The Truth About the Animal ID Plan
(Page 4 of 7)
June/July 2007
By Jack Kittredge
One difficulty with these costs for small farmers is that so much of the expense is fixed. Whether you have one cow or 20, you will still need a reader, Internet access and database subscription. Even if you do the monitoring and reporting yourself, this can easily cost $500. The situation is even worse for someone raising smaller, less valuable livestock. Amortized over a few goats or a flock of laying hens, $500 can easily exceed the value of the animals.
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It’s too intrusive. Some small farmers object to the intrusiveness of the ID program, feeling they should be free to raise animals much as their ancestors did, unimpeded by government. Others feel it infringes on their constitutional or property rights. Still others have religious beliefs that prevent their using electricity, computers, telephones or other aspects of modern technology that would be needed to implement the program.
It endangers outdoor production. Another concern, especially among organic and sustainable growers, is that by imposing costly new burdens on the small operator, the USDA program favors large confinement operations and threatens outdoor and pasture-based production. Under organic regulations, animals must be raised with access to the outdoors. Many customers also prefer the quality of free-range meat and like to support farmers who use that practice. But in the mistaken belief that avian flu is transmitted by migratory birds (it is well established now that it travels with commercial shipments of birds and manure along rail and truck routes), some localities have now clamped down on outdoor poultry raising. It has been prohibited in Quebec, Germany, Nigeria, Slovenia and Hong Kong. The Massachusetts Commissioner of Agriculture, writing in support of the program, said he envisioned a time when outdoor raising of poultry would not be tolerated.
WHY CONSUMERS SHOULD OPPOSE MANDATORY ANIMAL ID
Some analysts think large confinement animal production works to the detriment of environmental and human health.
It’s bad for the environment. In 1997, U.S. livestock and poultry produced 1.1 billion tons of manure — six times the amount generated by the human population. This manure could be a valuable fertilizer if produced in small, manageable quantities on small farms throughout the country. But when produced in concentrated amounts in factory farms, it cannot be safely applied to local fields and results in contamination of waterways and groundwater. Ammonia, hydrogen sulfide and other gases given off by decomposing manure cause respiratory problems in animals and humans, and can travel for miles.
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