A dog owner who turned her beloved pooch vegan says the pet food industry is 'destroying the planet'.
Margarita Sachkova and her dog Lily both live off plant-based diets, after she changed the cocker-spaniel's meat-heavy meals she was tucking into each day.
In cutting meat out from Lily's diet, Margarita hopes to save other animals from slaughter and to minimise the impact the dog has on the environment.
According to studies, pet food takes millions of hectares of land to make and produces vast quantities of green house gases each year, accelerating environmental destruction and global warming.
Margarita, 35, is determined that she and Lily will have as little negative impact on the environment as realistically possible.
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"We can't ignore the environmental crisis," she told The Mirror. "So many people now are trying to consume less meat. Every day we see how damaging animal agriculture is for the climate.
"An Oxford study said if you switch to a vegan diet you can cut your carbon footprint by 73 per cent.
"It is applicable to dogs as well. You can't really be environmentally friendly and still buy meat. It is ruining the planet."
Over the past several years multiple scientific studies have concluded the same thing - that pet food is a huge drain on the world's limited resources.
University of Edinburgh researchers found an area double the size of the UK is used to produce dry pet food for cats and dogs across the world each year.
The industry emits more greenhouse gases each year - 106 million tonnes of carbon dioxide - than countries such as Mozambique and the Philippines, they concluded.
If all the world's pets, 95 per cent of which are cats and dogs, were a single country, they'd be the 60th largest greenhouse gas emitter.
Researchers in the US concluded that the 163 million cats and dogs in the country were responsible for between 25 and 30 per cent of American emissions from food.
Rough comparisons with the US's pet and people population suggests the UK is in a similar position proportionally.
Dog owners such as Margarita and Lewis Hamilton, whose bulldog Roscoe eats a plant based diet, have decided a vegan diet is the best way to cut emissions.
While many may argue dogs need to eat meat, the Peta worker is convinced that the diet is good for Lily.
Margarita said: "She is full of energy. She always approaches other dogs and tries to play with them.
"When Lily entered my life her diet was meat. I knew I wouldn't be comfortable buying that for her.
"I started slowly mixing her normal food with vegan food, and in the course of a week I completely swapped her diet.
"She's had many health checks and she's absolutely healthy.
"Now I buy food for her called Benevo. Lily's kitchen has a vegan range now as well.
"I also feed her peanut butter and bananas. The food has to be well balanced. The dog needs to get all the nutrients they need."
When confronted with the argument that feeding a dog plant based food is unnatural, Margarita pointed out that typical dog food is often made from factory farmed animals and heavily processed.
"I would say to people that have dogs that other animals like pigs and cows also have personalities and can experience fear and joy just like dogs," she continued.
"It's strange to cuddle a dog while eating a burger."
Dogs have amylase genes which means they can digest plant starch, a quality they may have developed from eating scraps left around prehistoric camp fires.
But Dos Santos, president of the British Veterinary Association (BVA), warns that those pet owners looking to turn their pooches vegan should exercise caution.
"It is theoretically possible to feed a dog a vegetarian diet, but it’s much easier to get it wrong than to get it right,” she told The BBC.
“You would have to do it under the supervision of a veterinary-trained nutritionist.”
What do you think about dogs being fed plant-based food? Tell us in the comments below.
