Animals

Boycott Factory Farm Foods: But Don’t Forget The Fish

April 9, 2018 Ronnie Cummins, Organicconsumers.org Resist! Animals, boycott, Factory Farming, Fishing, Public Health

Factory farming and fish production are now a multi-trillion-dollar monster with a growing and devastating impact on public health, animal welfare, small farmers and farmworkers, rural and fishing communities, ocean marine life, water quality, air pollution, soil health, biodiversity and last but not least, global warming. Worldwide, two-thirds of all farm animals are now inhumanely imprisoned on highly-polluting factory farms, fed pesticide- and chemical-contaminated grains and GMOs, often supplemented with contaminated fish meal and oils, and routinely dosed with antibiotics and hormones. In the U.S., 90-95 percent of all dairy, meat and poultry come from industrial-scale factory farms, while more than half of all fish consumed comes from factory-scale fish farms.

Meat Industry Linked To Largest Toxic Dead Zone In US History

November 3, 2017 Alexandra Jacobo, nationofchange.org Resist! Animals, Food and Agriculture, Toxic Chemicals

By Alexandra Jacobo for Nation of Change - The meat industry, more specifically corporate giants such as Tyson foods, has been directly linked to the environmental catastrophe know as the toxic dead zone. Corporations that are a part of the meat industry use industrial-scale agriculture to raise their animals, which is the number one source of water pollution in the country. Even though there are better solutions available to minimize the impacts on the environment, corporations continue to use resource-intensive and ecologically destructive practices. This pollution has lead to toxic “dead zones”, which are areas where there is no longer enough oxygen for fish to survive. The largest dead zone in the United States is in the Gulf of Mexico. America currently houses five times as many livestock animals as humans. More than a third of America’s agricultural land is dedicated for the production of corn and soy, key ingredients in animal feed products. American humans only consume 10 percent of that which is produced. A new campaign launched by Mighty Earth is aiming to expose Tyson’s role in the process of livestock feed production that causes major pollution – and hold them accountable for it.

‘Appetite For Destruction’: How Feeding Livestock Strains The Planet

November 2, 2017 Dharna Noor, therealnews.com Educate! Animals, Factory Farming, Food and Agriculture, Waste

By Dharna Noor for The Real News Network - DHARNA NOOR: Welcome to The Real News Network. I'm Dharna Noor joining you from Baltimore. There's a growing awareness that meat production puts a strain on water, land use and habitats, and that it increases greenhouse gas emissions, which drives climate change. But few know the largest environmental impact actually comes from what the animals are being fed. To discuss a recent study on this topic, it's from the UK branch of the World Wildlife Fund, and it's titled Appetite for Destruction. We're joined by Duncan Williamson. He's the food policy manager for WWF UK. Thanks for joining us today, Duncan. D. WILLIAMSON: Well, thank you very much for having me. DHARNA NOOR: So, your recent report says that producing crops to feed livestock is putting an enormous strain on our natural resources, and it's a driving force behind wide scale biodiversity loss. How does livestock feed actually have that kind of impact? D. WILLIAMSON: It's two things. It's the numbers of animals that we're producing globally, and where we are growing the crops to feed them, so for example, we know there's 23 billion poultry animals on the world at the moment. That's enough for three animals each basically, and most of these animals are grown in intensive systems, so they don't have access to the outside, so they have to be fed on something, and their feed tends to be maize and soy.

Former Colorado Beef Ranch Is Now A Thriving Animal Sanctuary

September 25, 2017 Amanda Froelich, www.nationofchange.org Create! Animals, Colorado

By Amanda Froelich for Nation of Change - If you truly love animals, eschew the beef tartare and try out some veggie lentil loaf. This is what owners Jen and Tray Federici did, but with their entire business in Colorado. Now, their Larkspur-based ranch is now a thriving animal sanctuary. Once a lucrative business that butchered and sold cows for profit, the Surf and Turf Animal Sanctuary is now a safe haven for a variety of species. Both Jen and Try are lifelong animal lovers. They never really realized the disconnect of their passion and professions unit last year, however. After being unable to cope with the killing of an older cow they had selected from their herd, the couple decided change was needed. Said Jen, “We officially had our last ham Christmas 2016. We never looked back after that. We swore off all meat as well as all animal products. Needless to say, we have never felt better or more healthy, both mentally and physically.” In the summer of 2017, the duo transformed their 100-acre ranch into a 501(c)3 Nonprofit Animal Rescue and Sanctuary. VegNews reports that it is now a home to a variety of rescue animals, including longhorn cows, calves, pigs, goats, chickens, and zebras – among others.

Meet Ava: The Chicken I Risked My Freedom For

January 30, 2017 Eva Hamer, www.commondreams.org Resist! Animals, Farms

By Eva Hamer for Common Dreams - This past summer, I entered a place most Americans - especially those in urban areas - can barely even fathom: a place that sounds innocent, but when you step foot in it, you realize it’s one of the darkest places on the planet. I entered a modern farm. This farm was different from most other farms. Though farms across America are shifting away from holding hens in what are known as “battery cages,” this was the rare farm that had both caged and cage-free barns. With a small team of other activists, we carried out two birds—Mia from a cage-free barn and Ava from a cage. Mia was a beautiful Rhode Island Red chicken, and as I carried her through dark fields and passed her over barbed wire fences to save her from hell

USDA Allows Non-GMO Label For Some GMO Fed Animal Products

December 10, 2016 Staff, www.sustainablepulse.com Educate! Animals, Food and Agriculture, GMOs, USDA

By Staff of Sustainable Pulse - The United States Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) informed Sustainable Pulse on Monday that they will allow multi-ingredient products, which include GMO fed animal products, such as eggs, meat or poultry, to be labeled Non-GMO. Sustainable Pulse requested further details on the FSIS guidelines published in August, due to ‘confusing’ language regarding which products will be able to be labeled non-GMO. FSIS confirmed that for “single ingredient products, such as a steak, plain chicken breast or ground beef, and the animal that the meat came from was fed GMO feed, that product cannot be labeled as non-GMO.”

Sea Shepherd To Obstruct Japanese

December 8, 2016 Staff, www.islandbreath.blogspot.com Resist! Animals, Japan

By Staff of Sea Shepherd - After final preparations in Australia, two Sea Shepherd vessels are now on their way to the Southern Ocean to intercept the Japanese whaling fleet in a bid stop their slaughter of Minke whales. The marine conservation organization's flagship vessel the Steve Irwin departed Saturday from Seaworks, Williamstown in Melbourne, followed by its fast new patrol vessel the Ocean Warrior, which departed from Hobart, Tasmania on Sunday. They're now on their way to the vast Southern Ocean in an effort to prevent the Japanese whaling fleet, which left Japan on November 18th, from killing its self-allocated quota of 333 Minke whales.

For First Time, Bees Added To U.S. Endangered Species List

October 5, 2016 Katie Herzog, www.grist.org Organize! Animals, Bees, Environment

By Katie Herzog for The Grist - Seven types of yellow-faced or masked bees once common in Hawaii are now officially threatened or endangered, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Hawaii’s pollinators are particularly threatened by habitat loss from invasive plants and development. And their declining numbers aren’t just a problem for the bees themselves: The yellow-faced bees are the sole pollinators for some of Hawaii’s endangered native plant species as well as more common varieties of flora.

Biodiversity Below Safe Levels Across More Than Half Of World

July 24, 2016 Adam Vaughn, www.theguardian.com Educate! Animals, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Food and Agriculture, Sustainability

By Adam Vaughn for The Guardian. The variety of animals and plants has fallen to dangerous levels across more than half of the world’s landmass due to humanity destroying habitats to use as farmland, scientists have estimated. The unchecked loss of biodiversity is akin to playing ecological roulette and will set back efforts to bring people out of poverty in the long term, they warned. Analysing 1.8m records from 39,123 sites across Earth, the international study found that a measure of the intactness of biodiversity at sites has fallen below a safety limit across 58.1% of the world’s land. Under a proposal put forward by experts last year, a site losing more than 10% of its biodiversity is considered to have passed a precautionary threshold, beyond which the ecosystem’s ability to function could be compromised.

Landmark Report Maps Feces-Laden Hog And Chicken Operations In N. Carolina

July 4, 2016 Staff, www.waterkeeper.org Educate! Animals, Factory Farming, North Carolina, Waste

By Staff of Waterkeeper Alliance - Washington, D.C. – A first-of-its-kind interactive map revealing the locations of more than 6,500 concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, across the state of North Carolina was released today by Waterkeeper Alliance, North Carolina Riverkeeper organizations and Environmental Working Group (EWG). In addition to swine and cattle CAFOs, the project documents the locations of over 3,900 poultry operations, which up until now have been shielded from the people of North Carolina.

In A Rhino, Everything

May 30, 2016 Staff, www.charleseisenstein.net Educate! Animals, Nature

By Staff of EC - I don’t cry very often. But this week I cried twice. For the rhinos. It breaks my heart that they’re going extinct. In order to make myself feel better, I try to intellectualize this. It’s totally irrational, I say to myself, to be sad for the rhinos. Why not be sad for the fairy shrimp, going extinct right here in Southern California? There are so many things to be sad about: police shootings, for example.

Save Monarchs, Plant More Milkweed

July 25, 2015 Center For Food Safety, www.ecowatch.com Create! Animals, Environment, Food and Agriculture

By Center For Food Safety in Ecowatch - Center for Food Safety (CFS) released today a detailed, 80-page scientific report, Monarchs in Peril: Herbicide-Resistant Crops and the Decline of Monarch Butterflies in North America. The comprehensive report reveals the severe impacts of herbicide-resistantgenetically engineered (GE) crops on the monarch population, which has plummeted over the past twenty years. The report makes it abundantly clear: two decades of Roundup Ready crops have nearly eradicated milkweed—the monarch caterpillar’s sole source of food—in cropland of the monarch’s vital Midwest breeding ground. At the urgent request of scientists and public interest groups, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is currently considering listing the monarch as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. The report is being presented to Congress today at an expert briefing on the decline of monarchs.

Cowspiracy Exposes The Truth About Animal Agriculture

October 14, 2014 Ward Pallotta, www.ecowatch.com Educate! Animals, Energy, Food and Agriculture

In 90 minutes, co-producers Kip Andersen and Keegan Kuhn argue that our institutional and individual attention to selected environmental issues will not make a collective difference unless we also confront the realities of animal agriculture. Animal agriculture’s environmental effects are so pervasive that apparent progress elsewhere cannot counter its destructive and growing impact. The film suggests why protection for expanded areas of the ocean will not protect oceans or ocean animals. Growing food organically, even on a commercial scale, will not protect the land. Keeping lumber operations out of the Amazon will not save the rainforest.

Study Finds Unusual Contamination In Animals Near Oilsands

July 10, 2014 Marty Klinkenberg, www.edmontonjournal.com Educate! Animals, Environment, Oil Sands, pollution, Science

Scientists at the University of Manitoba say they have linked pollution in the oilsands to elevated cancer rates in Fort Chipewyan for the first time. The impact on health in communities downwind of development is “clear and worrisome,” researcher Stephane McLachlan told a news conference Monday in Edmonton. “Something unique is happening in Fort Chipewyan, especially around cancer.” Conducted in collaboration with the Athabasca Chipewyan and Mikisew Cree First Nations, the study found fish and animals consumed as part of a traditional diet contained unusually high concentrations of contaminants emitted during the extraction and upgrading of bitumen. Twenty-three cases of cancer were reported among 94 people interviewed as part of the three-year, $1-million study, which was partially paid for by Health Canada and peer-reviewed by its scientists.

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