This is a great write up! Thanks for sharing it!

I'm curious how you see this aspect playing out?

Many MPs are supportive of animal issues but have little incentive to raise it as a political issue. One MP and one staffer said that politicians are often exposed to radical animal activists and need to be shown that animal advocates can be moderate and offer reasonable policy solutions.

I think there is a difference between radical actions and radical asks. If a radical action is asking for a country to immediately stop eating meat, the ask and action are generally considered easy to write off and dismiss as being unrealistic. I think this is often a default view of animal activists. Radical actions (and the threat of them) with a reasonable ask, ie cage-free campaigns, are more difficult to be dismissed.

The issues you chose to focus on from my perspective, seem quite reasonable. Are you considering incorporating more radical actions into your future plans?

If I get it right, your thoughts are how do we mitigate costs, limit logistics and provide better access to major organisations and funders.

I'm excited about and supportive of how AVA has developed regional conferences. I attended the Asia AVA and noticed that numerous funders from other parts of the world were in attendance as well as staff from major organisations. I think the regional events provide a number of other pluses that AVA Africa pretty much say themselves.

By hosting this event on the continent, we can:
 

• Bring together a larger, more diverse group of advocates from the region.
   
• Address logistical and cost barriers such as visa challenges and travel expenses.
   
• Facilitate better-informed and regionally relevant interventions for farmed animals.

Many funders I've spoken to have a genuine interest in supporting and growing animal protection work in other parts of the world and I can imagine that their attendance will continue and probably grow at these regional events. I also see potential, that these regional events, might inspire future funders in each region, something I see as important as we continue to grow this work.

I can see that LA might not be the best place if we are looking at a global event, concerns about the scholarship progress and your burning desire to do great things for animals. I also think that the addition of the regional conferences is a fantastic step in improving accessibility for organisations to meet, co-create, build community and fundraise.

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In your post and subsequent comments I sense dissatisfaction with the scholarship process and that your primary goal of attending AVA US is to access funders. I realise you are posting from an anonymous account, so maybe you already do this, but if not. Post about the work your organisation is doing here and on FAST. I'm sure people would love to hear about it. If you haven't presented at a regional AVA summit or a conference like CARE I think might be a great thing to do.

Working with many food companies on their commitment to transition to a cage-free egg supply. I have seen the following happen, staff gain internal buy-in, publicly state it on their website, in some cases the first time the company has a tangible stated animal welfare position. 

I've rarely encountered people at a company who don't care about animal welfare, I think the challenge for them is understanding how they can operationalise it. I think the cage-free work has helped many companies, and staff within them, to move forward and builds inertia.

An example I like of this is Carrefour's work on cage-free for chickens and then moving forward to create cage-free systems for quail.

I understand that in total corporate commitments cover about 70-80% of the US egg market. 

The remainder 20-30% is more or less what you identify, non-chain restaurants and non-chain companies in other industries, where the time to do corporate work is probably not worth it and would be expected to shift following law making. 

Many schools and cafeterias use third party catering companies like Sodexo, Compass, Aramark etc, that have cage-free commitments and are making solid progress on their commitments.

If you're calculating the 40% aggregate by assuming that all the companies have equal market share, that can skew what is happening. The largest in each sector normally have the largest piece. And sector by sector by market share it is grocery stores, restaurant chains/caterers, manufacturing and then hotels. 

I agree in the large change in a short amount of time. Small thing, my colleagues at THL recently wrote a blog on an update on USDA numbers which slightly changed the data. 

Edit (forgot to add the link)

And I agree with Jakub's take.

Welfare Footpring Institute, gives a nice overview of the pain reduced moving from cage to cage-free environments here.

The ambition and execution your team has continues to inspire me.Looking forward to seeing this continue!

Thanks for sharing this update Stephen, it's been inspiring to see the recent momentum your organisation has had.

Thanks for looking into this. Two things.

1. I have heard a number of positive endorsements of https://www.vegan-friendly.com/ work from people that I view has having better insight into this than I.
2. In conversations I've had on cage-free and moving to egg replacements with companies. Perhaps, the largest concern I've heard is the fear of a company being reliant on one brand/product. The companies are often of the opinion that eggs give them much more flexibility in their supply chain to scale up/down and shift suppliers. I imagine that egg replacement solutions that share that characteristic might be better received.