US banks are “undermining” their climate commitments by financing industrial livestock corporations, according to new research.

A study published by Netherlands-based research group Profundo and US environmental organisation Friends of the Earth found that between 2016 and 2023, 58 US banks provided $134 billion in lending and underwriting to meat, dairy, animal feed, food processing, and agri-commodity companies.

More than half of the financing examined in the report came from Bank of America, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase; collectively leading to 24.4 million metric tons of CO2e emissions.

Bank of America and JP Morgan declined to comment on the report.

FStech has contacted Citigroup for comment.

Industrial livestock production generates massive GHG emissions, with the report finding that the 56 largest corporations involved in meat, dairy, and/or feed production reviewed for the study generate more carbon dioxide-equivalent emissions each year than the entire nation of Japan, the world’s eighth largest emitter.

“Banks have committed to pathways to net zero, but they are ignoring a huge ‘cow-shaped hole’ in their plans,” said Monique Mikhail, lead author of the study and the director of Friends of the Earth’s Agriculture & Climate Finance program. “Big meat and dairy exerts a vastly disproportionate impact on the banks’ total emissions, putting their own stated climate commitments at risk.”

The research discovered that US banks’ lending to meat, dairy and feed corporations results in approximately 11 per cent of the greenhouse gas emissions linked to the banks’ financing.

Despite this, the report says that these corporations represent only 0.25 per cent of the banks' portfolios, meaning that this financing presents an outsized impediment to banks meeting their climate commitments.

“Our research finds that by eliminating their financing of high-emitting corporations involved in meat, dairy, and feed production — a relatively small change in how they allocate their capital — these big banks can affect a sharp emissions reduction,” said Ward Warmerdam, another author of the study and the senior financial researcher at Profundo. “According to our research, defunding industrial livestock production is one of the most climate-positive choices these banks could make.”

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