Chronology of humane progress in India (Part One)

 

Special: Chronology of humane progress in India

by Merritt Clifton, Editor, Animal People News

PREFACE

The “Chronology of Humane Progress in India” covers only events originating before 2007,  to give more recent events time to settle into perspective.  The outcomes of court cases in which judgements were rendered more recently are discussed in light of antecedents which have evolved for much longer…”

Organizations mentioned are included either because they are believed to be the oldest within their respective regions,  or because for some reason they are of national or international note.  Among the many founded more recently than 10 years ago,  only the Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organizations is mentioned;  it is included because it is a representative body providing a forum and collective voice to the entire Indian humane movement.        Read more

Correction regarding which Pohlmann son was fined

ANIMAL PEOPLE has learned,  11 years after publication, that the November 2000 article “Million hens killed in Ohio-twister hits like forced molt” conflated the identities of two sons of Anton Pohlmann,  who built battery egg production complexes in both Lower Saxony,  Germany,  and Ohio.

Both complexes have been in frequent legal difficulty  for decades over a variety of labor,  occupational safety,  and environmental quality issues. Read more

Romanian activists are wary of newly passed U.S.-style animal control law

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:

 

BUCHAREST--Romanian animal advocates fear that a new national
animal control law ratified on November 22,  2011 by the national
Chamber of Deputies will initiate dog population control killing at a
pace unseen since then-Bucharest mayor Traian Basescu in April 2001
unleashed the most notorious dog pogram since the fall of Communism.
Basescu has since 2004 been president of Romania,  elected in
part because the 2001 dog killing helped to establish his reputation
for enforcing law-and-order.  The Chamber of Deputies is dominated by
the Democratic Liberal Party,  of which Basescu is a founder.  The
Democratic Liberal Party collected half a million petition signatures
in support of the new animal control law before bringing it to a
final vote. Read more

Who has the mandate to speak for farm animals?

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:

Editorial Feature

 

Controversy continues in this November/December 2011 edition of ANIMAL PEOPLE,
as in almost every edition since July/August 2010,  over agreements reached during the past 18 months among animal charities and entities representing agribusiness.  In dispute are both the substance of the agreements themselves, which concern the lives,  suffering,  and deaths of more animals than are involved in all other animal advocacy issues combined,  and the even greater question of who is ethically entitled to speak for the interests of livestock. Read more

Congress removes restriction against USDA inspecting horsemeat slaughterhouses

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:

WASHINGTON D.C.--A Congressional conference committee
scrapped House-approved language prohibiting the use of USDA funds
for horse slaughter inspections while reconciling differing House and
Senate versions of the “mini-bus” Agriculture,
Commerce/Justice/Science appropriations bill signed into law on
November 18,  2011 by U.S. President Barrack Obama. Read more

Ruling on Tony the truck stop tiger

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:

GROSSE TETE,  Louisiana— More than 10 years of controversy
and litigation over Tony,  the resident tiger at the Tiger Truck Stop
near Interstate 10 in Grosse Tete,  Louisiana,  may be near an
end–or maybe not.  District Judge Michael Caldwell on November 3,
2011 ruled for the second time in six months,  in a case brought by
the Animal Legal Defense Fund,  that Tiger Truck Stop owner Michael
Sandlin is illegally keeping the tiger.  However,  Caldwell’s
previous ruling was reversed by a three-judge panel of the Louisiana
First Circuit Court of Appeal,  and Sandlin is expected to appeal
again. Read more

How the Zanesville animals were shot

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:
ZANESVILLE–Muskingum County Sheriff Matt Lutz on the evening of October 18,  2011 ordered his deputies to kill 18 tigers, 17 African lions,  six black bears,  two grizzly bears,  two wolves, and a baboon because he believed that the circumstances under which they were running loose–including a failed attempt to shut some of them back in their breached cages–left no other options.

Reported Zanesville Times Recorder staff writer Hannah Sparling,  “Sam Kopchak,  64,  owns about four acres on Kopchak Road,”  next door to Terrry Thompson’s 73-acre Muskingum County Animal Farm.  Kopchak was walking his horse Red back to his barn when he noticed a group of about 30 horses on Thompson’s property acting
strange,  he said.  He looked a little closer and saw they were running from a bear.  Then, Kopchak turned around and saw a male African lion standing about 30 feet from him and Red.  The only thing separating them was a 4- or 5-foot wire fence,  he said.”

“I don’t know how I controlled myself,”  Kopchak told Sparling.  “We made a beeline toward my barn.” Read more

BOOKS: Legislative & regulatory options for animal welfare

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:

Legislative & regulatory options for animal welfare
by Jessica Vapnek & Megan Chapman
for the Development Law Service,  FAO Legal
Office.   FAO Legislative Study 104.
Free download from:  http://www.fao.org/docrep/013/i1907e/i1907e00.htm

“Because food animals are important to
human welfare–as a source of nutrition and
income–concern for animal welfare is
inextricable from concern for human needs,”  open
United Nations Food & Agricultural Organization
researchers Jessica Vapnek and Megan Chapman in
Legislative & regulatory options for animal
welfare.  “This is particularly the case in
countries with developing economies,”  Vapnek and
Chapman continue,   “where current and expected
population increases are putting pressure on food
security and economic growth.  Increased food
animal production,”  Vapnek and Chapman assert,
“is often a necessary part of attaining both
goalsŠThe key challenge is to find ways to
increase food animal production while
simultaneously improving or ensuring good animal
welfare and protecting food security.” Read more

Another Burton Sipp fire raises questions

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:

SPRINGFIELD,  N.J.--A three-alarm fire killed two giraffes,
three dogs,  four cats,  and 15 parrots at the Animal Kingdom Pet
Store & Zoo on October 31,  2011 in Springfield Township,  New
Jersey.  About 20 puppies were reportedly rescued.  Owner Burton K.
Sipp,  67,  told George Mast of the Cherry Hill Courier Post that he
was in Arizona on horse racing business at the time of the fire.  The
fire started at about 8:45 p.m.,  about half an hour after Sipp’s
brother George said a Halloween party in the store had ended.
“Some kind of explosion must have ignited it,”  George Sipp
told Philadelphia Inquirer staff writer Darran Simon. Read more

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