Animal Equality, of Spain, collects video from 172 pig farms in just three years

June 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2010:

MADRID–Sharon Nunez, founder of the
less-than-five-year-old organization Animal
Equality, on May 19, 2010 disclosed that 70
Animal Equality volunteers between August 2007
and May 2010 “physically entered a total of 172
pig farms in 11 regions of Spain,” documenting
their findings with 200 hours of video and 25,000
still photos.
Nunez released 50 minutes of the video and 2,600 photos.
“This intensive work comprises the
largest investigation into animal exploitation so
far carried out in Spain,” Nunez said.
In actuality the Animal Equality
investigation was larger by itself than all
previous undercover probes of farms and
slaughterhouses combined, worldwide.
The Animal Equality volunteers “recorded,
amongst other events, how workers routinely kill
pigs by slamming them against the floor,” Nunez
said, or “how pigs are hit, kicked or have
fingers thrust into their eyes to force them to
stand or walk,” and witnessed “countless scenes
of cannibalism–as much on organic or
‘free-range’ farms as on factory farms.”

Cell phone videocams open factory farms to public view

June 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2010:
BOULDER, URBANA–Ignoring 20 years of
warnings by leading U.S. agribusiness educators
and pundits has begun to cost the livestock
industry serious money and– perhaps–consumer
confidence.
Increasingly frequent and effective
undercover exposés are acquainting ever more of
the public with meat, egg, and dairy production
practices, including with the ineffecacy of
agribusiness at improving animal welfare despite
frequent promises.
More than a hundred activists have now
worked undercover at many hundreds of factory
farms and slaughterhouses, documenting
procedures with thousands of hours of video.

Undercover footage of horse slaughter shocks the world

May 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2010:
FORT MacLEOD, Canada; FRANKFURT,
Germany–Undercover video of horse slaughter in
Canada, Mexico, and Brazil, and horse
transport for slaughter from the U.S. shocked the
world in April 2010, after broadcast by the
leading Canadian and European networks and
postings of graphic clips to YouTube.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
aired video obtained by the Canadian Horse
Defence Coalition three days after networks in
The Netherlands, France, and Belgium aired
video from Animals’ Angels, a 12-year-old
organization with offices in Germany, Britain,
and the U.S.

U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upholds 2008 California anti-downer law

April 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2010:

SAN FRANCISCO–The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth
Circuit on March 31, 2010 upheld both California legislation
prohibiting the slaughter of downed livestock and the principle that
states may enforce livestock handling and slaughter standards more
stringent than those required by federal law.
Introduced by assembly member Paul Krekorian (D-Burbank) at
request of the Humane Farming Association, the California law made a
misdemeanor of buying, selling, processing, or butchering a
non-ambulatory animal for human consumption. Downed animals must
instead be euthanized.

Beef ranchers lean on Cal Poly

March 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2010:

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif.– “Top officials at Harris Ranch are
trying to use their clout as big-money donors to censor what’s taught
at Cal Poly’s College of Agriculture,” editorialized the San Luis
Obispo Tribune News on January 17, 2010.
“Specifically,” the editorial charged, “they threatened to
withhold $500,000 in donations for a new meat-processing center,
unless the university tones down teaching about alternatives to the
traditional factory farming methods practiced by Harris Ranch.”

Farm animal initiative in Ohio builds on California success

March 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2010:
COLUMBUS, Ohio–Ohioans for Humane Farms,
a coalition headed by the Humane Society of the
U.S. and Farm Sanctuary, on February 1, 2010
began gathering signatures to place an initiative
on the November 2010 Ohio state ballot which, if
approved by voters, would require the Ohio
Livestock Care Standards Board to ban lifelong
confinement of veal calves, breeding sows, and
laying hens.

Transporter sinks

January 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2010:

BEIRUT–Thirty-nine people were rescued, but nine were found
dead, 35 were missing and presumed dead, and 10,224 sheep plus
17,932 cattle died when the livestock transporter Danny F II capsized
and sank on December 17, 2009, 11 nautical miles from Tripoli,
Lebanon, en route from Montevideo, Uruguay, to Tartarus, Syria.
The British captain reportedly went down with the ship.
Launched as the car transporter Don Carlos in 1975, the
Danny F II was renamed when converted to haul livestock in 1994. In
2005 the Danny F II was reportedly detained at Adelaide after
inspectors found holed bulkheads, defective navigation lights and
radio equipment, and defective watertight doors.
The sinking brought the biggest loss of life of any livestock
hauling incident since the sheep transporter Uniceb burned and sank
in September 1996, killing 67,488 sheep who were en route to Jordan
from New Zealand and Australia.

Editorial feature: 21st century began with 10 years of hard-won gains

January 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2010:
Most ANIMAL PEOPLE readers are probably buried lately in a
blizzard of appeals reviewing the deeds of animal charities during
the past year and decade. Recipients will be cheered by recaps of
“victories,” no matter how transient. Some may notice, though,
that “defeats” are seldom mentioned.
Comprehensive assessments of progress tend to be fewer–and
can be discouraging, in view of frequent contradictory indicators.
But the animal cause does not advance primarily through obvious
“victories,” or fail through the unmentioned defeats, which most
often result when legislation is proposed before sufficient
groundwork is done to pass it, or when resources are inadequate to
achieve an ambitious goal.
Fundraisers and campaigners like to evoke imagery suggesting
that at some point a cause will “triumph,” perhaps after someone
blows the right horn to bring all obstacles tumbling down. This is a
tried-and-true appeal format, but reality is that if any “war”
metaphor is appropriate to advancing the cause of animals, it is
that of trench warfare.

Pregnant mares’ urine biz wins case after big losses

January 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2010:

NEW YORK, N.Y.– New York State Supreme Court Justice Martin
Shulman on December 16, 2009 threw out 23 lawsuits brought by breast
cancer victims against the makers of hormone supplements synthesized
from pregnant mare’s urine.
“While plaintiffs’ proffered evidence is extensive, a review
of the material and the record as a whole contain no evidence of
fraud, misrepresentation or deception,” Shulman wrote in dismissing
the cases before any of them went to trial.
The verdict appeared to blunt the economic impact of recent
jury awards totaling more than $165 million against the PMU
industry–and appeared to vindicate the Pfizer Inc. strategy of
consolidating and defending the industry, even as new scientific
findings strengthened the association of PMU-based hormone
supplements with an elevated risk of breast cancer.

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