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ACTION: Big Ag in Ohio Says "Trust Us, We're Experts"

by: Jill Richardson

Mon Sep 28, 2009 at 10:29:54 AM PDT

Ohio's answer to Prop 2 is Issue 2. Prop 2, if you'll remember, was a ballot initiative that passed overwhelmingly in California last year to ban 3 specific cruel animal agriculture practices - sow gestation crates, veal crates, and battery cages for egg laying hens. Now the Humane Society (who was behind Prop 2) has been targeting Ohio for a similar ban on cruel practices. Ohio's Big Ag contingent has responded with Issue 2- a ballot initiative that would put THEM in charge of animal care standards.

Issue 2 would create a Livestock Care Standards Board to make the rules on how animals are to be treated. It will be on the November ballot in Ohio, and it is backed by the Ohio Farm Bureau and the Ohio Pork Producers Council. Since we already know how the agricultural establishment thinks that animals should be treated, there's no reason to assume that a Livestock Care Standards Board would come up with anything different. In other words - battery cages for hens are A-OK! Debeaking, forced molting, providing hens with no more space than the size of a sheet of paper... all of this is OK. For comparison, I've heard a recommendation that each hen should get 2 to 4 square feet.

If you live in Ohio, it's time to get active. Start by telling your friends and neighbors about Issue 2 and by making sure you're registered to vote. If you wish to get more involved, my hunch is that the Humane Society is the place to go for that.

UPDATE: Check out the website http://www.ohioact.org/ to get active on Issue 2 in Ohio.

Jill Richardson :: ACTION: Big Ag in Ohio Says "Trust Us, We're Experts"

Tags: Humane Society, Issue 2, Ohio, (All Tags)

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ACTION: Big Ag in Ohio Says "Trust Us, We're Experts" | 3 comments

Humane Society (4.00 / 2)

I've been thinking, always a dangerous passtime.

In this country alone, we have hundreds of millions of pets, whose owners would never for an instant consider that their pets should be treated the same way our industrial livestock is treated.

I once knew a small Pennsylvania hog farmer, who raised hogs in cages on two levels. His rationale was, manure fell through the second-level grates as food for the hogs on the ground level. I don't know if this is common practice.

by: count @ Mon Sep 28, 2009 at 18:31:22 PM UTC

Veal crates (4.00 / 2)

From the veal wiki,

...Veal crates (individual stalls often too small for the animal to turn around) were banned in the UK (under the 1987 "Welfare of Calves Regulations" which came into effect in 1990) and throughout the European Union in 2007.
...The AVA (American Veal Association) announced in 2007 a 10 year phasing out of "crates". In North America, there has been a recent move to more group housing, although it has been used since 1981 in various forms.

by: count @ Mon Sep 28, 2009 at 18:46:14 PM UTC

Vote NO on ISSUE 2 (4.00 / 2)

As a Farm Bureau member I worked on our local committee to find ways to fight and defeat HSUS and PETA at their own game.

My problem with this constitutional amendment is the excessive power it places in the hands of a 13 member group of non-elected bureaucrats.

This issue should not have been a constitutional amendment. The same objective to thwart PETA and HSUS could have been accomplished by including the key words "agricultural best management practices for such care and well-being" in section 900 of the Ohio Revised Code.

The big question for me is, "What did it take to twist the arms of all the members of both the House and Senate to make them take such a draconian measure?" If we change the Constitution every time the wind blows from the wrong direction, what value remains in it? What next? Change the US Constitution to remove free speech and religious freedom?

VOTE NO on ISSUE 2

by: WalkingHorse @ Fri Oct 16, 2009 at 18:17:10 PM UTC