The 2017 Conference on Animal Rights in Europe (CARE) took place last November in Vienna, Austria and brought together not only animal organizations from Europe, but also animal organizations from all over the world. Throughout this conference, leaders from various backgrounds and organizations spoke about their own country’s situation and progress regarding animal rights.

Two people, from two different groups represented Italy in the conference. Claudio Pomo from Essere Animali was one and Annamaria Pisapia, from Compassion in World Farming Italy (CIWF), was the other.

Pomo reported that there had been a sharp decline in vivisection between 2007 and 2015, with the number of animals in total shrinking from 908,000 to 581,000. In addition, he reported that culture in Italy is rapidly changing with fur consumption decreasing by 8 percent every year, the number of vegans increasing by 300 percent, and Italians spending more on vegetables than meat in 2015.

Pisapia talked about some of the successes of the CIWF team, which included increasing awareness about factory farming through publicized investigations, cinema ads on meat, and a late night, weekly program on farming that, despite its very late airtime, garnered over a million viewers.

Meanwhile, in Russia, the vegan, vegetarian, and animal rights movements face immense difficulties under the totalitarian regime. Protections for animals in this country are marked with an F-Level, the worst level of all. The country has dog hunters who publicize footage of dogs being tortured, shot, and burned alive. Protests occurred in response but only Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Leningrad have banned the publication of these violent videos. The movement in Russia is made up primarily of women, like Dinara Ageeva from Voices for Animals - Russia. Unfortunately, in a largely patriarchal society, this means that the movement is not taken seriously. Despite the struggles, however, activists have persevered and launched a vegetarian TV channel and held the fifth successful vegan festival in St. Petersburg.

While these issues and battles may feel like they’re happening on another planet, the truth is that the animal rights movement is one that is a global one. In order to see more victories, we must start working together on all over the world.

We encourage you to contact organizations in other countries as well as those in the United States, to publicize their efforts, donate to them, and, most importantly, inform yourself about the issues as much as possible and find out how you can help. Alone we can do a lot, but together we can accomplish truly extraordinary things.