Corporate livestock strikes again
A Chicago Tribune article from earlier this week exposed a bill that’s been laying in wait since December in the House Subcommittee on Environment and Hazardous Materials. Let’s hope it stays there. Pushed by the corporate poultry industry via the ironically-named group “Farmers for Clean Air and Water,” and co-sponsored by 164 House members, the bill would exempt animal manure from being labeled a hazardous substance under the federal Superfund law. Superfund regulations have been used in a number of cases brought by communities and environmental groups against industrial livestock operations for environmental damage. The Tribune article discusses a pair of cases that have riled the industry:
“[In 2001,] Tulsa [Oklahoma] filed a lawsuit against the poultry industry after algae blooms polluted the city's water supply, a case that was settled after poultry companies in the watershed agreed to regulate their application of manure as fertilizer. The state of Oklahoma followed up with its own lawsuit last year, suing poultry companies for polluting the scenic Illinois River (this one starts in Arkansas) water basin, a popular destination for tourists.”
The impressively persistent Oklahoma Attorney General, Drew Edmondson, has promised to take the fight against pollution from corporate livestock operations from watershed to watershed in his state. The industry has struck back with its new lobbying effort, and with clever PR that paints the Superfund regulations as inimical to the interests of all farmers, not just to corporate CAFO (confined animal feeding operation) owners. Another excerpt from the Tribune article:
“The livestock industry also argues that if successful, Edmondson's lawsuit could have apocalyptic repercussions, from harming the organic industry to forcing the livestock industry overseas.”
But Superfund regulations allow for the “normal” application of manure for fertilizer, so family farmers who raise livestock and use the manure on their crops aren’t affected. If that’s the case, then what’s going on here? It seems like a another example corporate livestock operations trying to cash in on voters’ sympathy for the good old American farm. If corporate operations and family farmers are “all in this together,” then CAFOs housing 50,000 hogs can benefit from policies meant to protect smaller, diversified, and more ecologically responsible family farms. That’s happened already with right-to-farm laws in a number of states. The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy has a detailed report on the environmental, labor, and livelihoods implications of corporate livestock production; see the section on how CAFOs avoid local, state, and national environmental laws here.
For more information on campaigns to hold corporate livestock and agribusiness accountable, see:
Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement http://www.iowacci.org/
Agribusiness Accountability Initiative http://www.agribusinessaccountability.org/page/home/
Missouri Rural Crisis Center http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/rural.html
Land Stewardship Project http://www.landstewardshipproject.org/programs_factoryfarms.html
“[In 2001,] Tulsa [Oklahoma] filed a lawsuit against the poultry industry after algae blooms polluted the city's water supply, a case that was settled after poultry companies in the watershed agreed to regulate their application of manure as fertilizer. The state of Oklahoma followed up with its own lawsuit last year, suing poultry companies for polluting the scenic Illinois River (this one starts in Arkansas) water basin, a popular destination for tourists.”
The impressively persistent Oklahoma Attorney General, Drew Edmondson, has promised to take the fight against pollution from corporate livestock operations from watershed to watershed in his state. The industry has struck back with its new lobbying effort, and with clever PR that paints the Superfund regulations as inimical to the interests of all farmers, not just to corporate CAFO (confined animal feeding operation) owners. Another excerpt from the Tribune article:
“The livestock industry also argues that if successful, Edmondson's lawsuit could have apocalyptic repercussions, from harming the organic industry to forcing the livestock industry overseas.”
But Superfund regulations allow for the “normal” application of manure for fertilizer, so family farmers who raise livestock and use the manure on their crops aren’t affected. If that’s the case, then what’s going on here? It seems like a another example corporate livestock operations trying to cash in on voters’ sympathy for the good old American farm. If corporate operations and family farmers are “all in this together,” then CAFOs housing 50,000 hogs can benefit from policies meant to protect smaller, diversified, and more ecologically responsible family farms. That’s happened already with right-to-farm laws in a number of states. The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy has a detailed report on the environmental, labor, and livelihoods implications of corporate livestock production; see the section on how CAFOs avoid local, state, and national environmental laws here.
For more information on campaigns to hold corporate livestock and agribusiness accountable, see:
Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement http://www.iowacci.org/
Agribusiness Accountability Initiative http://www.agribusinessaccountability.org/page/home/
Missouri Rural Crisis Center http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/rural.html
Land Stewardship Project http://www.landstewardshipproject.org/programs_factoryfarms.html
posted by elanor starmer at 6:23 PM
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