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Thanks for sharing, Rakefet!

- Over 80% of participants plan to continue following a plant-based diet!

How many of the 7 M people you reached replied to the survey asking about whether they plan to continue following a plant-based diet? You may be interested in my cost-effectiveness analysis of Veganuary. I do not trust the results of Veganuary’s 6 month survey in 2024, according to which 81 % of people decreased their consumption of animal products over the last 6 months by at least 50 %, because only 0.0237 % as many people responded as reported participating in Veganuary in 2024.

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China Vegan Society's V-March results

by Rakefet Cohen Ben-Arye

Apr 201 min read 4

35

Animal welfareAnnouncements and updatesNews relevant to effective altruismOrganization updatesResearch

Frontpage

We're thrilled to share the results of our V-March (vegan in March) 2025 campaign!

The numbers speak for themselves:

- Reached over 7 million people across China

- More than 70,000 active engagements through comments and shares

- 600+ daily check-ins via our WeChat Mini Program

- 341 Sogdian Trees planted (reclaiming approximately 3410㎡ of desert)

- 3410.12 RMB donated to the Alashan SEE Ecology Association

undefined — By Arkadiusz Nowak, Marcin Nobis, Sylwia Nowak, Agnieszka Nobis,Anna Wróbel, Sebastian Świerszcz, Ewelina Klichowska,Iwona Dembicz & Grzegorz Kusza - Arkadiusz Nowak and Marcin Nobs (Eds): Illustrated Flora of Tajikistan and adjacent areas, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw 2020., CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=128815843

Our survey reveals a powerful impact:

- Over 80% of participants plan to continue following a plant-based diet!

- Over 70% reported noticeable health improvements

- 67% plan to reduce meat intake by 40-80%

- 58% stayed fully plant-based throughout the campaign

What motivated people most?

- 23% cited health benefits as their primary motivation

- Our participants were 77% female, 18% male, and 5% identifying as non-binary or preferred not to say

- A wide range of age groups participated, with 30% aged 24-30

The most significant challenges?

- 40% found eating out to be the biggest challenge

- Interestingly, over half said missing non-vegan food was their least difficult aspect!

62.1% of the participants gave a maximal score to their need for vegan labeling.

A special thank you to our 70+ collaborating restaurants, shops, and brands, to our media and communications manager Nina Manukian, to Faunalytics, and of course to Veganuary for their inspiration and global leadership in promoting plant-based lifestyles!

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Vasco Grilo🔸Apr 245

Thanks for sharing, Rakefet!

- Over 80% of participants plan to continue following a plant-based diet!

MaxtandyApr 233

This is awesome to see, congratulations on the campaign!

It's no secret that this is a pretty neglected space, especially when compared to how big the impact could potentially be. It's great you're sharing your results, and I hope to see it continue in years to come. The data you've gathered seems potentially useful in helping to guide and promote future campaigns too. Very impressed by the initiative here.

I've got a few questions, mostly about the numbers you've given.

I don't think it's clear how many participants there were. Is it the 70,000 engagements, or the 600 (or 287 - your numbers differ) daily check ins?

The seven million people reached is also interesting. What counts as being reached? I imagine seeing an advertisement or something, is that right?

I'm not surprised the follow through appears to be something like 1% - personal diet is hard to change anywhere in the world. Do you have a sense of where people fell out of the "funnel" the most, percentage wise?

I'm also surprised by how many people identified as non-binary in the results. Perhaps it's naive of me, but I would have expected fewer people to select that option due to social and political pressure. Do you think there's a selection effect here? As in, the people who commit to plant based eating are more likely to also think critically about other topics?

Lastly are you able to talk about your reasoning behind partnering with the ecology group and the interest in tree planting?

Thanks again for the work and for sharing the results too!

Rakefet Cohen Ben-AryeApr 242

Hey @Maxtandy, thanks for the kind words and for your insightful questions!
You're right, it's important to be transparent about the data.

To answer your questions:
Participants: The 70,000 engagements refer to the total number of interactions (likes, comments, shares) across all our platforms. The 600+ daily check-ins are from our WeChat Mini Program, which is a separate platform used for tracking individual participation.

Reach: The 7 million people reached refers to the estimated number of individuals who saw our campaign materials across various platforms. This includes social media posts, ads, and media coverage.

Follow-through: You're right, the follow-through rate is lower than we'd like, but it's still a significant number of people making changes to their diet.

Non-binary: It's great to see such a high representation of non-binary individuals in our campaign. It's possible that there's a selection effect, as you mentioned, and individuals who are open to plant-based diets are also more likely to be open to diverse identities.

Tree planting: We partnered with the Alashan SEE Ecology Association because we believe that addressing climate change is vital.

Thanks again for your interest and for engaging in this vital conversation!

MaxtandyApr 241

Thanks for the response Rakefet!

Can I ask how many responses to the survey you got? That is still unclear to me and seems like one of the most important numbers for determining impact, and I dont have a good sense on how seriously to take any of these numbers without it.

I'm not sure about the effectiveness of lumping in climate change. I agree addressing it is important, but many issues are important - why not also donate to Against Malaria Foundation? Climate change is different in that people do associate it with diet more strongly, and I think that anything that leads to less animal suffering is good, regardless of the reasons people make that choice, but I worry about things like people choosing to eat fish instead of cows. I'm also not convinced that the org selected is most efficient in terms of actually taking carbon out of the atmosphere in comparison to lobbying efforts or something.

I'm not an expert, so I may be well wrong, but I think an org thats primarily concerned with impact would make different decisions to those made here. If they are, I'd be interested to hear the rationale or theory of change. If they're not, then I don't think that these numbers actually speak for themselves as claimed, and there's still lots we don't know, and it raises my belief that people looking to fund opportunities in this area would find higher impact orgs elsewhere.

You're under no obligation to respond to this rather pointed line of questioning/comments, but I thought it was important that I express these doubts. I do sincerely hope that this runs again in the future and the results are shared again.