Unbelievable as it may seem, I read something honest on HSUS's website today. Maybe that was because they cut it short? Or more likely they copy and pasted it onto their site from something else. Don't get used to it, in fact I just learned today that they also have a faith outreach division. Can you imagine your guest speakers at services being a couple of farmer hating vegans? But as the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board finally came to their senses after a brief hiatus and a busy public comment session, I can once again breathe a sigh of relief. There was talk that the deal struck with HSUS last year would be off after the Standards Board discussed allowing veal crates to continue. Of course, this is nonsense in the first place sense even the American Veal Association plans to phase out these crates, but that's what worried me most about the potential reversal by the board. Glad to hear that it didn't end up that way.
As Ohio continues to lead the picture with their Care Standards Board, Massachusetts has now begun the formation of their own board similar in design and intent. Hopefully there will be strength in numbers and an increase in momentum towards something more reasonable than uninformed and rash legislation. This board idea still makes me nervous because it keeps giving the impression of flying South, but thus far it has provided a lot of confidence and industry stability.
As a final thought, I also found this on their site, highlighting a kid's antibiotic project. I doubt. I doubt because even the one statistic in the write-up is incorrect. It's impossible to get 15% of samples from 22. And if you can't report that straight, what's the truth behind the rest?
Showing posts with label Livestock Care Board. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Livestock Care Board. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
No honesty
I could've probably labeled this post "HSUS" since it would've been a synonymous title, but who really would've wanted to read a post with that title? Let's talk for a few minutes about the past couple of weeks worth of reports and commentary stemming from the ADSA e-newsletter I receive. Feedstuffs does a really great job of combining relevant articles and attracting attention to critical issues in their assistance to this e-newsletter and the last couple of weeks have been especially good so I'm just going to have time to share briefly the best of the lot, because I think that these all link together nicely.
It wasn't too long ago that HSUS released yet another video of a bunch of alleged poultry abuse and neglect on a farm in Texas. Well, the UEP invited reporters to visit this same farm on an unguarded tour of the whole facility. They were free to ask any question, take any picture and record any video. Of course, HSUS didn't solicit any of this media for their own benefit, but I think this reporter would argue that's because it all turned out to be a lie. (And in case you think it's possible to clean up a farm's act in that short of time, let me just say it can't happen. It would've been easier to just go out of business and restart than to clean up a bad act that fast).
I recommend you to read both parts of this farm visit, starting with an introduction and then more of the specific critiques in the second one. The reporter's best statement in the entire thing might be near the beginning when he says that he felt betrayed by HSUS for having been giving such faulty media for release and coverage. So it seems that nobody really likes being played, not even the media.
Of course, while we're in the habit of discrediting HSUS and their claims, we probably ought to also examine the new reports about foodborne illness incidence in the US. With new reports just released, indicating significantly lower illness occurrence than previously cited, that takes just one more bite out of the dog.
Finally, let's take a look at HSUS's past work. Prop 2 in California still sits as a relatively useless piece of legislation that is more of a legal excuse to neglect animals than it is a regulation for improved care of animals. And this is why a farm in California has petitioned for a true ruling on what this law means. If they'd have had a Care Standards Board, these things might've been more clearly defined by experts in the industry who care about animal care, rather than self-obsessed activists with little regard for the animals they steal money on behalf of. For a video feed on the chicken farm who petitioned for this clearer legialation, click here.
It wasn't too long ago that HSUS released yet another video of a bunch of alleged poultry abuse and neglect on a farm in Texas. Well, the UEP invited reporters to visit this same farm on an unguarded tour of the whole facility. They were free to ask any question, take any picture and record any video. Of course, HSUS didn't solicit any of this media for their own benefit, but I think this reporter would argue that's because it all turned out to be a lie. (And in case you think it's possible to clean up a farm's act in that short of time, let me just say it can't happen. It would've been easier to just go out of business and restart than to clean up a bad act that fast).
I recommend you to read both parts of this farm visit, starting with an introduction and then more of the specific critiques in the second one. The reporter's best statement in the entire thing might be near the beginning when he says that he felt betrayed by HSUS for having been giving such faulty media for release and coverage. So it seems that nobody really likes being played, not even the media.
Of course, while we're in the habit of discrediting HSUS and their claims, we probably ought to also examine the new reports about foodborne illness incidence in the US. With new reports just released, indicating significantly lower illness occurrence than previously cited, that takes just one more bite out of the dog.
Finally, let's take a look at HSUS's past work. Prop 2 in California still sits as a relatively useless piece of legislation that is more of a legal excuse to neglect animals than it is a regulation for improved care of animals. And this is why a farm in California has petitioned for a true ruling on what this law means. If they'd have had a Care Standards Board, these things might've been more clearly defined by experts in the industry who care about animal care, rather than self-obsessed activists with little regard for the animals they steal money on behalf of. For a video feed on the chicken farm who petitioned for this clearer legialation, click here.
Monday, December 13, 2010
The end of a boycott
I knew this was coming, but it still feels a bit weird for me to say that today I went back to Chipotle and ate a huge burrito with some fantastic chips. I've been craving and when Amanda suggested it today, I finally made the leap and returned to the light. Let's be honest, the food there is delicious.
For those of you still holding out, you might call me a traitor. However, I did some reading on my own over the past few months and while Chipotle's own intentions are not clear besides the obvious desire to sell product and make money, it is clear that they have limited intentions in supporting HSUS. Of course, since Chipotle doesn't in fact support HSUS, I have little bone to pick with them and thus I was able to justify breaking the fast and consuming their good food today.
It took a while for everything to come out of the wash on this issue, and I think there are still a lot of people in the dark, but it was really when I started going back through the compiled readings I did for my previous blog post and then the outlandish claims by Humane Watch on the issue that I realized some points had truly been pushed too far. So let me put it plain and you can do your own reading and make up your own mind.
Last year when HSUS was campaigning heavily (and often sub-legally) for their ballot initiative which disregarded the people of Ohio's opinion, Chipotle was named as one of their campaign contributors. In the backlash that ensued, I became one of the boycotters, despite claims by Chipotle themselves that they didn't financially support HSUS. However, I can now understand where Chipotle's own views did come into play with their donation to HSUS's campaign. While they don't support the organization, they do and have for a while now supported the use of higher standards of food production than are standard in the industry right now. I can respect this because it is a company choice, and frankly, the consumers are paying for it. Further, Chipotle's food prices aren't unreasonable and so I am willing to pay for it as well from a "I like their food and flavor" standpoint. Chipotle supporting the HSUS campaign was just their way of saying that they stand by their viewpoint on animal production and they wanted to put a financial backing on an issue which supported their viewpoint.
Where Chipotle went wrong is that they have assumed many things that aren't necessarily true. They assumed that the ballot was really as well-intended as HSUS proposed it was. They assumed that the ballot would really effective improve animal welfare. They assumed that the lies that HSUS was pushing around about the ineffectiveness of the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board were true. They assumed that the methods of livestock care supported by HSUS truly improve animal welfare. None of these things are true or have been shown to be true, and some quite to the contrary. But I can't fault a company for good intentions and they differ from a company like Yellow Tail because their contributions were for different reasons.
And so I ate Chipotle today...
For those of you still holding out, you might call me a traitor. However, I did some reading on my own over the past few months and while Chipotle's own intentions are not clear besides the obvious desire to sell product and make money, it is clear that they have limited intentions in supporting HSUS. Of course, since Chipotle doesn't in fact support HSUS, I have little bone to pick with them and thus I was able to justify breaking the fast and consuming their good food today.
It took a while for everything to come out of the wash on this issue, and I think there are still a lot of people in the dark, but it was really when I started going back through the compiled readings I did for my previous blog post and then the outlandish claims by Humane Watch on the issue that I realized some points had truly been pushed too far. So let me put it plain and you can do your own reading and make up your own mind.
Last year when HSUS was campaigning heavily (and often sub-legally) for their ballot initiative which disregarded the people of Ohio's opinion, Chipotle was named as one of their campaign contributors. In the backlash that ensued, I became one of the boycotters, despite claims by Chipotle themselves that they didn't financially support HSUS. However, I can now understand where Chipotle's own views did come into play with their donation to HSUS's campaign. While they don't support the organization, they do and have for a while now supported the use of higher standards of food production than are standard in the industry right now. I can respect this because it is a company choice, and frankly, the consumers are paying for it. Further, Chipotle's food prices aren't unreasonable and so I am willing to pay for it as well from a "I like their food and flavor" standpoint. Chipotle supporting the HSUS campaign was just their way of saying that they stand by their viewpoint on animal production and they wanted to put a financial backing on an issue which supported their viewpoint.
Where Chipotle went wrong is that they have assumed many things that aren't necessarily true. They assumed that the ballot was really as well-intended as HSUS proposed it was. They assumed that the ballot would really effective improve animal welfare. They assumed that the lies that HSUS was pushing around about the ineffectiveness of the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board were true. They assumed that the methods of livestock care supported by HSUS truly improve animal welfare. None of these things are true or have been shown to be true, and some quite to the contrary. But I can't fault a company for good intentions and they differ from a company like Yellow Tail because their contributions were for different reasons.
And so I ate Chipotle today...
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
ODA Civil Penalties for Welfare Violations
The Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board met and finished the released draft of their proposed civil penalties for livestock neglect and abuse. I read through the draft and am impressed by the timeliness of this released document as well as the increased stringency of the proposed fines and punishment. Hopefully these proposed penalties will be enough to deter those farmers who potentially would give a bad name to the rest of farmers doing a good job of caring for their animals in Ohio.
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Ohio Livestock Euthanasia Standards
Today marks a special day in the history of the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board as they begin to change their first legislative draft into law. That's right, they've finally finished their first public draft. In retrospect it's becoming more a good idea to have made that deal with HSUS to back off of this fall's ballot initiative since it has take this long just to get anything on paper out of the board. I'm even surprised by how long it has taken them to materialize anything but at least it is hopefully a well-thought and debated piece of paper. Well, more like many pieces of paper. You can read their proposed standards for euthanasia online. Of note, there is not a provision for legal strangulation or hanging of livestock as an approved method of euthanasia, so this stands within the agreement with HSUS from this summer.
Personally, I found everything in that document to be acceptable and to show promise of progress towards better regulated animal well-being in the future. However, these are just the accepted euthanasia practices and we have a long way to go from here.
Personally, I found everything in that document to be acceptable and to show promise of progress towards better regulated animal well-being in the future. However, these are just the accepted euthanasia practices and we have a long way to go from here.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Eggs again
As the news keeps hitting the egg topic, I just figured I would include a few links to make you a more educated reader.
HSUS is making a loud claim that this Salmonella outbreak in Iowa is because the farm is a caged system, citing their top source (this sometimes takes 2 attempts to load) as a paper which could be more accurately described as a summary of many reasons why Salmonella can be elevated on any farm. As always, it takes only a surface scrape to get attention, but digging deeper always brings out more of the truth. So don't take my word for it, but read the 2 links above as well as Feedstuffs' take on it.
Also, the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board is not expected by Director Boggs to specifically adhere to the deal brokered by Gov. Strickland with HSUS to prevent a ballot initiative this fall. Instead, we can expect more of a balanced approach considering each issue within the deal singly.
HSUS is making a loud claim that this Salmonella outbreak in Iowa is because the farm is a caged system, citing their top source (this sometimes takes 2 attempts to load) as a paper which could be more accurately described as a summary of many reasons why Salmonella can be elevated on any farm. As always, it takes only a surface scrape to get attention, but digging deeper always brings out more of the truth. So don't take my word for it, but read the 2 links above as well as Feedstuffs' take on it.
Also, the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board is not expected by Director Boggs to specifically adhere to the deal brokered by Gov. Strickland with HSUS to prevent a ballot initiative this fall. Instead, we can expect more of a balanced approach considering each issue within the deal singly.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Gateway to Animal Welfare
Courtesy of my new e-newsletter: Gateway to Animal Welfare, I received a large quantity of new animal welfare articles which excites me, even if you don't care nearly as much about it as I do.
First on my list today is an article outlining how just one more use of labels to assure consumers of animal well-being has failed. It might be selling to some people, but not like it was supposed to work. You see, we have this great idea that we can sell just about anything with labels. Look at Certified Angus Beef, well, that was a success, right? So then why can't we seem to sell animal welfare certified labels with the same success. Isn't that what the general public wants to see? Better welfare for the animals may be what people want to see but either they don't want to pay for it in the grocery or they don't believe we're really providing better care. And every single time that they find out our standards aren't what they thought they should have been, then the public loses even more faith in our welfare labeling. In contrast here is another article endorsing buying these labels... hold your breath for when they decide that these standards don't match either. "High free-range standards" aren't scientifically proven to be any better for the bird either, especially as they find that the birds in some cases are even worse off in free-range. Think that over...
It sounds like they will find out in 2015 how much it costs for better eggs. Sure, we've speculated and calculated, but once supply, demand and input/output changes, then we'll finally see the true change. And will the well-being of the chickens actually be improved or is this just another example of HSUS publicly helping animals and behind the scenes having only hurt the future of healthy animal production. And then there is the extremely sticky situation of inter-state trade. So the battery eggs can't be sold in California, what about shipped?
And then there's those just "wow" moments... It's really hard for me to take this seriously.
Finally for today, here's another press release from the Ohio deal with HSUS...
First on my list today is an article outlining how just one more use of labels to assure consumers of animal well-being has failed. It might be selling to some people, but not like it was supposed to work. You see, we have this great idea that we can sell just about anything with labels. Look at Certified Angus Beef, well, that was a success, right? So then why can't we seem to sell animal welfare certified labels with the same success. Isn't that what the general public wants to see? Better welfare for the animals may be what people want to see but either they don't want to pay for it in the grocery or they don't believe we're really providing better care. And every single time that they find out our standards aren't what they thought they should have been, then the public loses even more faith in our welfare labeling. In contrast here is another article endorsing buying these labels... hold your breath for when they decide that these standards don't match either. "High free-range standards" aren't scientifically proven to be any better for the bird either, especially as they find that the birds in some cases are even worse off in free-range. Think that over...
It sounds like they will find out in 2015 how much it costs for better eggs. Sure, we've speculated and calculated, but once supply, demand and input/output changes, then we'll finally see the true change. And will the well-being of the chickens actually be improved or is this just another example of HSUS publicly helping animals and behind the scenes having only hurt the future of healthy animal production. And then there is the extremely sticky situation of inter-state trade. So the battery eggs can't be sold in California, what about shipped?
And then there's those just "wow" moments... It's really hard for me to take this seriously.
Finally for today, here's another press release from the Ohio deal with HSUS...
Friday, July 2, 2010
Everybody wins...
... for now.
As I sit and watch the Nederlands as they are down to Brazil at the half, I thought that I would take a minute to attach more articles relating to the HSUS and Ohio Agriculture compromise which will be the defining leader in animal welfare decisions and discussions for the next few years in Ohio. Time will tell how the board takes this agreement and puts it to use, and time will also be the indicator as to how honest HSUS's intentions truly were, but for now we have a respite from the sharp debate and the wording in the document shows potential to be a reasonable way to use the care standards board to truly function as they were intended to per last years election results and to improve animal welfare in livestock production within the state of Ohio.
For more opinions, please read the OVMA, Ohio Pork Industry, Ohio Dairy Producers and Wayne Pacelle's (HSUS CEO) opinion on the issue.
As I sit and watch the Nederlands as they are down to Brazil at the half, I thought that I would take a minute to attach more articles relating to the HSUS and Ohio Agriculture compromise which will be the defining leader in animal welfare decisions and discussions for the next few years in Ohio. Time will tell how the board takes this agreement and puts it to use, and time will also be the indicator as to how honest HSUS's intentions truly were, but for now we have a respite from the sharp debate and the wording in the document shows potential to be a reasonable way to use the care standards board to truly function as they were intended to per last years election results and to improve animal welfare in livestock production within the state of Ohio.
For more opinions, please read the OVMA, Ohio Pork Industry, Ohio Dairy Producers and Wayne Pacelle's (HSUS CEO) opinion on the issue.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Standards Board Progress!
I know this may seem silly, but with the Care Standards Board just getting started and all of the pressure on the board from the HSUS and their activist support, I'm really excited every time that I hear about progress from them. They have started talking about acceptable forms of euthanasia and talk about something and what is acceptable is exactly the direction that I want to hear about them going right now. I'm just glad to hear that they're doing or even talking about something other than listening to people telling them what to talk about.
Perfect
Just when I was wondering what I would post on here, the perfect article came stumbling across my facebook courtesy of Joe. Thank you!
For those of you who don't really read links, HSUS was kicked off the Tuscarawas Fairgrounds for lying to people at a farmer's market in an effort to get signatures for the ballot vote that they are trying to get passed this fall. Thank you to the Tuscarawas County Sheriff's Department for escorting them off of the fairgrounds. Again their disrespect for Ohio laws is exhibited. HSUS, please leave us alone as we allow the Livestock Care Board to do their job.
For those of you who don't really read links, HSUS was kicked off the Tuscarawas Fairgrounds for lying to people at a farmer's market in an effort to get signatures for the ballot vote that they are trying to get passed this fall. Thank you to the Tuscarawas County Sheriff's Department for escorting them off of the fairgrounds. Again their disrespect for Ohio laws is exhibited. HSUS, please leave us alone as we allow the Livestock Care Board to do their job.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Standards Board Website!
I've been out and crazy busy, so I'll begin trying to catch up on things here. Of importance right now, the livestock care standards board for Ohio launched their website 11 days ago. I'm pretty excited about this website and hope that it is widely read and updated often.
On other news, I hear rumors of HSUS failing in their signature collection attempts. I won't believe it until I hear that they've failed for sure, but I like the idea of Ohioans standing up for their in-state legislature and supporting local livestock agriculture in its attempt to improve animal well-being without the forced and negligent HSUS ballot legislation.
On other news, I hear rumors of HSUS failing in their signature collection attempts. I won't believe it until I hear that they've failed for sure, but I like the idea of Ohioans standing up for their in-state legislature and supporting local livestock agriculture in its attempt to improve animal well-being without the forced and negligent HSUS ballot legislation.
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