BOOKS: The Rainbow & Other Stories

March 1, 2000 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2000:

The Rainbow & Other Stories by Maneka Gandhi Puffin Books (India ), 1999.

Distributed in the U.S. by the Jiv Daya Committee (1718 E. Jeter Road, Bartonville, TX 76226.)

68 pages, hardcover. Illustrated.

Offered as premium for $30 donation to help the People for Animals street dog project in Bombay; the Jiv Daya Dharma Donkey Sanctuary and Education Center, also in India; and spay/neuter projects by Ahimsa of Texas

As federal minister for social justice and empowerment in India since August 1998, a portfolio which includes oversight of animal welfare, Maneka Gandhi holds the most influential public office attained by any outspoken animal rights advocate.

Guest column: New approach needed in foreign outreach by Pat Kyriacou

March 1, 2000 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2000:

It has been interesting to watch ANIMAL PEOPLE expand your international focus, analysing what you find, questioning the status quo, speaking out against the animal welfare establishment when necessary.

I too have been observing some of the large animal welfare organisations as they expand their activities abroad. Here in Cyprus, in the southeast Mediterranean, primarily British organisations have become involved. This is probably because Cyprus is a former British colony. Cyprus hosts millions of British tourists, plus thousands of resident British retirees, who often contact large British organisations when they are concerned about animal abuse.

It is interesting to contrast the approaches taken to animal advocacy in developing countries by ANIMAL PEOPLE and some of these large British organisations.

Letters [March 2000]

March 1, 2000 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2000:

Getting data

I think your publication of the salaries of people in animal defence is so valuable. Would it be possible for you to include some groups from Canada in your list? How exactly do you get your statistics? How could I get some information about salaries?

––Marg Buckholtz

Kingston, Ontario

We include some Canadian groups, and have included more in some past years, but the Revenue Canada disclosure form for charities does not require them to disclose salaries or the names of board members and top-paid staff.

Letters

WILDLIFE IN THE CAPITOLS

March 1, 2000 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2000:

Prairie dogs

WASHINGTON D.C. ––The Interior Department ruled on February 2 that black-tailed prairie dogs qualify for protection as a threatened species, as they now occupy less than 1% of their former range––but Interior also said it would not act soon to protect prairie dogs, calling scarcer species a higher priority.

Arizona, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Texas, and Wyoming have all reportedly agreed to develop their own prairie dog protection plans.

The National Wildlife Federation, which petitioned for the threatened species designation, said it was pleased with the Interior Department action. However, NWF still has not answered repeated ANIMAL PEOPLE inquiries as to whether it has asked members of the 48 state hunting clubs for which NWF is national umbrella to refrain from participating in prairie dog shoots.

Editorial: Lassitude on attitude

March 1, 2000 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2000:

Beginning on page one of this edition, ANIMAL PEOPLE compares Chinese attitudes about animals, as recently surveyed by professional pollsters, to the attitudes of Americans, voiced in similar surveys done in the United States.

Readers with our own penchant for tracking statistics may notice that in order to find surveys which asked Americans essentially the same questions, we had to use data gathered on 27 different occasions by 22 different polling agencies––and though some of the questions were asked just a few months ago, others were most recently asked 17 years ago.

There were some questions we could find no match for. Hired by the International Fund for Animal Welfare, Animals Asia Foundation, and the Hong Kong SPCA, the Chinese pollsters asked not only about issues and practices indigenous to China, but also about forms of animal use and abuse which might be imported, to see what might take hold if allowed the opportunity. Bullfighting and circuses were of particular interest, because entrepreneurs have already brought both bullfights and western-style circuses to the Chinese mainland. Incredibly, though we combed more than six feet of files documenting U.S. activism over animal use in entertainment, we found no indication that anyone here has ever really tried to find out what Americans think about animal spectacles in any kind of detail. All the existing data allows us to say with certainty is that Americans mostly approve of well-managed zoos and overwhelmingly disapprove of cockfighting. Where Americans stand on bullfighting, circuses, and rodeo––which combines aspects of both––is presently measured only by television ratings and gate receipts.

Wolves

March 1, 2000 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2000:

DENVER––The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on January 13 reversed a 1997 ruling by U.S. District Court Judge William Downes that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service violated the Endangered Species Act by reintroducing 66 wolves to Yellowstone National Park and central Idaho in 1995 and 1996 as an “experimental, non-essential” population.

The American Farm Bureau Federation and Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho affiliates held that the “experimental, non-essential” status illegally reduced protection of wild wolves already in the area, and that therefore the reintroduced wolves and their progeny should be removed.

The verdict enabled the Fish and Wildlife Service to proceed with the scheduled reintroduction of grizzly bears to the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness Area northwest of Yellowstone. Five grizzlies a year would be released into the wilderness over a five-year span.

Wild Animals

Panel set to draft feral hit list

March 1, 2000 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2000:

WASHINGTON D.C.––Cruelty is of no concern to the Invasive Species Council, Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt signified on January 26, excluding humane representation from a 32-member Invasive Species Advisory Committee named to help direct the federal war on feral wildlife.

There was no room on ISAC, as the advisory committee is called, for anyone from any of the more than 10,000 U.S. organizations formed to prevent cruelty to animals, whose donor base includes one household in four, and may be larger than the constituency who elected President Bill Clinton.

But there was room for a representative from Monsanto––a leading maker of the pesticides used in ever-growing volume against alleged “invasive species,” and coincidentally a leader in creating and introducing new species via genetic engineering.

RETURN OF THE PET THIEVES

March 1, 2000 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2000:

NASHVILLE, MUNCIE, KALAMAZOO, FLINT––Missing dog reports reminiscent of the bad old days of roundups for laboratory use flooded animal shelter telephone lines and Internet chat boards between Thanksgiving 1999 and mid-January 2000 in at least three midwestern and southern regions linked by Interstate Highways 64, 65, and 69.

The first burst of theft reports fitting the pattern came in Maury County, Tennessee, south of Nashville. Almost all of the missing animals were reportedly purebreds.

After Christmas came 30 alleged thefts in southwestern Indiana.

“Red flags started going up,” said Evansville Courier & Press staff writer Judy Davis, when Gibson County Animal Services director Cindy Hyneman realized that, ‘All of the dogs’ descriptions matched––large, shorthaired, friendly dogs.’”

Invasions created the Mara, Serengetti vista

March 1, 2000 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2000

KEEKORAK, Kenya––The Masai Mara National Park in southwestern Kenya and the Serengetti National Park of northwestern Tanzania together offer one of the world’s great wildlife viewing venues, punctuated by the spring and fall migrations of the wildebeests, in herds of thousands.

Yet if the bioxenophobes who dominate the conservation establishment were philosophically consistent, the great wildlife parks would represent an ecological horror show: almost all of the charismatic megafauna whom the world beats paths to see were once invasive species.

Elephants would be especially reviled––as they are, by many botanists––because their habit of breaking down trees tends to keep the savannah from evolving back into the dry forest it apparently was once, before they came.

« 1 … 431 432 433 434 435 … 720 »