On 27 September Switzerland votes on public support for plant foods

On 27 September the Swiss electorate will vote on a popular initiative entitled "for food security". The text aims to enable Switzerland to cover up to 70 per cent of its food needs from domestic production.

To get there, the initiative calls for a change in agricultural policy to promote the production and consumption of plant-based foods rather than animal products. The reasoning is that the same cultivated area yields far more calories available within the country if it is used directly for human food rather than for animal feed.

The text was launched by the environmental campaigner Franziska Herren together with six other people. It is backed in particular by the Young Greens. The Federal Council and Parliament, by contrast, recommend rejection.

Where the disagreement runs

The heart of the debate is political rather than technical, and concerns the scope of state action. Supporters present the initiative as a step towards sustainable farming and towards less dependence on imports, both of food and of feed. Opponents describe it as a vegan diktat, that is, as state interference in individual dietary choices and in farms' production decisions.

The question bears directly on those who work the land. A shift towards crops for human consumption means changing rotations, machinery and commercial outlets and, for many mountain farms, calling into question a model built on livestock because pasture is the only resource available. These effects fall unevenly between the lowlands and the Alpine regions, and between large and small farms.

The initiative comes to the vote in a summer marked by drought, which has already cut grass growth and forced many farms to draw on their winter forage reserves. The debate on self-sufficiency is therefore taking place in a setting where the yield of the land has become less predictable than it once was.

SWI swissinfo.ch has opened a discussion forum asking readers how far the state should intervene in what ends up on people's plates.