041179 California Senate Condemns "Factory" Farming of Animals

Sacramento, CA - Large dairy cattle, beef cattle and poultry farms in California use factory-like methods that enhance product quality and profits but can pollute the environment and might cause animals to suffer, according to a state Senate report.

Produced by the Office of Research, the report explores the concerns of environmentalists and animal rights activists about confined animal facilities, ranging from the debeaking of poultry to how dairy owners dispose of cow waste.

Senate President Pro Tem John Burton, who requested the report, said consumers and policy-makers should be concerned, but he didn't recommend specific legislation. The San Francisco Democrat has reached his term limit and will leave office next month.

Burton pushed a bill through the Legislature this year to ban foie gras - a liver pate derived by force-feeding geese - beginning in 2012 unless producers adopt more humane practices.

Agricultural industry leaders called the Senate report misleading and shabbily researched. Bill Mattos, president of the California Poultry Federation, said he invited Senate staffers to visit the federation's farms, but they declined.

"To me, (the report is) propaganda disguised as research," he said. "No one took up our offer to come up and see a facility. Obviously, this research has no basis in fact."

Californians should understand the impact of "factory farming," Burton said in a statement.

"We aren't saying 'Don't eat meat or poultry or don't raise meat or poultry,' but the people need to be aware of, and the Legislature and the governor should pursue, the public health and animal cruelty impacts of factory farming," he said.

Bryan Pease, outreach director for the Animal Protection & Rescue League, said he hopes the report prompts legislation to help regulate the industry.

"It's not an industry that is capable of regulating itself," he said. "The treatment of these animals is driven by profit, not by concern for animal welfare."

According to the report, sales of feedlot beef cattle, dairy, swine and poultry constitute a $75 billion-plus industry.

Dairy operations threaten air and water quality, it says. Dairy lagoons can break, sending wastewater into streams. Cow manure produces gasses that help form ozone and tiny chemical specks which can lodge in human lungs and cause health problems.

Michael Marsh, chief executive officer of Western United Dairymen, said the industry is working to address environmental concerns. Dairy owners take good care of their cows, he said. California is the top milk producer in the United States with more than 2,200 dairies producing 3.5 billion gallons each year.

In the poultry industry, activists are concerned about the practice of cutting or burning beaks so birds don't hurt each other in close quarters.

Mattos said his industry no longer debeaks chickens. And the practice doesn't hurt the birds, he said, likening it to "cutting your fingernails."

According to the report, evidence exists that factory farming can harm human health. Hormones and chemicals can be transmitted through food and drinking water, it states. U.S. meat producers routinely put low levels of antibiotics into feed given to healthy animals to encourage faster growth, it says. Marsh said regulators keep a close eye on antibiotics used in livestock.

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