Teaching Hills About Sustainable Pet Nutrition

Hills and Just Be Kind Dog Food sponsor Provet Nutrition Course with Hills learning a thing or two about sustainable pet food!

Updated on May 16, 2026 by Just Be Kind Dog Food Arielle

What a pleasure to have sponsored Dr Mike Davies Specialist in Small Animal Nutrition's PROVET NUTRITION COURSE alongside Hills - wow! (see the Just Be Kind logo below!!)

Hills and Just Be Kind Dog & Cat Food sponsor this year's Provet Nutrition Course

As a passionate vegan vet, when I first entered the pet nutrition space in 2019, I did as many courses as I could. We are taught NOTHING about dog and cat nutrition at vet school. It is a given that you just recommend Hills, Royal Canin or Purina food as a vet (which is what I did as a GP vet for 25 years until I saw the light!)

Dr Mike Davies' Nutrition Course was one of the first that I completed and I found it so enlightening, that I have completed his intensive nutrition course every year for the last 5 years learning something new every year!!

In 2024 the Provet course was sponsored by Nestle Purina.

I bravely asked Dr Mike Davies if Just Be Kind could sponsor alongside Hills in 2025, and that's what I did - a bit of a 'pinch me moment' as our small independent passionate business stands alongside a pet food giant and allows vets to learn all there is to know about feeding dogs and cats kindly and sustainably without any animals being harmed!

Mike Davies and Dr Arielle Griffiths at Provet Nutrition Course

Here are some snippets of the course and important facts learnt that vets who attended were able to take away with them and use in practice.

Mike showed us the real reasons why plant-based foods are fed and are important -

Dr Mike Davies and reasons why plant-based foods are fed

Dr Mike was able to follow this up with speaking about innovation in this space with microbial fermentation protein made up as the very first food MicroBell that actually enhances the health and gut microbiome of dogs in scientific studies.

Dr Mike Davies speaking about MicroBell benefits in dogs

This was in stark contrast to what Hills had in the way of sustainability as ALL of their foods sold are meat or fish-based.

Hills seem more intent on promoting all their meat-based foods rather than focussing on sustainability which would possibly mean a decrease in their profits as they compete with all the other large corporates for their share of the market and the heavily subsidised byproducts of the meat and fish-based industry are much cheaper to buy and easy to sell!

Hills have spoken of reducing emissions by 90% in 2040 in this article , but we worry that they cannot achieve this with their current range.

They have in fact moved towards even less sustainable options by buying out a Prime 100 fresh food company in 2025 (please read more here about exposing Hills and their sustainability credentials)

There is some light, as in May 2026, Hills announced their association with Bond pet foods using precision fermentation.

The Hills rep attended the Provet Nutrition course along with Just Be Kind and mentioned this insect-based food shown below (only available in the US), and we applaud them for trying to be more sustainable, but they add a type of fish called pollock which they say is a wild caught Alaskan fish!

Hills insect-based food with a fish called pollock

This is very concerning as an addition to the food, as we badly need to protect our oceans when there are perfect plant-based and algal alternatives which Mike Davies also spoke of in the course!

(And we have available to buy on our Just Be Kind site, and for vets to see such as Hannah Capon in the image below who runs CAM or Canine Arthritis Management in the UK and works with thousands of owners treating arthritis in dogs. Our Omega 3 daily rich in EPA is a breakthrough for dogs' joints!)

Dr Arielle Griffiths with Hannah Capon from Canine Arthritis Management at Dr Mike Davies Provet Nutrition Course Dr Mike Davies also spoke of increasing interest and development in plant-based cat foods with a Hills study as shown in the slide below that shows how adding plant-proteins to a cat food actually INCREASES the digestibility of the proteins (study actually done by Hills)!

Dr Mike davies shows how increasing digestibility

Mike Davies is the one who made me aware of how dangerous it is to the health of cats to feed them fish-based products and fish oils with studies showing these concerns in cats fed high fish-based diets -

6 TOP REASONS WHY CATS SHOULD NOT EAT FISH

Almost all of the Hills products for cats contain fish or fish oils, whereas at Just Be Kind, we have products that provide the solution - Omega 3 straight from where fish get it - the Microalgae without the heavy metal contamination as shown in this post.

It was such a pleasure to meet and spend time on the Provet Nutrition Course with hugely inspiring Maria who as a very passionate vegan veterinary nurse; has started her own business OmPets that will stock and sell THE VERY FIRST wet complete plant-based cat food containing Feedkind bacterial fermentation protein - hurrah for innovation and independent small businesses leading the way!! (We will definitely be stocking it as soon as it is available!)

Maria who started Ompets and is making plant-based cat food and Dr Arielle

Mike Davies also spoke of another very exciting new plant-based product LeanPaws available in 2026 which leads the way with weight loss in our dogs. Please read this post about weight loss supplements - Ozempic or Mounjaro for Dogs.

“Find a group of people who challenge and inspire you, spend a lot of time with them, and it will change your life.”

“I believe in a kinder, healthier way to feed our dogs that does no damage to our environment, harms no animals and uses fresh, healthy plant-based ingredients for a balanced, wholesome and delicious diet”

- Dr Arielle Griffiths Plant Powered Vet

Published on December 30, 2025Updated on May 16, 2026 by Just Be Kind Dog Food Arielle