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1.
NEW JERSEY FARMED ANIMAL STANDARDS CHALLENGED
Oral arguments were heard on Wednesday
in a lawsuit contending that New Jersey’s Department
of Agriculture (DoA) has failed to establish humane
standards for farmed animals as required since 1996
by the state’s legislature. Regulations issued
by the DoA in May 2004 continue to permit “inhumane”
practices and grant broad exemptions for agribusiness,
charges the lawsuit filed by the Animal Welfare Institute,
Farm Sanctuary, The Humane Society of the U.S., other
public interest organizations, farmers and citizens.
Lawyers for the state deny it has failed to apply
the law, and assert that practices that may seem cruel
are sometimes necessary to protect animals from each
other and safeguard their health.
The lawsuit is unprecedented in that
it seeks a judicial declaration that regulations authorizing
inhumane practices are illegal under state law. The
DoA did amend the regulations on Dec. 4th by banning
the forced molting of birds due to welfare concerns.
New Jersey is currently the only state that requires
humane standards be set for farmed animals but the
case could help establish national standards. A decision
by the 3-judge appellate panel isn’t expected
for months. Background information and legal briefs
can be found at: http://www.njfarms.org/lawsuit_2006.htm
NEW JERSEY SUIT A TEST CASE ON FARM ANIMAL
CRUELTY
Reuters, Jon Hurdle, Dec 13, 2006
http://tinyurl.com/y4y2b5
ADVOCATES FOR FARM ANIMALS SAY STATE GUIDELINES ARE
INHUMANE
The Star-Ledger, Rick Hepp, December 14, 2006
http://tinyurl.com/yegkgl
2.
HORSE-SLAUGHTER BILL HALTED
The American Horse Slaughter Prevention
Act was not voted on by the U.S. Senate prior to the
close of the Congressional session on December 8th.
It had passed the House of Representatives with a
263:146 vote in mid-September (see: http://tinyurl.com/sucqo
).
The bill would also halt the transport of horses for
slaughter, and animal advocates rallied to get it
though the Senate with a letter of support signed
by a quarter of the Senate’s 100 members and
footage of brutal slaughter in the U.S., Canada and
Mexico. The Mexican footage shows a horse collapsing
after being repeatedly stabbed in the neck and back
(viewable on-line at: http://tinyurl.com/ylvz3e
). In the Canadian footage, a horse is shot while
standing in a stall, while the U.S. footage shows
a horse killed with a bolt gun. The legislation will
have to clear the House again after Congress reconvenes
in January before another vote on it can be attempted
in the Senate.
ANIMAL RIGHTS GROUPS PRESS CONGRESS TO HALT THE SLAUGHTER OF HORSES
The State, Dave Montgomery, Dec. 5, 2006
http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/nation/16171552.htm
3.
BREAST CANCER DROP BELIEVED DUE TO HORMONE USE CESSATION
A sharp decrease in new U.S. breast
cancer cases in 2003 is believed to be the result
of millions of women ceasing hormone replacement therapy
(HRT) the prior year. HRT [commonly made with the
urine of pregnant horses] is prescribed for problematic
menopausal symptoms. In mid-2002, researchers warned
that a major study suggested it raised the risk of
breast cancer and other serious maladies (see: http://tinyurl.com/yjzcu8
). About 30% of U.S. women over the age of 50 were
using HRT, but about half of them quit it after the
warning. The incidence of breast cancer had been increasing
during the two decades prior to July 2002.
FEWER BREAST CANCERS LINKED TO LESS HORMONE
THERAPY
Reuters, Ed Stoddard, Dec. 14, 2006
http://tinyurl.com/yhpshx
4.
FARMED ANIMALS' DARK ENVIRONMENTAL SHADOW
Increasingly large herds of cattle
have been singled out as the world’s leading
cause of environmental problems -including climate
change, deforestation, land degradation, water and
air pollution, water shortage and loss of biodiversity-
in a 400-page report by the United Nations Food and
Agricultural Organization (FAO) entitled Livestock’s
Long Shadow. Farmed animal industries in general are
deemed "one of the top two or three most significant
contributors to the most serious environmental problems
at every scale." Farmed animals surpass transport
as the leading source of greenhouse gas emissions,
accounting for 18% of the global total (versus 13.5%).
They produce about 9% of carbon dioxide, up to 40%
of methane, and nearly two-thirds of nitrous oxide.
Farmed animals comprise some 20% of
the terrestrial animal biomass, and the crux of environmental
problems is said to be the vast amount of land used
for them. They occupy 26% of all ice-free land, with
pastures comprising 70% of the Amazon’s deforested
areas, and feed for them using a third of global cropland.
The authors call for strong and immediate political
commitment in stopping the environmental spiral caused
by the continued increase in demand for meat and milk.
Global veganism is not considered a viable solution,
however, due to the reliance of a billion people on
farmed animal production for their livelihoods, and
the environmental impacts of plant production. Instead,
the authors argue that prices and fees for natural
resources must be made to cover the full economic
and environmental cost. They call for the taxing of
beef products from the world's 1.5 billion cattle
as a way to decrease demand for them, and note that
consumers, "because of their strong and growing
influence in determining the characteristics of products,
will likely be the main source of commercial and political
pressure to push the livestock sector into more sustainable
forms." The complete report can be accessed at
(PDF file): http://tinyurl.com/ymotue
UN SAYS CARS ARE GREENER THAN COWS
Stuff, Beck Eleven, December 13, 2006
http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/3897838a7693.html
COWS, PIGS AND SHEEP: ENVIRONMENT'S GREATEST THREATS?
New Scientist, Catherine Brahic, Dec. 12, 2006
http://tinyurl.com/uwqkc
DO NOT GIGGLE
Daily Grist, Dec. 1, 2006
http://grist.org/news/daily/2006/12/01/6/
U.N. REPORT TAKES AIM AT CATTLE PRODUCTION
BEEF Cow-Calf Weekly, Joe Roybal, Dec. 15, 2006
http://enews.prismb2b.com/enews/beef/cowcalf_weekly/current#a061215_12
5.
ROLLING STONE COVERS SMITHFIELD
Boss Hog is a lengthy article about
Smithfield Foods in the December 14th issue of Rolling
Stone magazine subheaded: "America's top pork
producer churns out a sea of waste that has destroyed
rivers, killed millions of fish and generated one
of the largest fines in EPA history. Welcome to the
dark side of the other white meat." The initial
photograph (included in the on-line version) is of
a large outdoor pile of many dead pigs. Author Jeff
Tietz begins: "Smithfield Foods, the largest
and most profitable pig processor in the world, killed
27 million hogs last year," the numeric equivalent
of the human populations of America's thirty-two largest
cities.
The company also generates an estimated 26 million
tons of total waste discharge a year, with the pigs’
excrement being extremely toxic because: "Smithfield's
pigs live by the hundreds or thousands in warehouse-like
barns, in rows of wall-to-wall pens. Sows are artificially
inseminated and fed and delivered of their piglets
in cages so small they cannot turn around. Forty fully
grown 250-pound male hogs often occupy a pen the size
of a tiny apartment. They trample each other to death.
There is no sunlight, straw, fresh air or earth…Taken
together, the immobility, poisonous air and terror
of confinement badly damage the pigs' immune systems.
They become susceptible to infection.…”
which is addressed with antibiotics and insecticides.
Smithfield's largest operation “dumps
more toxic waste into the nation's water each year
than all but three other industrial facilities,”
according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Tietz takes readers on an aerial tour of the company’s
North Carolina operations, detailing the immense environmental
devastation wrought by them, the human health hazards
they pose, and the political contributions that have
enabled the company to operate so. The article concludes
by telling of Smithfield’s ventures into less
regulated Poland and the devastation that has resulted
there, and its stated intent to turn Eastern Europe
into “the Iowa of Europe.”
BOSS HOG
Rolling Stone, Jeff Tietz, Dec. 14, 2006
http://tinyurl.com/vr8vn
6.
PIGS TORTURED, BEATEN, HUNG, SHOT
Pigs at Wiles Farm “are ineffectively
shot and left alive, beaten to death with hammers,
have their heads slammed into walls and floors multiple
times, and sows are strung up by their neck and slowly
suffocated.” A former employee alleges: “They
basically use them as target practice when they shoot
them.” The whistleblower said the owner’s
adult son told her: “Pigs don’t feel pain.”
A special prosecutor is looking into these and other
charges filed by the Humane Farming Association (HFA),
which has been investigating the northeast Ohio pig
breeding facility since September 2005. “Workers
often vent their frustrations on the pigs by physically
attacking and abusing them,” states the HFA
complaint, which, including photographs, can be viewed
at (PDF file): http://tinyurl.com/yd3r2a
It also documents pigs forced to live in cold water
and other inhumane conditions.
Law enforcement officials searched the
property on November 8th. Less “disturbing”
portions of undercover videotape obtained by HFA were
aired by Cleveland station WKYC. Ohio Congressman
Dennis Kucinich, who viewed the broadcast, said he
will address the issue of farmed animal treatment
in the next Congressional session. (Kucinich has also
announced his candidacy for the 2008 Presidential
election: http://www.kucinich.us
) Farm owner Ken Wiles claims that he complies with
all state and federal laws [there are no federal laws
regarding the treatment of animals on farms], but
HFA contends that the facility has systematically
violated Ohio anti-cruelty laws. The National Pork
Producers Council announced that it “abhorred”
the acts on the tape but that Wiles is now working
with a veterinarian who specializes in pigs to implement
corrective measures.
HFA TAKES ACTION AGAINST OHIO HOG FACTORY
Crimes Uncovered Include the Intentional Abuse of
Pigs
http://www.hfa.org/campaigns/wiles.html
CONGRESSMAN REACTS TO PIG FARM STORY
WKYC, Dec. 2, 2006
http://www.wkyc.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=59982
SPECIAL PROSECUTOR INVESTIGATES HANDLING OF PIGS
ON NORTHEAST OHIO HOG FARM
WKYC-TV, Bill Safos, Nov. 30, 2006
http://www.wkyc.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=59955
STATEMENT OF THE NATIONAL PORK PRODUCERS COUNCIL
AND THE OHIO PORK PRODUCERS COUNCIL ON OHIO HOG MISTREATMENT
National Pork Producers Council & Ohio Pork Producers
Council, Dec. 8, 2006
http://www.nppc.org/wm/show.php?id=630&c=1
7.
LIVE CHICKENS COMPOSTED; LIVE GOSLINGS SHREDDED, SCALDED, SMASHED
"We called them zombie chickens…Some
of them crawled right up out of the ground. They'd
get out and stagger around," said California
resident Jim Stauffer explaining the plight of hens
he saw who had been put into compost piles while still
alive. Composting hens who no longer produce eggs
at the demanded rate is a practice employed throughout
the country. The compost is then used as fertilizer.
The hens are said to first be put in a sealed box
filled with carbon monoxide to die. According to a
one large egg farmer, two out of every 40,000 birds
who are gassed usually survive. In Sonoma County (Ca.)
alone, half a million chickens are composted annually.
Slaughterplants no longer take the birds, who only
yield about a pound of meat, which is much less than
that from chickens bred for meat production. "It
is a fact of life, chickens do their job and go away,"
said Stauffer, "They don't read the paper and
vote." See also: http://tinyurl.com/yzdjbq
and item #4 of: http://tinyurl.com/uc42
Activists with Four Paws International
obtained footage of foie gras production in Hungary
including photographs of goslings being shred alive,
which have been published in London’s Daily
Mail newspaper. (See also: http://tinyurl.com/umxjh
) Female baby geese don’t grow as quickly as
do male goslings so, instead of being force fed for
foie gras, shortly after hatching “they are
dropped into a giant funnel that leads to the blades
which slice them into feed for other animals.”
Hungary is the world's second largest foie gras producer
after France. Numerous European countries have banned
foie gras production, and the European Union wants
the practice of force-feeding birds to be prohibited
within 15 years. The Pope has denounced the practice
as being in violation of Biblical principles. The
Daily Mail notes: “In America animal rights
workers have reported that female ducklings and goslings
are stuffed into nylon sacks and dumped into scalding
water. Workers killed the survivors by smashing their
heads against dustbins.”
RECYCLING CHICKENS
The Press Democrat, Tobias Young, Nov. 22, 2006
http://tinyurl.com/ylerlk
FOIE GRAS REJECTS THAT ARE SHREDDED ALIVE
Daily Mail (London), Allan Hall, December 13, 2006
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/AR-News/browse_thread/thread/6a8f5e8273581fae
8.
FARMER ADMITS BURNING CALVES
Peter Mravlja has pled guilty to felony
insurance fraud for burning down his Mravlja Farms
dairy barn in Worcester, N.Y., on Easter Sunday in
April 2003. Twenty-three calves were killed and a
fireman was injured. After Mravlja Farms, co-owned
by Mravlja’s father, was paid $143,555.81 in
compensation by its insurance company, a confidential
tip led to a reinvestigation. Along with the arson
and fraud, Mravlja, who had been a volunteer fireman,
was indicted for witness tampering. His sentence includes
a $50,000 fine; a 5-year felony probation term; 1,000
hours of community service over the next five years,
and an order to sell all of his guns.
N.Y. MAN SENTENCED FOR FRAUD IN DAIRY
BARN FIRE
Insurance Journal, December 1, 2006
http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/east/2006/12/01/74654.htm
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