Montag
10-27-2008, 03:07 AM
A California Ballot Measure Offers Rights for Farm Animals
By JESSE McKINLEY
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/us/24egg.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
excerpt:
SAN FRANCISCO — In the end, it all comes down to eggs.
On Nov. 4, California voters will be asked to decide on Proposition 2, an animal rights ballot measure that would grant the farm animals in California the opportunity to spread their hooves and claws, rather than being confined to restrictive cages, as many chickens, sows and veal cattle now are.
But because veal and pork are not major industries in California, the battle over Proposition 2 is focused almost exclusively on the state’s henhouses, which opponents say will be hard hit by higher production costs if the measure passes.
“This is a well-intended initiative for animals with some very negative unintended consequences for people,” said Julie Buckner, a spokeswoman for Californians for Safe Food, the leading anti-Proposition 2 group. “It’s going to wipe out the California egg farmers, and it’s going to raise the food costs for consumers. And this is at a time when our economy is hurting.”
Supporters of the proposition, the first of its kind in the nation, reject those arguments, casting the ballot measure as an act of kindness for animals whose bodies and byproducts usually end up on dining room tables.
“If animals are going to be killed for food,” said Wayne Pacelle, the president and chief executive of the Humane Society of the United States, “the least we can do is treat them with decency and give them a semblance of life.”
The two sides do agree that the ballot issue is sure to be the most expensive — and quite likely the most bruising — animal rights campaign ever. The Humane Society alone has already given about $4 million toward the campaign for Proposition 2, about half of what Mr. Pacelle thinks his side will spend before Nov. 4.
Californians for Safe Food had raised more than $6.7 million by the end of September, according to federal election documents, with scores of donations from agricultural operations around the country, including egg companies in Colorado, Georgia and Minnesota.
California is the nation’s fifth-largest producer — and No. 1 consumer — of eggs, producing an estimated $337 million worth in 2007. Nationwide, the country produces about 77 billion table eggs a year — 250 per American — valued at about $6.7 billion.
Considering the market at stake, it is not surprising that Proposition 2 has supplied some of the election season’s most emotionally charged advertisements. One, by supporters, shows images of abused animals on factory farms, while opponents’ commercials have warned that the measure would lead to the importation of unsafe eggs from Mexico.
Opponents have pressed a line of attack that suggests that Proposition 2 — which would require that animals be provided room to turn around, lie down, stand up and fully extend their limbs — could expose birds, via contact with their own waste and that of other animals, to such dreaded diseases as salmonella and avian influenza. They also argue that standard egg-laying cages — a little more than eight inches square — actually protect hens from aggression by other birds and predators.
Mr. Pacelle calls such arguments “far-fetched and ridiculous.”
Still, the proposition, which would take effect in 2015, has led to a division between some small-animal “pet vets” and large-animal agricultural veterinarians. In September, several agricultural veterinarians formed a group separate from the 6,000-member California Veterinary Medical Association, the state’s leading veterinary group, over the association’s support for Proposition 2.
One of those who split was Dr. Nancy D. T. Reimers, a poultry veterinarian who has been paid for work for Californians for Safe Food. Dr. Reimers said people often do not understand the work that veterinarians do on farms.
“The folks that are involved in the food supply know what we have to do to keep the animals and the food safe,” Dr. Reimers said. “And they are, by and large, opposed” to Proposition 2.
Supporters, meanwhile, question why Proposition 2 opponents have drawn so much financial support from out-of-state egg producers, who presumably would benefit if California egg farmers failed. “You’d think those egg companies would be chomping at the bit” to see the measure pass, Mr. Pacelle said.
Those companies, he said, fear a “ripple effect” of similar legislation in other states or a demand from big retailers like Wal-Mart if consumers seek more humane products.
Mitch Head, a spokesman for United Egg Producers, a farmers’ collective that represents 95 percent of the nation’s commercial egg producers, said some out-of-state support was a reflection of the fact that an outbreak of disease in eggs anywhere leads to bad press for the industry as a whole.
Mr. Head also noted that California was traditionally a trend-setter. “I think they believe that if a few states start doing these things,” he said, “it will come to their states.”
By JESSE McKINLEY
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/us/24egg.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
excerpt:
SAN FRANCISCO — In the end, it all comes down to eggs.
On Nov. 4, California voters will be asked to decide on Proposition 2, an animal rights ballot measure that would grant the farm animals in California the opportunity to spread their hooves and claws, rather than being confined to restrictive cages, as many chickens, sows and veal cattle now are.
But because veal and pork are not major industries in California, the battle over Proposition 2 is focused almost exclusively on the state’s henhouses, which opponents say will be hard hit by higher production costs if the measure passes.
“This is a well-intended initiative for animals with some very negative unintended consequences for people,” said Julie Buckner, a spokeswoman for Californians for Safe Food, the leading anti-Proposition 2 group. “It’s going to wipe out the California egg farmers, and it’s going to raise the food costs for consumers. And this is at a time when our economy is hurting.”
Supporters of the proposition, the first of its kind in the nation, reject those arguments, casting the ballot measure as an act of kindness for animals whose bodies and byproducts usually end up on dining room tables.
“If animals are going to be killed for food,” said Wayne Pacelle, the president and chief executive of the Humane Society of the United States, “the least we can do is treat them with decency and give them a semblance of life.”
The two sides do agree that the ballot issue is sure to be the most expensive — and quite likely the most bruising — animal rights campaign ever. The Humane Society alone has already given about $4 million toward the campaign for Proposition 2, about half of what Mr. Pacelle thinks his side will spend before Nov. 4.
Californians for Safe Food had raised more than $6.7 million by the end of September, according to federal election documents, with scores of donations from agricultural operations around the country, including egg companies in Colorado, Georgia and Minnesota.
California is the nation’s fifth-largest producer — and No. 1 consumer — of eggs, producing an estimated $337 million worth in 2007. Nationwide, the country produces about 77 billion table eggs a year — 250 per American — valued at about $6.7 billion.
Considering the market at stake, it is not surprising that Proposition 2 has supplied some of the election season’s most emotionally charged advertisements. One, by supporters, shows images of abused animals on factory farms, while opponents’ commercials have warned that the measure would lead to the importation of unsafe eggs from Mexico.
Opponents have pressed a line of attack that suggests that Proposition 2 — which would require that animals be provided room to turn around, lie down, stand up and fully extend their limbs — could expose birds, via contact with their own waste and that of other animals, to such dreaded diseases as salmonella and avian influenza. They also argue that standard egg-laying cages — a little more than eight inches square — actually protect hens from aggression by other birds and predators.
Mr. Pacelle calls such arguments “far-fetched and ridiculous.”
Still, the proposition, which would take effect in 2015, has led to a division between some small-animal “pet vets” and large-animal agricultural veterinarians. In September, several agricultural veterinarians formed a group separate from the 6,000-member California Veterinary Medical Association, the state’s leading veterinary group, over the association’s support for Proposition 2.
One of those who split was Dr. Nancy D. T. Reimers, a poultry veterinarian who has been paid for work for Californians for Safe Food. Dr. Reimers said people often do not understand the work that veterinarians do on farms.
“The folks that are involved in the food supply know what we have to do to keep the animals and the food safe,” Dr. Reimers said. “And they are, by and large, opposed” to Proposition 2.
Supporters, meanwhile, question why Proposition 2 opponents have drawn so much financial support from out-of-state egg producers, who presumably would benefit if California egg farmers failed. “You’d think those egg companies would be chomping at the bit” to see the measure pass, Mr. Pacelle said.
Those companies, he said, fear a “ripple effect” of similar legislation in other states or a demand from big retailers like Wal-Mart if consumers seek more humane products.
Mitch Head, a spokesman for United Egg Producers, a farmers’ collective that represents 95 percent of the nation’s commercial egg producers, said some out-of-state support was a reflection of the fact that an outbreak of disease in eggs anywhere leads to bad press for the industry as a whole.
Mr. Head also noted that California was traditionally a trend-setter. “I think they believe that if a few states start doing these things,” he said, “it will come to their states.”