State of the Movement is our ongoing research initiative designed to map how organizations use resources to reduce, reform, and replace the use of animals in the food system. State of the Movement 2024 reflects survey responses from 211 organizations across 50 countries, capturing more than USD 259 million in annual expenses intended to directly or indirectly benefit animals farmed or caught for food.
HIGHLIGHTS
Resource landscape
- Total tracked expenses increased significantly. The report includes USD 259.6 million in in-scope expenses—up approximately 30% since 2021 and consistent with movement growth trends since 2018 as measured by Farmed Animal Funders using different methods. Two-thirds of respondents also reported expenses outside the survey scope, reflecting diverse organizational missions.
- A few large organizations dominate spending. Just 8% of organizations—those with annual expenses over USD 5 million accounted for 63% of all reported expenses.
Regional variation
- Spending remains regionally concentrated. Organizations based in Northern America and Europe made up 73% of survey respondents but accounted for 94% of total spending. About 90% of their expenditures remained within their home regions.
- Cross-regional spending remains important. Even small amounts of international spending by well-resourced organizations contributed substantially to expenditures in other regions.
- Regional priorities differ. Europe devoted a relatively larger share of spending to aquatic animals and government policy work. Latin America focused on business engagement, Oceania on direct animal care, and Asia and Northern Africa on growing local advocacy.
Strategic focus patterns
- Strategic focus shifts with size. While intervention patterns were broadly similar across budget categories, smaller organizations spent more on public outreach, while larger ones focused more heavily on government work.
- Aquatic animals and insects receive far less spending than other animals. Aquatic animals received 11% of all in-scope spending, mostly from European organizations. Farmed aquatic animals received substantially more spending than wild-caught ones. Insects, eaten by humans or by animals in feed, were in scope but received minimal reported spending.
- Chicken welfare is a major strategic focus. Egg-laying and broiler chickens received 15% and 11% of animal-specific spending, respectively—over 26% combined compared to 5% for pigs and 2% for cattle.
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Only one-third of spending was directed toward specific animal types. Rather than targeting specific animals defined in the survey (such as turkeys, farmed fish, or farmed cephalopods), most spending was allocated to broader categories—39% went to “All Terrestrial Farmed Animals” while 20% had a focus in which the animal was unknown or could not be specified.
Intervention and outcome patterns
- Spending is balanced across all but one intervention category. Public, Business, Government, and Movement interventions each received comparable shares of total spending. Just 3% went to Animal interventions, such as sanctuaries, veterinary care, or rescue.
- Welfare reform leads spending on outcomes and interventions. Improving welfare standards was the top intended outcome (32% of spending), while corporate engagement for welfare reform was the most funded individual intervention (11%).
- Movement building is gaining ground. Interventions supporting the movement—such as research, skill building, and network building—accounted for 22% of total expenses. Network building alone ranked as the second-most-funded intervention overall, with over USD 21 million.
Acknowledgments
This report would not have been possible without the contributions of many.
Stray Dog Institute gratefully acknowledges Farmed Animal Funders for their trailblazing efforts to measure the resources of the farmed animal protection movement and for graciously entrusting us with continuing this survey.
We thank the many organizations worldwide that served as early pilot testers, helping to refine and improve the survey questions. We also appreciate our fellow funders, grantee partners, and nonprofit allies for promoting the survey within their networks. These efforts extended the survey’s reach, encouraging participation among underrepresented segments of the movement.
We are especially grateful to Faunalytics, Rethink Priorities, Animal Charity Evaluators, Open Philanthropy, The Navigation Fund, and Good Growth for their valuable review comments and suggestions for future survey improvements.
Finally, and most importantly, we thank the hundreds of nonprofit organizations worldwide participating in the 2024 survey, donating their time to provide the detailed source data that powered this report.
