This article is part of my FAQs series.
For well over a decade, I have been answering anonymously submitted questions on my Tumblr blog. Over that time, I have noticed many recurring themes, concerns, and misunderstandings.
This series brings together concise, practical responses to the questions I am asked most often, based on real conversations with people at every stage of thinking about veganism.
If you’d like to see more entries in this series, you can find them here.
The Short Answer
Yes, quinoa can be ethical to consume, including for vegans.
Claims that eating quinoa harms Bolivian farmers are often exaggerated or misleading. While quinoa, like any global crop, can be produced unethically under certain conditions, there is no good evidence that vegans are responsible for widespread harm. Ethical concerns around quinoa are best understood as part of wider issues in global food systems, not as a reason to reject veganism
The Detail
Where This Criticism Comes From
The “quinoa objection” became popular after media reports suggested that rising global demand had made quinoa unaffordable for people in Bolivia and Peru, where it has traditionally been a staple food.
These reports were quickly taken up by critics of veganism, who implied that vegans were responsible for this situation by making quinoa “fashionable” in the West. The suggestion was that vegans cared more about animals than about poor farmers.
This argument contains both logical and factual problems.
The Central Fallacy
Even if quinoa production were harmful, using this as an argument against veganism would still be a tu quoque fallacy.
Rather than addressing the ethics of exploiting animals, the argument shifts focus to alleged hypocrisy among vegans. It attacks people’s behaviour instead of engaging with the moral principles behind veganism.
Even if some vegans made inconsistent choices, that would not undermine the ethical case for veganism itself.
What Farmers Have Said
When researchers and journalists spoke directly to quinoa farmers, many told a very different story from the one presented in headlines. Numerous farmers reported that rising demand had:
- Increased their income
- Improved living standards
- Brought investment to poor regions
One Bolivian farmer described quinoa as “absolutely changing the lives” of local communities. Anthropologist Pablo Laguna has similarly argued that quinoa’s popularity has benefited small, indigenous farmers in historically disadvantaged areas.
The “They Can’t Afford Their Own Food” Claim
A common claim is that farmers can no longer afford to eat quinoa themselves. This is misleading, and misunderstands the role of cash crops like quinoa.
Farmers usually keep part of their crop for personal consumption, they do not typically buy back their own produce at international market prices. Studies have found that even when quinoa prices rose sharply, farmers did not reduce their own intake. Even if producers judged that quinoa had become too valuable to justify eating rather than selling, this would still put farmers in a better economic position than they were in before the price boom, with income available to buy other crops and invest in their farms.
The idea that farmers were “priced out” of their own food reflects a misunderstanding of how subsistence farming works.
Quinoa Is Grown Around the World
The central problem, that almost nobody making this argument seems to realise, is that quinoa is no longer produced only in Bolivia and Peru. It is now grown in:
- North America
- Australia
- Europe, including the UK
Anyone who has a legitimate concern about South American supply chains can choose quinoa grown elsewhere, or avoid it altogether. This makes it difficult to argue that eating quinoa necessarily harms Bolivian communities.
Real Problems in a Wider Context
This does not mean quinoa is problem-free. Like other high-demand crops, it can involve:
- Labour exploitation
- Environmental damage
- Land degradation
- Unequal distribution
However, these problems are shared by most global crops, including rice, wheat, corn, coffee, and cocoa. It is telling that the focus is on a crop that is deemed to be popular with vegans specifically, rather than say, coffee or chocolate. These cash crops have very similar issues on a larger scale, but are popular with everyone.
Food prices in Bolivia have risen across many staples, due to climate change, droughts, flooding, and global inflation. Blaming quinoa alone, and blaming vegans in particular, ignores this wider context.
Comparing Quinoa and Animal Agriculture
It is equally striking that critics rarely apply the same scrutiny to crops used as animal feed.
Vast amounts of soy, corn, and grain are grown to feed farmed animals, often involving deforestation, land exploitation, and poor labour conditions. Producing meat requires far more crops and resources than producing plant-based food for direct human consumption.
In practice, meat-heavy diets place a demonstrably greater strain on agricultural systems and workers than plant-based diets do.
A False Dilemma
Anti-vegan arguments often frame the issue as if the choice were between eating quinoa or eating animals. This is false.
No one needs to eat quinoa to be vegan. Many vegans don’t. There are countless alternative grains and legumes available. If someone has ethical concerns about quinoa, the obvious response is simply not to eat it – not to use it as a justification for animal exploitation.
The Bigger Picture
The quinoa objection is often less about concern for farmers and more about finding a convenient reason to dismiss veganism.
That does not mean ethical food systems are unimportant – they matter greatly. But selectively invoking concern for farmers only when criticising vegans, while ignoring the far greater harms of animal agriculture, suggests misplaced priorities and cynical intentions.
If we care about justice, we should be concerned with improving food systems as a whole, rather than using vulnerable communities as rhetorical tools in anti-vegan arguments.
Suggested Reading
- Alexander Kasterine – Quinoa isn’t a threat to food security. It’s improving Peruvian farmers’ lives. The Guardian.
https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2016/jul/17/quinoa-threat-food-security-improving-peruvian-farmers-lives-superfood - International Labour Association – How Peruvian Farmers Have Boosted Their Income.
https://www.ilo.org/resource/article/how-peruvian-quinoa-farmers-have-boosted-their-income - The Yale Globalist – The Quinoa Controversy.
https://globalist.yale.edu/in-the-magazine/glimpses/the-quinoa-controversy-the-implications-of-the-growing-popularity-of-a-bolivian-grain/
Support independent, research-based advocacy
Helping keep free, educational content online
