On Saturday morning, activists from the international NGO Sinergia Animal took action at the Annual Board of Governors Meeting of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) with a powerful artistic performance titled “The Banquet of Collapse.”
Santiago, March 30, 2025
As part of the Annual Board of Governors Meeting of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in Chile, a group of activists from the international NGO Sinergia Animal staged an artistic performance titled “The Banquet of Collapse” to demand that banks stop financing industrial livestock due to its vast environmental impact.
The demonstrators set up a table in front of the Estación Mapocho, simulating a dinner scene featuring farmers, members of the public, and Amazonian wildlife. Their plates, filled with ashes, symbolized the forest fires caused by the expansion of livestock farming and deforestation. Meanwhile, other performers played the role of bankers, indulging in lavish plates of meat. With the message “IDB: Don't use our taxes to finance destructive livestock,” the activists captured the attention of dozens of passersby near the venue.
“This demonstration reflects the massive environmental damage to wildlife in the Amazon and other regions, where millions of hectares of native forest are cleared for cattle ranching and soybean plantations used for animal feed,” explained Camila Silva, Campaigns Manager for Sinergia Animal Chile.
A Global Coalition Against Industrial Livestock Financing
Sinergia Animal is part of the Stop Financing Factory Farming (S3F), a coalition of over 25 environmental, animal protection, human rights, and Indigenous organizations. The coalition urges multilateral development banks, such as the IDB, to stop financing industrial livestock, arguing that it is a destructive activity that drives climate change, biodiversity loss, and negatively impacts rural and Indigenous communities.
A Crisis Funded by Public Money
The IDB receives public funds from various Latin American countries, including Chile. With this capital, it finances development projects across the region and the Caribbean. These projects include industrial livestock farming, where animals are often confined in highly restricted spaces and large-scale agricultural plantations for animal feed. According to Sinergia Animal, this type of financing contradicts the bank’s own commitments to initiatives including the Paris Agreement, the Global Biodiversity Framework, and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, all of which aim to foster a sustainable economy.
“Industrial livestockfarming is suffocating the planet, and we cannot allow Chilean taxpayers’ money to be used to finance this industry, especially considering the IDB's sustainability commitments,” Silva emphasized.
The consequences of industrial livestock farming are alarming. This form of mass production is a leading driver of deforestation, excessive water use and contamination, greenhouse gas emissions, and the suffering of animals kept in intensive confinement systems.
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About Sinergia Animal
Sinergia Animal is an international animal protection organization working in Global South countries to reduce farm animal suffering and promote more compassionate diets. We have been recognized as one of the most effective animal protection NGOs in the world by Animal Charity Evaluators (ACE).