now there's disputed health information on how healthy red meat is for you. And it's just like I don't think it's disputed, I think it's actually very clear. But anyway, especially if depending on the audience it can be quite hard to do that. So I think that is a skill. So that's very interesting. The first thing is I guess building political legitimacy and authority through having this relatively long standing network where you’re having these credible debates and having a wide range of people involved.

James: I guess what else would you say are the other key components to this win?

Rune-Christoffer: The message that we've really stuck to throughout is that we are both for whole foods and imitations and everything in between. And I think this is really a key message that I keep- people have. If someone has seen me before, I might have said this before, but I think it's so important. It's because I actually think when we go attend events with animal advocates or plant based advocates generally, the food comes from both realms. I generally think. So, I think it's out there in reality. But sometimes in the minds and the debates there can be some people who are too much into the romantic idea that we should cook everything from scratch. Our children just need to be taught how to cook a proper meal in school and then everything would be fine.

Rune-Christoffer: And that's naive on one side and then on the other hand everything can be solved from tech. We just need to make a perfect meat imitation and then we'll save the world. And I think both. The truth is we need both solutions and also a lot of stuff in between. Fermentation version 10.0, plant based mince version 20.0 and some of it will be strong in its imitation and some of it will just be an even more delicious falafel or patty than we ever knew existed. You know, that- we need all these solutions. And by insisting on that we managed to I think both make the people who are innovation-curious, who are innovation-oriented, science-oriented. They think, “Cool. Can you make this? Wow, it tastes so good. And this is really made from only plants?” You can make these people on board.

Rune-Christoffer: But we can also still keep. There's still a substantial segment of people who generally support environmentalism, animal ethics. And also the organic movement will be more into more natural solutions, you can say. And the whole foods, you know, whole food plant based diet is a strong movement in itself. So by getting both on board and saying, you know, the Danish food grant will support both kind of things, it makes it more difficult to be against.

James: Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: And. And that makes it possible to secure support from more political parties who will come from diverse backgrounds in support of this.

James: Yeah, that makes sense. And yeah, I mean I totally agree that the whole foods plant based part is very hard to argue against. I think that's something that many people do agree on because in terms of the health benefits, you know, sometimes alternative proteins get dismissed as ultra processed. Obviously beans, chickpeas can't have that same complaint. Everyone knows it's. It's clearly a very healthy option. How do you manage if people try like take away like one part of that portfolio? Because you said there's like the innovation-focused people and the whole foods but I can imagine the farms might be like, oh, just keep the whole foods, get rid of the innovation stuff. Like have you had those kind of attacks and how did you manage those?

Rune-Christoffer: No, it's a good one. When I do a presentation or as my summary slide, I tend to show a dish which can look both like it has possibly a meat imitation or maybe it's just beans. That's the final picture I usually have where you're not- even, no, actually sometimes it was split screen kind of split slide. We both see really processed stuff and delicious thing with whole foods on the same side. Just to show that we are equally talking about both. I think, yeah, that's one way to do it. But I think it's like for example, if there is a news- yesterday there was actually a news debate about the whole thing, whether there should be more funding for the plant based food grant during current negotiations.

Rune-Christoffer: And then this television station put up the kind of background photo they put behind the speaker in the news that they were filming in the room. I was just showing only an imitation product on sale. And then I felt, yeah, great, you help mainstreaming this product by showing it. But I would still have liked that you switched in between the two because there will be some people who will now think why the hell should we spend, why should we spend a billion crowns on this disgusting stuff? And I don't want to make it too easy for these people to be against it. Like one hand it's great to mainstream it, but the same goes if they had only been showing home cooked meal, I would also feel like, no, this is also the wrong.

Rune-Christoffer: So it's a delicate balance to show that plant based are both and that we need to invest in both these things.

James: That's a useful viewpoint to have is like you're always almost, almost devil's advocate and saying you should broaden your horizons and yeah, I think that's very interesting. Yeah, I think that's something probably that the alternative protein industry I guess probably hasn't done very much historically. But I think that there's a bit of a change now, I think towards more like whole foods. And I think also because of all the health concerns happening in the media and otherwise, I think maybe there is more of a need to actually focus on the slightly more healthier or like at least whole foods options.

Rune-Christoffer: And I guess the risk is of course, let's say if Beyond Meat now, substituting with avocado oil and having something fermented coming up. I think also, you know, like if they do that successfully and they increase the market, it's great. But if you just swap entirely into that then they'll totally just reach. We had this discussion I think even four years ago with McDonald's who had, believe it or not, hadn't had even a vegetarian burger in Denmark. We know that it has been in the UK and Germany for 20 years, but Denmark, not even. No vegan, but no vegetarian either. And then they asked us, so which burger should we introduce? One with an imitation or the one that we successfully use in Germany made from quinoa and something and which sells well in Germany.

Rune-Christoffer: And we said you should really have both because they're different target groups.

James: Yeah, I think that is a good point. Is like fundamentally that the audiences can be different and also I guess in your case the stakeholders you can persuade. It's much bigger if you talk about both. How did you go about building the required relationships? I guess both with the politicians and ministers involved, also I guess the key stakeholders who you had to have on side. Maybe in this case it's the Conventional Farmers association, the Organic Farmers association, who I guess, maybe without them it would have been very hard to get this passed.

Rune-Christoffer: So I think the most important thing is patience because we started working with policy work in 2016 so eight years ago. And at that time I felt when we got a meeting with the most left wing party and a small, quite recent, very green party and I thought wow, they want to meet with us. Wow. Then I felt the honor winning. I think they. Yeah, I don't know why, you know, because in Denmark it's. You should be able to talk to your politicians. But I just before that I realised it was a realistic option and look at what has happened later. But then gradually we got a meeting with another party and then it was really. It should not be underestimated that there is one person who is a vegan in one of the parties. He's called Carl Valentin. He really does amazing work.

Rune-Christoffer: He's a very pragmatic well spoken vegan and he knows how to again, what compromises to take when and how to argue his case and still get the stuff through.

James: Is he an elected representative or does he work for one as a staff member?

Rune-Christoffer: He's elected representative of a party.

James: Got it.

Rune-Christoffer: And he got a speakership on food and agriculture of his party. So with the support of. But he has been able to move his party to a much more pro plant based direction and towards being against industrial livestock production. Actually want to abandon that. And he's now in quite a substantially essential party, really. It's to the left of the centre, but just next to the left of the centre you can say. But the main green party here now that's the one and himself, he cannot do this alone. But one thing is he's managed to move his own party and then in specific negotiations he can usually be able to convince others very well and he can debate publicly in forceful but still pragmatic ways.

Rune-Christoffer: But then also importantly he will ask, you know, he will get some advice, data input, statistics, stuff from us that can be helpful for him. And I think he has been actually helpful in that more parties have started becoming interested in talking with us because he has also been talking nicely about us. It's not that he should be given the full credit but. But I think he has, it has been helpful that there is a friendly politician who is saying by the way, try to talk to these guys and. But, but of course it's not enough that he's saying it. Others need to experience that also in reality that, that they feel that we are reasonable to talk with. So. So I just want to mention him because he deserves to be mentioned. But apart from that there are politicians from.

Rune-Christoffer: There's also a party from the most left wing party. He's also a vegetarian by the way. But. But that party usually there- they can be imported in certain situations. So they still have definitely done their work well as well. But usually the governments will always want the parties from or closer to the centre of politics to get broader agreements. That's how it works In Denmark we have had at least two politicians where I know that they have. We have directly inspired them to become really interested in this agenda but also inspired them on how to tackle this agenda in a way that doesn't, you know, if you overnight vegans or just overnight people who suddenly open their eyes and you can become really wow, why didn't I see. Or it's a massive problem. How can we do this?

Rune-Christoffer: And that can make that some people then initially become suddenly very harsh and strong and judgmental because they're just coming out of seeing the world in a new light themselves. And that can also affect how they then talk to others about it. And these politicians, they're not vegans, neither these two nor vegetarians. But they have become strongly inspired about the urgency of this agenda. But then they found a way to talk about it in a pragmatic way. It's always a balance how much credit can who take and who's- and it's all the collaboration between many beautiful souls and voices in this world. But, but there- we've been told that it has been inspiring for them to meet some friendly, pragmatic people representing the plant based side that helped them internalise that language and work with this agenda in that way.

Rune-Christoffer: And they've realised that that helped them, that made them get less resistance.

James: So you think there it's something about, I guess, when you're I guess meeting with the politicians, I guess basically just almost being the most like you know, credible, pragmatic and also like a non confrontational I guess version of the movement you can because it seems like, I guess, they have some preconceived ideas of what people will be like. And if you can just be extremely pragmatic, friendly and like willing to work together, that's something they really value. Is that right?

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah. Yeah. Really. Now we had this case, one politician who we had an outdoors festival seven-eight years ago where we had a debate panel where we invited politicians and then one of them was used constructive but saying we should try to do some more research. But that's all what she felt at that time was relevant.

James: Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: And then when the debate ended, she was friendly, but she just wanted some more research. But she was keeping a bit of distance to the topic and. But she came there, she came, attended physically this debate. So we were happy with that.

Rune-Christoffer: But then we gave a book. We gave that. We usually do that. If we have a panel debate of some sort, we give a book and we often like to give a book about plant based nutrition or plant based health. So one of Dr. Greger's books or something similar from Denmark, from our Danish dietitian and doctor who are into plant based, because that's where you have a lot of the misconceptions and ideas and yeah. So that's usually what we would give and what we can see is, at least in that particular case, one year later, she suddenly send a picture of the book and told me, ‘now I read the book and now I'm onto this agenda’.

James: Wow, that's great.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah.

James: When people get excited about the agenda who are like you said, like maybe not necessarily vegetarian or vegan, is it primarily for like the health angle, for the environmental anger angle or. Yeah. What tends to work in your experience or is it just very varied on- against different people?

Rune-Christoffer: It is different from different people because you can say Carl Valentin, as I mentioned before, the vegan, he became pretty much vegan overnight several years ago now because that was for the animal ethical argument. Someone, a friend talked to him about it and that convinced him and then he felt, okay, I have to change. I'm not living aligned with my values on how we should treat animals. Then this person I mentioned before, that was definitely the health angle, but then multiple others, it would be environmental climate angle, you know, seeing I usually bring, for some of our first time we meet a new politician in an important role bringing presentation, you know.

Rune-Christoffer: And one of my favourite slides is a slide where you can see at The Guardian, the newspaper, they made an illustration based upon a study counting basically the biomass of all mammals in the world. You might know this figure as well. The ones that 60% of all mammals biomass in the world is livestock, 36% are humans and only 4% are wild mammals. And then for birds it's 70% are poultry being produced and 30% are wild birds. And these numbers are so staggering and I think they even convey an animal ethical message as well. Because you're showing, look, we have grown, producing huge amounts, but also then extinguishing the others at the same time. And. But it's also a biodiversity argument and environment and it can explain to people. You know, look, so much of the surface of the planet is about animal production nowadays.

James: Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: The feed for animals. So that message is so strong for people. They can understand that, everyone.

James: Yeah. So you tend to go for like in this initial presentation you can talk about a range of arguments and then you kind of see where they feel most connected and then you've kind of focused on that. Is that generally how it goes?

Rune-Christoffer: You know, the thing is with animal ethics is that I think that's what really deeply most people do resonate with. But politically it just still seems to be difficult-

James: Very hard.

Rune-Christoffer: -to move a needle where they're much more open to environment, climate and health and economical arguments and jobs. So definitely the more we move across the centre towards the right wing, economical arguments, jobs arguments, growth, innovation, potential arguments become more and more important.

James: Yeah. Moving on from the politicians, I guess, what was the role of the conventional meat industry in this and to what extent were the oppositional and how did you get them to come around it if they did?

Rune-Christoffer: Honestly, we haven't clearly overcome them yet because we still have a huge production and that shouldn't even be laughing about that because it's really terrible. We have a huge intensive livestock industry here. And so we clearly have not overcome that. But what we have done is I've been through the years like attending some farmer schools across the country. 10 of them, I think 10 times, totally. Some panel debates or presentations and being out there and I think one good example, I know specifically that by having been through some of them there's quite a number of farmer students and also their parents. Farmers also come to these debates and listen to them.

Rune-Christoffer: So it's quite a large number of people you manage to cover within the farming community here and

I have this one experience of the debate I attended where in the break I just went down to the front row to chat with some of the students and this one of them said, look what we've been- our friend has been writing here on a paper that the vegetarian is tonight's positive surprise. And yeah, and. And it means that somehow, even when clearly standing for what I say is necessary and massive transformation of the system and all that, but apparently I do it in a way where they feel I'm not attacking them. They have made their personal choices, but at a structural level I can still question it. And I think that's.

Rune-Christoffer: That has been helpful because I know later that has meant other people talk about there's this guy who's representing the plant based movement who is apparently somehow reasonable so then others invite me to give presentations for other farmers. And then there's also simultaneously and we should say that this think tank called Fry, I mentioned earlier, where I was founded by two young women, daughters of farmers, one of them is still active there and the head of the think tank, but is also the head of the board of the plant based food brand here. And she and her organisation, they've been really good at generally trying to build bridges between countryside and cities and Denmark and trying to find that- the balance between many viewpoints.

Rune-Christoffer: And they have also taken a, you know, after looking into the evidence, they've taken a strongly pro plant based viewpoint. They still insist on the rule of livestock and all that. Yeah, but because they come from a conventional farmers families, they're trusted by the farmers when they say this. And there's been multiple interdependencies here, you know, where we inspire each other or cross refer to each other. And it's helpful that they have been, I know they have also been kind sometimes saying to the farmers that yeah, maybe you should invite the Vegetarian Society of Denmark. So I think I don't, that's an important thing here. I don't think vegans and vegetarians necessarily need to hide. There's some people who think maybe we should just hide away from the discussion because it's so tense. The debate in some countries.

James: Yeah, it's polarising. Yeah, yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: But I think there's a point in itself in being from the vegetarian vegan movement, being out there and actually showing, hey guys, I'm just a human being. Like we can talk together. Let's, let's have a reasonable conversation together. And that has been helpful for people to realise that there are some reasonable arguments for this transition. And I think they respect us for that. That's what I hear. And then of course we invite them to panels. We invite the conventional farmers when we have panels and discussions. So that's suspended. And that's, I think that has been really important in overcoming the power as you say. Like they've come to a place where they respect us, they know we strongly disagree.

James: Yeah. I guess for me what stands out there is I guess actually engaging with people and going to events a) you kind of realise the kind of the most intense toxic stuff you see online. Like that's extremely polarising. It's probably way less severe when you go talk to people in person because actually most people have reasonable views like you said, and they can see the merits of different arguments. And I think, yeah, like you kind of pointed out, they probably appreciate you way more saying oh, he's actually willing to come chat to us. And I guess you gain some credibility by being known and actually being willing to engage with them. Whereas I guess probably what people get annoyed about is if you're saying stuff that attacks your industry and you won't even talk to them face to face, which is like particularly annoying.

Rune-Christoffer: I've been wondering whether I should start to offer myself to do a tour again of the farmer schools. It might be time to do that again.

James: Nice. It's very cool. Yeah. And I guess it's also very handy. This think tank, I guess. Yeah. Has this, you know, they're like a great messenger in that they come from this traditional livestock family. So I think that's a useful boost. I think you mentioned before that like the organic movement was quite a big ally in this, in the plant action plan and the fund. Can you say a bit more about that?

Rune-Christoffer: The organic farmers in Denmark have their association called Organic Denmark. They have for many years had a strategy which is on a meal level. They've been very explicit about promoting organic meal policies in public sector kitchens and private sector kitchens as well. And then they're saying as part of converting the food into organic there, in order to keep it at the same cost you have to lower the number of animal products and increase the share of plants. So actually there have been the whole concept of organic kitchen conversion whereby you will get kitchens engaged, professional kitchens engaged in an organic kitchen conversion which means they do more food from scratch, a little more training on how to cook again, getting back to some of the skills they were losing in the past, less food waste and less animal products.

Rune-Christoffer: And that's how you then- overall, they need to invest in the training of the competence uplift you can say. But once they've done those trainings of them at a one time expense, there is no recurring additional expense because they managed to keep it within the same budget by lowering animal products and food waste. And this model has meant that it goes hand in hand in the organic meal model you can say and then at a farmers organisation level they've I think also had that policy for many years that an organic farming system does mean much less livestock. But that said, it's still something they're debating and there are different opinions on that within the organic farming community. But I would say the mainstream most organic farmers here in Denmark have see it now as this is going hand in hand like to have an organic- if you want to feed the world organically.

Rune-Christoffer: Since the yields are lower, there can be many arguments protecting groundwater from pesticides and biodiversity within the fields at least. But then since you need more space to cultivate, you will need to switch to more plant based to justify it. And that has been- become a strong recognition among the organic farmers here. So that has created a mutual value alignment. You can say like although it, you know, at least to a different conclusion for an organic farmer compared to a vegan. But you know the idea like you care about the animals, then you choose maybe vegans and organic farmers still take different solutions.

Rune-Christoffer: An organic livestock farmer and a vegan farmer would, a vegan would take a different solution but they still have a joint value about they do care about animals, they do care about the environment and they care about human health. So because of that there is a strong overlap of values. And that has made it quite easy for us I would say to find a mutual trust between the two organisations and to say to the politicians, you know, it's because again, you know, there's only so and so much funding and since the organic movement in many countries is used to receive a lot of funding. So if we come as a plant based movement, as something completely else, then we just start competing about the same funding and it will actually be difficult.

Rune-Christoffer: So that's why for example the Danish plant based food grant eventually is 50% is earmarked for organic. It works well actually approximately 50%. It's, it's, it seems to be the right number in terms of who's actually applying and who are the best applications. So it works well with approximately 50% being given as well.

James: I guess as a project I'm involved in and we've been struggling with this tension of, you know, there's some in this case kind of funders, people who are like very pro, you know, just we'll just produce things according to agroecology methods and regenerative and organic. And I'm like this is great but like you said, this means lower yield, more inputs and therefore I like your analogy. It's just like to balance that you just need more plant based and less meat. The whole like less but better. And I think at least I've been struggling to like be like what you're saying requires what we're saying. So we should work together. So I think, yeah, just figuring out how to communicate that seems quite valuable.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah. And I think to put it really briefly actually what has happened here is probably that the organic movement here has lent a helping hand in mainstreaming us faster than otherwise would have happened because by recognizing us and collaborating with us, it has legitimised us as a political entry that others have started respecting more quickly. At the same time, we do have much more young people behind us with our plant based movement than the organics and we struggling a bit with getting the young people to buy sufficiently into the organic. So. So for them it's helpful that we are also standing there as we are pro organic. Meaning it's not like we're, you know, we have, we know there are certain products that you cannot make organically to get the proper imitation effect.

Rune-Christoffer: And it's not again, but it's about, we do think it's good, we want to avoid pesticides. And yeah, there's a common interest here that is helping elevate both movements and giving both a stronger position together. And again, the plant based food brand of Denmark would very surely have been smaller if it wasn't for a political party which cares a lot about organic farming to also support the plant based food grant because part of the funding was earmarked for organic. So I'm certain to say that overall the grant is larger because a part of it is earmarked for organic.

James: Well, in terms of this coalition, seems like that was like one main party. Is there anyone else you'd say was like another key ally? It seemed like the climate movement were quite involved. You think they're the other like key kind of party involved in this.

Rune-Christoffer: So I mentioned earlier the collaboration with the main farmers association on that R&D strategy because they trusted us and that was really important. But apart from that, of course we should mention I would say generally there are many green NGOs in Denmark who have also been positive towards plant based. So like Greenpeace, Green Transition Denmark, the Nature Conservation Union of Denmark, each of them have maybe one staff working on food systems change or perhaps plant based or this livestock transition. So we are now an organisation with more employees who can work in depth on it. But it's important that they put their weight behind it. So for example, we've done multiple times this was original idea by Greenpeace some years ago. But for example, right now, during current negotiations we've had some.

Rune-Christoffer: We generally don't believe a lot in advertisements in newspapers, but at critical moments in negotiations it will have an impact. We know because the politicians pay attention to what the media coverage is and who's saying what in the newspapers. So we just had actually yesterday full page advertisements in the three largest newspapers in Denmark relating to current negotiations. So we had the funding in place. But then we invited other organisations and that means we show it together with multiple organisations having the logo in support of the message. Because this is not about our organisation getting attention, this is about the message getting attention and showing strength behind it.

Rune-Christoffer: So this having a broad support from many organisations behind a joint message has been really important here that there's not a lot of insight between the NGOs here and about securing members or donations, at least that's not how we think. We think this is about, not about getting donations or members. It's about getting a message and getting political action. And then a second thing, the Plant Based Business Association of Denmark, they have maybe what corresponds to I think now three employees approximately. We collaborate a lot with each other, support each other, we're independent from each other. They're strong, they're completely an industry business association. But it's still important to have someone like them. People have asked us, should we become a lobby organisation for the business?

Rune-Christoffer: But I think then we are not an NGO and there's a value of being a neutral NGO and then a business association, we can complement each other because they can also attract open doors to more right wing parties with a pure business argument.

James: Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: So this is extremely valuable as well. So I think now I've mentioned the most important allies in this process, but compromises between NGOs and businesses, finding common ground with the organic movement, where we do have a lot of value alignment and also finding a way to open the door to the conventional farmers and to show that we can be for plant based together without agreeing on what we think about livestock.

James: Yeah, yeah. Because yeah, in a way people, I think some people even say, I was at an online event with a farmer who was saying he doesn't like the wording alternative proteins, he likes it to be called complementary proteins. So it's not necessarily an alternative, but this is an addition. But obviously there is some tension with this because people like us probably know we do want it to replace, we do actually want it to go down. So there is a bit of tension there.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah. And I think we are honest about that tension in public debate. But then when we. But sometimes you can disagree, you can agree about disagreeing. Like we also had this lawsuit against Danish Crown about the so called climate controlled pork. And of course the farmers association are not happy about the lawsuit and that has probably also somehow damaged. It has not- it has maybe they were probably open to collaborate more earlier but then after that they felt that nah, we are collaborating with them on certain plant based things, but maybe they didn't want to get closer because of that. And that's also where we have to find the balance between being an independent NGO which is still feeling like, you know, we cannot tell people that pork can be climate more climate friendly than you think or climate controlled. So that's that balance.

Rune-Christoffer: But we can still agree about disagreeing on that and then still agree on some constructive collaboration on how do you make sure that plant based products are using ingredients grown by Danish farmers so they also get a part of the. Of the cake.

James: Yeah, exactly. It seems like at least with the arable farmers there's a clear common ground. It seems like when it comes to the livestock farmers then it becomes, you know, it's not really clear at all how we're going to benefit each other, but I guess focusing on the arable farmers seems quite useful.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah. And some are still doing both here. But, but it's clearly those who do grow feed crops at arable lands, they have an interest in selling something that has a higher value than a feed crop.

James: Yeah, yeah, definitely. Do you have any almost like specific tactical tips on what you've done that you think worked quite well in terms of building relationships or I guess securing some of these coalition partners? I guess you mentioned maybe a couple, which is, you know, go speak at their events, invite them to speak at your events, give out these books and maybe they'll read them. Is there anything else come to mind?

Rune-Christoffer: I would say again, patience is really important and the things I've said, yeah, be fact based, be pragmatic and more patience. Also we've had politicians that we try to invite ourselves for a meeting or invite them to a panel debate. For years, there was this guy from a centre, right, it's a Libertarian party. For years he never responded to the emails or once in a while he responded saying, no, sorry, I can't participate in your debate. And then finally last year he said, yeah, sure, let's take a meeting, let's take a cup of coffee. And he remembered that we'd been approaching him for so many years. So somehow while this was our first meeting with him, at least he knew that we'd been out there asking for a meeting and now he was warming up to be more interested in the agenda.

Rune-Christoffer: So that's, I think we really need to be patient and I think an important message because I think surely if some great people out there in the world try to do more policy work inspired by what has happened in Denmark, they'll surely hit their head right into the wall for the first. Some of them might be successful quickly, it can happen. But others might need really a lot of patience. So remember, it's not that you're necessarily doing things wrong. We can all learn and adjust all the time and adjust our method, but sometimes you just need time, time, time. And then if you get a chance to give them a good science based book, as I mentioned earlier, maybe that's a, that's a way forward.

James: Yeah, yeah. Well, it seems like also like almost persistence. Right. It's not like what I would have thought was actually if someone doesn't reply to my email like two or three times, maybe I'll stop emailing them. But it seems like actually in this case you were quite committed. Like, no, I really want to have this debate. I really want you to like engage with us. And that eventually paid off, which is quite interesting.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, yeah. And it's not like we're spamming them, but maybe we've been writing this guy two times a year for four years and then finally he responded, maybe something like that.

James: That's pretty cool. That's really cool. Lesson something that maybe I'll think about because maybe I'm too quick to be like, okay, yes, didn't work twice. That's it. But obviously people are especially like the politicians, incredibly busy. So many demands on their time and almost every second there could be a political scandal. So it is hard.

Rune-Christoffer: And of course Denmark is a smaller country. Population is around 6 million. Right. But still in most countries, I guess still the idea that you somehow know people or have known them for a while or have heard about them for a while overall, I think would probably increase trust and confidence just a little. So like if you're coming completely unknown, asking for a meeting in the beginning, they're kind of, who is this? I don't know if I have the time, I don't know if I care. I don't know if they're important and I'm not really sure. But then over the time there's something normalisation happening. I think as I see it, at least the main pharmacist association here, but I suspect this is also happening in other countries. But what they're extremely good at here also they spend their money for it.

Rune-Christoffer: They have a huge army of public affairs people who attend all sorts of meetings and conferences and seminars and roundtables and they're always there. And some of their arguments can be a little too far, some out in some directions, but they're human beings and they're there and you can eat your lunch with them and they're next to you and they're not that bad. So. Yeah, so by just being there, networking there, just being a somehow relatable human being, they're making it more difficult for others to really be against them. But I think this also happens for our movement. You know, the animal rights movement and the climate movement.

Rune-Christoffer: You know, we sometimes we need patience and just make people aware that we exist and that we out there and we are not biting and that we are reasonable human beings with some really good ideas on how to solve major issues and ethical issues also in the world.

James: Yeah, yeah. No, I like that. Well, maybe one selfish question here, then we can move on. In the case of the UK, we have a new government, you know, great many new members of Parliament, maybe like to think 200, over 200 people who are new to elected office. What would you say as advice, basically like, okay, you're an animal group, you do policy work. How would you approach this opportunity?

Rune-Christoffer: What I would have done would be, again, I don't know how this works in other countries, but in Denmark you can normally find the email addresses of most candidates before the elections. So we send out a survey ahead of the elections and then through those who actually answer that survey even if we ask maybe 20 questions on possible policy initiatives which are quite reasonable. Some of them are a little, going a little more far, but many of them are just really reasonable, low key policy asks. And then we see who is actually acting favourably to just a few of these. And then we know this, we could contact after the elections. I guess one can in theory also do it after they've been voted in. You can still make a survey, I guess, but they are more likely to answer ahead of an election.

James: Beforehand.

Rune-Christoffer: So and this is not just about identifying, we also ask what they eat themselves. But because that can be helpful, it gives it. If they both answer yes to a lot of stuff and eat or are a vegan themselves, then we kind of feeling that's a big chance. So this is really helpful tool for us to have that data. But apart from that, generally we go through people with different speaker responsibilities from different parties. But in the UK you would need people who know the local context. Actually what I can say is I know the Vegetarian Society of the UK are setting up an event in the Parliament in November where they've invited. We are coming. And together with the former Minister of Food and Agriculture of Denmark, Rasmus Prehn, who was a guy who oversold the deal here.

Rune-Christoffer: So he and I will be coming to this event in the Parliament and we are crossing our fingers. They're expecting to be able to attract quite many parliament members, they're saying, and maybe especially because Danish case is kind of interesting and we have the former minister coming, so hopefully they will actually attract multiple politicians. But how they are structuring that event I don't know. But at least that's a way to do it, organise, get some crazy aliens from Denmark. I think that's part of our philosophy onwards actually.

James: Yes. Having the draw of another minister has done something similar. Cool. And maybe now we can move on to talking about not just the work you've achieved in Denmark today then I guess that's ongoing, but also you have ambitions to scale this up towards an EU wide action plan for plant based foods. Can you speak more about, I guess, the ambitions there and what you want to achieve?

Rune-Christoffer: Definitely. There's clearly a momentum and an interest from other countries in what happened in Denmark because again, you know, Denmark has a huge livestock industry, but still has the world's first action plan for plant based foods and the plant based food branch. So we're basically seeing is there a chance of setting something similar up in other countries, but possibly also even the EU level. And that could really be anything ranging from an action plan with a lot of words on a paper that may still just be worse on a paper. But you know, in the world today there are still countries where this is seen as highly conflicted stuff and where it's difficult, just having the EU publish an action plan saying a lot of nice words about plant based would be an achievement in itself.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, there would still be resistance just against that, but still. So, so see, could we get that then? One thing is if it just has a lot of nice words, I still think that is an achievement worth celebrating if that could happen. Secondly is of course an action plan with actual action that would change things in different ways. And then of course granting mechanism because the problem is like, let's say we other countries in Europe will start putting funding towards plant based. Like the German government did something last year. Now the UK is outside the EU, but still UK is doing something on biotech. And then here and there is the Catalan government in Spain I think did a little as well. So surely we'll get some more.

Rune-Christoffer: Now Netherlands has a different government, but you know, in the future probably certain countries, Netherlands, Sweden would be expected to move more in this direction again. Right, but then how about all these other EU countries which are not likely in the near future to get a government that will prioritise this. So EU is after all has a huge budget and if the EU could set up a granting mechanism and whether that could be similar to the Danish or in what way. You know, there's a lot of EU funding available now that many stakeholders can apply for a lot of rules regarding what that's- iIt's bureaucratic.

Rune-Christoffer: So I think one of these will be about how to set up a scheme that is within the possibilities of the EU bureaucracy, but that is not true bureaucratic, but where multiple stakeholders could apply for funding for research, for education, for training, for R&D activities. And I think that would be really the key aim. And the wonderful news is actually that I don't know how much I can say here on the podcast unrelated to that, but I can say that we just recently have been informed that there is at least one Danish politician who has now a good position in the European Parliament where he would really try to work on this as much as he can from that position.

James: That's great.

Rune-Christoffer: And again, this is a give and take. You might have parties. It's really ultimately a question about who will be included in what. When you have multiparty setups, it's about who will be included in the agreement if you have the chance to be included in the agreement. It's always a choice about whether you want to stay outside the agreement because you think the agreement is overall too dirty, too dark, too much continuation of the same usual stuff, or whether you would enter it and accept that, let's say a really big part of it is just the usual old stuff. But if you by entering the agreement could get, let's say, 2 billion euros to a plant based fund, I would never hesitate to jump into that agreement because, you know, that's how you start things.

Rune-Christoffer: So someone would need to compromise on some of their, you know, it's about standing outside and saying this is not enough, we're not doing enough. And then sometimes entering an agreement which is not sufficient, but which could still be kickstarting the whole thing at EU level.

James: Yeah, I mean, I definitely agree that, you know, something is better than nothing. And like EU level, you know, animal and plant based stuff hasn't been going that well.

Rune-Christoffer: No.

James: You know, for the last few years. So I think any kind of progress, like I said, even if it was a bunch of words saying we think this is good.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah.

James: That would be, to me, incredibly surprising. Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: Because this is also about the dynamics, if that would normalise it at a EU level that would even normalise it more, say China, US other power centres in the world.

James: The Russell's effect, as they call it. Yes. There was recently this thing called the Strategic Dialogue on the Future of Agriculture for the very fancy name, which was to my understanding, I think Ursula von der Leyen kind of set up this big stakeholder group compromising mainly of I guess food and farming bodies and I think maybe one animal body to talk about obviously the future of agriculture. And in that there was mention of a plant based action plan. I guess I'm curious, like were you involved with this or how do you feel about this? Obviously this is great news.

Rune-Christoffer: First of all, it's very great news and it was unexpected because there were some things you set down after these quite violent farmers protests earlier this year, pretty angry demonstrations back in February. So we expected this to be going a lot of steps backwards. But, but it seems like this strategic dialogue, their recommendations include a lot of. Of course they want generally more funding for the whole farming sector. They're asking for more fund. They don't want to take funding from the current system, but they would like additional funding to do some transformative work. Yeah, that's probably why they could agree on this among farmers and green groups. But it just one sentence is the EU should by 2026 develop a plant based action plan. And this is. There was, this was unexpected by us.

Rune-Christoffer: And as far as I know it is some of the green or consumer groups who got it into these recommendations. And we know there's this one Danish politician, Ida Auken, a quite high level politician who has been to Brussels a few times saying they think the EU should make a similar action plan. Like in Denmark, we have been arguing the plant based business association has been arguing it. And we know that there are many of these organisations that have talked together in Brussels and felt this was maybe a way forward to phrase it in that way, something that is about plants. So again, it's not so much about less of something, it's about more of how you invest in the plant based sector. I think whoever managed to get that sentence into it, one of these green or consumer groups did very well.

Rune-Christoffer: I do know that if our role in this has probably been that we have mentioned it as an idea at several locations. So people said maybe trying to aim for an EU action plan is a good idea because there are people within the Danish government who are interested in doing this and because Denmark will have the EU presidency next year. Yeah, so the EU presidency, there's 27 member states of the EU and every half a year it rotates. So it's every 13 and a half years Denmark would have the presidency and that would simply mean that Denmark will be facilitating meetings at what is called the EU Council. So that is the actual sitting governments of all 27 member states.

Rune-Christoffer: So Denmark will be hosting several meetings in Denmark and will be coordinating several meetings and also have an influence on the agenda, the topics. So Denmark just completely. You've seen what happened recently with the Hungarian Prime Minister Orbán. He suddenly went to China and had his own opinion about the Ukraine-Russia issue and he suddenly going rogue on his own. So you're not supposed to use your presidency in such a rogue way.

James: Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: But you still do have a chance to influence the actual agenda for the meeting.

James: Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: And even we are actually feeling it could be interesting if maybe it could be considered what is a food served at those meetings. There are many ways to entrench things as a host country.

James: Yeah, yeah. I mean that is super exciting. And yeah. The strategic dialogue, because it only came out last week, I think that was very much a welcome.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah.

James: Boost. And also I wasn't expecting it because before I was hearing from how I guess rigged the panel was or the stakeholder group was in terms of maybe not necessarily representative towards animal welfare, environmental and consumer groups. But like you said, seems like the ones there did enough to get people involved. And my understanding was you needed full consensus to get things into the tech. So actually it was quite a high bar, which is great news. Basically.

Rune-Christoffer: It is really great news. But I think it also shows that if we stay on the message about how do you develop the alternative space, the plant based space, then there's more opportunity to get that through. If we focus too much that we want to limit or shrink the livestock sector, it's clear it has to happen for the animals. There's no way to live within planetary boundaries. But it's just when we start talking about that there's much more resistance. But if we can show that there is an actual alternative that we're trying to develop, that's a theory of change. Of course you have to believe in. And people might say we are naive and you might prove me wrong in the future.

Rune-Christoffer: But that's at least the way we're trying to approach it to see is this the way that we can actually get change by first constructing a more solid alternative to the current system?

James: Yeah, yeah. It's funny how simple it sounds, but it's just reframing it from. From less meat to more plants, even though it's very similar, but actually people find that much more compelling and less threatening. Again, similar. I was in this meeting yesterday when someone was taking a strong issue to the words ‘meat reduction’ where it's. Well, it's like, but it has to happen. But if we just had more plants, maybe they'd be like, okay, great, but back to the EU focused work, I guess. So I guess big question, what do you plan on doing between now and the end of 2025 to basically make this a reality?

Rune-Christoffer: So what we are trying now to set up with multiple other organisations across Europe is some analytical work to try to see what are the specific barriers in different countries across EU. Some key countries, which are some of the big large countries, but also some of the large countries might be impossible to work with. So we also need smaller countries. Maybe there are some smaller countries where it's more feasible, like in Denmark, because. Yeah, just more manageable, less- overall, less controversy. So find different ways to get more countries on board by analysing, you know, doing some surveys, visiting, talking to local organisations, national organisations, finding out who has the right contacts there and then ideally our dream, we're still fundraising for this, but we think it's going to happen, but still working on it.

Rune-Christoffer: Would be able to send out small delegations, for example, from Denmark. So sending the former Minister of Food and Agriculture who is going to the UK soon incidentally, but a similar version of that, but also we would have some Danish young farmers, probably some of the startups. I have this idea that maybe to some of those countries which are really resistant to the whole thing of meat imitations, maybe we should send out some startups who are doing meat imitations but with very short ingredient lists and then that can somehow. I don't know if I can make them more comfortable, but maybe if it's a purely cultural hesitance and not an actual economic resistance, but if they're just culturally hesitant, maybe that could open their hearts and minds.

Rune-Christoffer: So I think different ways of working diplomatically, to inspire, to really get this whole idea of a food system transition down to Earth, not so much social media, not so much clashes and conflicts, but just down to human meetings. Peer to peer. That's one of the things we believe in, that maybe you need to find someone they can mirror themselves in so it doesn't have to be from Denmark. There’s also people from Netherlands, Germany, other countries where people can find peer to peer inspiration. But I do think bringing it down to a level where what it gets concrete and-

James: Not abstract or intellectual, sometimes.

Rune-Christoffer: Not so dangerous. Just get it down to human beings practically or into human beings. I think that could be a way forward to open up that space of curiosity in other countries.

James: Partially because I'm a bit ignorant on how the EU works and I just think it is a bit complicated, I guess how much of this going ahead rests on, like you pointed out, maybe a small number of countries who are like particularly resistant. Maybe like, you know, the Hungarys, maybe Italys and Frances of the world. I guess how much of your work is convincing them to not block it or do you just need some majority of other countries to be for it and that's kind of all you need?

Rune-Christoffer: I have a personal curiosity, you know, and I think there is something in this movement we need to really be even better at reaching out to the people we strongly disagree with or that we think we strongly disagree with. So I do think there's an interesting challenge in reaching out to those people who are really opposed. But then if we do that and then the door is really closed, which is really unlikely to happen, then it's wasting our time. But at least giving you that it's not going to hurt us and cost that much time or funds to try to see, to find out and again trying through other organisations who know the context from people who see someone knows someone who knows someone who can maybe give the right angle to talk to some of these people who are very opposed.

Rune-Christoffer: So I think it's a mixture of getting some of those along who will actually be positive, but maybe then also at least ensuring that those countries who are still somehow balancing will stay curious that they're not being dragged into the negative fold. So that will be a combination of, I think, different arguments for different countries and for different target groups. We should be really sensitive to national context. Yeah, that's the problem with, you know, some of the disappointment in the past has come, I think from lobbying too much, targeting the institutions in Brussels, the European Commission and the European Parliament and forgetting the national context of all 27 countries. And that's hugely complex work. But again, we'll see.

Rune-Christoffer: I think if we engage the right organisations on the ground in different countries, it should be possible to find a way forward for, again, you don't need everyone to be really in favour as long as you have only a few people were against. And a sufficiently neutral/curious group, if there's a sufficiently large group of countries who are curious, neutral, curious, that would be a success criteria, I guess. And especially again, it's about also showing there is Innovation potential. It's also about food security. We do think the whole food security argument is really important here. Like, you know, there is an issue with EU does depend too much on imports for the animal sector and it's not sustainable in a world with geopolitical issues as well.

James: Do you plan on, I guess trying to form the same kind of coalition where I guess it will also have a fairly strong organic focus to things that I guess also big in the EU and also with the green movement as well?

Rune-Christoffer: Yes, I guess again totally different in each country. There are some countries which are much more organic leaning there the organic argument would be strong. But there are other countries where the organic movement is small and not relevant. So then that's clearly not. But maybe again some of these young farmers or the think tank Fry I mentioned earlier, some representatives from conventional Danish farmers or who are taking this step. I think a really convincing example we have in Denmark is this company called. We have two now actually. But at least a really good story is one of them is the Organic Plant Protein is the name of the company. They're doing fava beans and peas, yellow peas. So they're mixing it into a meat imitation. It can be used for a huge variety of dishes. They're exporting the ingredient to more than 30 countries now.

Rune-Christoffer: It's entirely organic, but 30% of the company is owned by a large Danish farming cooperative called Danish Agro. So that means that a sizable chunk of Danish farmers are actually co owners of that company. For each of them it's a tiny, tiny investment. But through the cooperative they now own 30% of one of the main export oriented Danish plant based companies. So that clearly gives them ownership and interest in making that company succeed. And I think that's an example to share that story. That's maybe to encourage farmers associations in other countries to start buying shares, maybe spreading the risk, ideally multiple. Buying some shares in multiple alternative protein companies or plant based companies. I think that could be a way forward so they get an economic interest in it themselves.

James: In terms of these more challenging, difficult countries, what kind of arguments do you plan on making or how do you plan on getting them to the place maybe where they're neutral, curious and not against you?

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah. So again, we think generally the more conservative countries are, the more they are a little more to the right, the more it generally tends to be the market arguments, job creation arguments, balances between rural and urban that are usually convincing arguments. So we have to show some trends, some data showing that, you know, while you may have some companies that are failing and the market stagnating in some countries, you still have other places where it's still growing. I like to quote the study, you know this, that was made some years ago study poll where they asked 27 countries around the world whether they would prefer real meat from animals or meat like alternatives made from plants. I think it was made by GlobeScan 28, 21, something like that.

Rune-Christoffer: And you actually see that lots of Asian countries are saying that they're actually interested in the meat imitations. So if someone develops the right quality of a product, there's a huge market for it.

James: Export market. Yeah, interesting.

Rune-Christoffer: And then other concrete cases of companies who are actually doing well can be helpful. Apart from certain countries where demand and sales are still growing because it might change a bit from time to time. Who is doing where is it going well and where is it not. So I think the positive stories in the market are reported, but also the health economics that they huge healthcare costs for many countries related to unhealthy diets. Eating more plant based would major impact on that. So that I think that argument can be convincing for some countries as well.

James: Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. I think that the free market stuff is quite interesting because for example, in the case of the US right, generally as fairly free market based ideology. But then it's funny when you see some states banning cultivated meat and some and it's like no, you meant to be pro free markets and competition and then you're doing this regulation. So I think, yeah, maybe at least you could hope is these countries shouldn't be trying to regulate an industry in a way that, you know, these products never come to market, all this kind of stuff. So yeah, it doesn't make sense to push that. But there is some irony sometimes in what people say and what people actually do.

Rune-Christoffer: No matter what is the other side's counterargument. We should just generally be open to meet with them and understand them and we have to build. I think if you're a minority, we are representing still a win. Maybe we have values that represent the majority. But what we are working with is still for the moment a minority. Then we do have to be the ones to try to build bridges to the other side. We can't wait for them to do it or expect them to do it.

James: Yeah, that makes sense. This has been super interesting. I feel like I learned a lot about political advocacy as always and I hope people listening did too. As we move on to the closing, there's a few final questions we ask everyone. One of them is what's one bit of news you're grateful about or excited to hear recently.

Rune-Christoffer: So I think that's definitely the fact that just last week it was announced that the European Investment Bank EIB announced that for the first time it had invested in a meat alternative company. They invested 20 million euros in the Danish company called MATR. And considering the fact that this startup in Denmark has been a startup that many of us have felt very hopeful about and we think it's doing something really well. Even has a former executive of an animal production company, they're leading it, but she's very disruptive now. She's really great. The fact that they got this major investment from the European Investment Bank the first time they did it, that gives some hope both that this company might do- will now build a factory and can develop and expand.

James: Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: But also apart from that also that the European Investment Bank is now finally starting to invest in such companies. So I think that's fantastic news.

James: It's very cool. Yeah, it's like what we spoke about before. The signalling effect, even if it's, you know, 20 million obviously is actually quite a chunk of money, but at least maybe it signals to other bits of the EU infrastructure or other countries actually that this is a worthwhile investing in sector. So it's very cool. Nice. Okay, the next question we have is in terms of media recommendations, so are there any books, podcasts, videos you want to recommend to people?

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, this was a really nice one and I like that question. And, and I actually gave it some thought. I might even have more than two books. And I was okay, just, let's.

James: Go for it. We'll share them all. Don't worry. You just go for it.

Rune-Christoffer: So I think actually some of these books like 20 or 30 years old, but I just think they all have really value and meaning today. And I think they can be valuable for people today who don't know them already. So one of them is a fiction. It's one called Ishmael. It's a book by Daniel Quinn. It was later. It is. It has been filmatised later to a movie called Instinct with Anthony Hopkins. But the movie is really not good compared to the books.

James: We won't link that. We will just link the book.

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, but it's a conversation between a gorilla and a human being and it just gave. It had some really excellent. For me, that was the book that actually helped me see clearly a life purpose. I could say my life purpose or possibly even the. Or a very worthy life purpose. This is my own interpretation of what I read in the book. But I just felt it gave me the idea that I read at a time when I was still wondering what is the meaning of everything and of life and the universe? And is the universe ever eternal?

James: Big questions.

Rune-Christoffer: Is there any limit to the boundaries of the universe? It's just never ending. And you can get mad if you think too much about that.

Rune-Christoffer: And then I read this book and then I realised, well, maybe the meaning of life is just to make sure that whatever species live on this planet in some far distant future, that when they look back on humans beings and then they will feel like, wow, these guys were not that bad, you know. But if they look back on us feeling like that was a shitty chapter of history, that's not some- you don’t want to be part of that, right? You want to be part of something that the future will look back on with warmth and love. So I think that paving the way for- that human beings is not necessarily the end of history.

Rune-Christoffer: That was a message I got from that book that there are other species that if we give them space to evolve, you never know who will reach the so called highest level of consciousness. Like we need to give space to other species to live. I love that because of that.

James: That is not what I was expecting, but I love it. We'll link that and I'm very curious to read it. Have you got anything else?

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, so there's this book by Nick Fiddes called Meat: A Natural Symbol. It's I think from 1992 and it's really just to me at least the best book I've read on these very deeply ingrained beliefs about civilization, evolution, status, you know, all these things where meat is kind of has been for at least a few hundred years been put on top of the hierarchy. And I think that book is an anthropological book, but it's just very well in trying to understand why is it so deeply ingrained in all sorts of mental hierarchies we meet that meat has been put on top for so long time and all that is causing it.

James: Can I ask a random question that we may or may not remove? I was looking at LinkedIn today and I didn't know are you like a PhD, like fellow of anthropology or like. Yeah, what's your anthropology connection?

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah, so I'm an anthropologist, a masters, a bachelor and masters anthropologist. And then I have a PhD which is still not completely finished. It was delayed for several years first because of my engagement and the movement here in the organisation but then later because of some bureaucratics stuff that made it just delayed. But actually right now they are assessing a PhD that was finally submitted. So I will have to defend it sometime this year or next year. But it's years ago it was written now but has been delayed for various reasons. Oh wow.

James: Interesting.

Rune-Christoffer: And that's by the way about Indians who cultivate legume supposes in Ethiopia or who buy it from smallholders who grow it in Mozambique. So basically about value chains of chickpeas and lentils in eastern Africa involving Indians and locals.

James: Wow. It's very fitting. And if you're watching this on YouTube you can see there's some nice legumes behind Rune- Christoffer. You should look at the video.

Rune-Christoffer: Very fitting.

James: Yes. Sorry. Any other book recommendations?

Rune-Christoffer: Yeah. So then there is a book I think which is maybe really important, I think to read for especially I would say the more animal rights or vegan minded you are. And that's a book coming from, I would say one of. Because it's provoking you with the title itself. The author is called is Simon Fairlie and the book is called Meat: A Benign Extravagance. And personally I don't see meat as benign. I don't think it's benign to kill animals. But I think the book shows why we have a lot in common with the organic movement, environmentalists and others. And it's really showing, you know, like he's doing a lot of math, criticising the FAO. He's trying to show, you know, how much meat can be produced sustainably in a way that is much more ethical towards the animals.

Rune-Christoffer: He's advancing the argument that there's a huge food systems change you need. But he's also showing, you know, what is the. I think there are a lot of people here who would agree with 80% of the vegan vision. And for the foreseeable future we need these people on board. It's not going to happen without them on board. And I think he puts a compelling vision and calculations on why. What is that kind of vision he's arguing for that is aligned with the vegan. It's not identical with the vegan vision but that we still really need to collaborate with people who think like him. Otherwise we don't stand a chance. So I guess, yeah, these were the most important books. Finally, bonus book. This is that one you probably might know Michael Pollan, he wrote The Omnivore’s Dilemma.

Rune-Christoffer: But then he also wrote a book called In Defense of Food and the one called In Defense of Food it's really about nutritionism as a concept. How this whole idea that we ended up talking about small nutrients and instead of whole foods and he's tracing that actually back to the animal industry that tried to avoid explicit recommendations regarding the quantity of animal products. A way to avoid that was to start talking much more about saturated fat and all sorts of components of foods instead of the actual foods. And I think it's a really interesting argument he's making there on how nutritionism, it serves many purposes today but historically has helped the animal industry avoid a discussion about animal products.

James: Yeah, definitely. And similar almost it works the other way with like protein right now people like why you need to eat more protein. More protein, more protein. And then the first thing most people think of when they think of protein is some sort of meat source. So that's kind of benefit that way as well. Nice. This is very interesting. There's some good fairly broad ranging books on like you know the more philosophy and culture and yeah anthropology behind food.

Rune-Christoffer: I think these are really some of my favourite books. It was nice to think about it, reflect about it. What would be my recommended books. So I appreciate.

James: How could you do that and what are some ways people can get involved in your work? So I guess how can they follow you online? You know, do you need more volunteers? Obviously donations with this big European action plan. I guess anything you'd want to shout out.

Rune-Christoffer: People can of course always find us on our website and social media and the work we're doing in Denmark. It's. It's quite. Danish is very much a working language in Denmark so it would ideally be someone who speaks Danish if people would like to work for us. That said, we do have an intern now who well, she understands Danish but speaks fluent English. So it's not impossible to get to work for us if you speak- don't speak Danish but it would be usually needed within our office work here. But then for some of our international work you never know. Like let's say that this kind of Denmark as a model country for how to develop plant based. If that starts evolving more and more maybe we would then want more people who don't speak Danish. That could be possible. Yeah.

Rune-Christoffer: If you want to meet us. Of course we have various. We're not doing a lot of traditional outreach here but we do have some major events planned. Food festival which is a major expo. So there's one coming up in January, Aarhus here and then November but that's 2025 in the Copenhagen. We are also investigating whether we could do something international during Denmark's EU presidency year. But we're still looking for. Trying to identify funding for that. Possibly. Yeah. But otherwise, if you want to meet me, I am attending some other major vegan plant based summits internationally. Not all of them, but I try to attend here and there, some of them. So people can always reach out to me, of course, and my colleagues.

James: Pretty cool. Nice. Like I said, you can only travel so much. I know it can be difficult as well as doing everything else you're doing. We can wrap it up there. I just want to say again. Yeah, thank you. This has been super interesting and some insights into. Yes, some very impressive government advocacy and wins that will hopefully be an example to countries around the world and hopefully be replicated in the EU. Thanks Rune-Christoffer and speak to you soon.

Rune-Christoffer: Thank you so much. And I feel also like saying thank you to everyone else out there in this space because we are getting so inspired by others out there. Yeah, I didn't really get into. There's so many things here and there where we actually got the inspiration from colleagues internationally and then try to adapt it, tweak it and twist it and by that get some results here. So I think we really can learn a lot from each other.