Posted: Wednesday, May 25, 2011 SALEM, Ore. – The Northwest egg industry is changing the way it houses chickens. But animal rights activists in Oregon and Washington say the change isn’t going far enough. Lawmakers in both Olympia and Salem debated the welfare of egg-laying hens this year. Washington Governor Chris Gregoire has already...
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Three years ago, Alma Hasse walked purposely, head down, toward a red brick building. The Jerome County Courthouse held a mountain of files on the county’s dairy CAFOs, or concentrated animal feeding operations, and Hasse wanted a look at them. She and her agricultural watchdog group, Idaho Concerned Area Residents for the Environment believed...
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It’s easy to get all Dickensian when looking at what’s happening across the agriculture landscape. As the spring growing season begins, there are plenty of examples sprouting that suggest that, in terms of food and farming, we are indeed living in the best of times and, if not the worst of times, some pretty...
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On March 18, food writer Ian Brown published the piece “Foodies: Are food crazies getting their just desserts?” in The Globe and Mail. In it, he used the story of a snobby dinner companion sending back an under-salted dish as an example of epicurean elitism. A friend of mine sent back the duck confit we ordered...
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In conversations about agriculture and health, I think the issues raised in the book, Superbug: The Fatal Menace of MRSA by Maryn Mckenna, need to be front and center, especially as it relates to CAFOs (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations) and the use of antibiotics as a growth enhancer in animals. The book explains: Food animals...
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The flavor of great steak, like the flavor of fine coffee, chocolate or cabernet sauvignon is one of life’s deep, delicious and darkly subterranean flavors, a taste that can rock you to the bone like the bass line at a blues club. That’s no doubt why beef is Idaho’s No. 2 agricultural commodity (behind...
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The Florida legislation Craig Goodwin discusses here—which would make the unauthorized filming or photographing of a farm illegal—has similarities to an Idaho bill designed to protect farming operations from lawsuits and local ordinances. Both suggest that certain segments of the agricultural community are attempting to insulate themselves from public scrutiny at a time when the...
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