Liberation for
Our Brother & Sister Animals [LobsA] News
March 24,
2006
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| "The notion that human life is
sacred just because it is human life is medieval" ~~~ Peter Singer- philosopher and professor of bioethics at Princeton University and laureate professor at the University of Melbourne SUBJECTS: Quotes ; Animals Voice image gallery. Over 5000 + images of Animals being used for everything ; From AAQ & ALQ National Day of Action Saturday (tomorrow) Sat 25 Mar 2006 Call for Ban of all live animal exports ; Why I don’t wear wool: Take a hard look at how sheep are treated down under ; Factory farming: A moraI issue by Peter Singer ; Arizona citizens mobilize to defeat factory farm control ; Current In Defense of Animals Action Alerts ;Toll Free poll on animal Cruelty laws (AU) ;Tell Wal-Mart that Palm Oil Kills Orangutans ; Jamie Oliver encouraging squirrel-eating ;Animals Voice Newsletter includes many action alerts, articles ; A COK Update: “45 Days” Broiler Chicken Documentary at the Tiburon International Film Festival ; MP wants action to stop animal deaths (AU);From UPC: Poultry Industry Experimenters Promote Fire-Fighting Foam as a “Humane” Method of Mass extermination of Chickens Used in Meat Production, Calling It a Form of “Euthanasia”; from UPC - In the Turkey Breeding Factory; LET'S HELP KEI the wolf OUT ON HER BIRTHDAY - wolf kept in very small cage at zoo in japan for 15 years ; From Farmed Animal Watch Newsletter Poultry Welfare: Euthanasia and Effects of Lighting, Overcrowding, and Food & many more articles ; Bangalore - McDonald's goes 'vegan'; INTERNATIONAL ANIMAL RIGHTS GATHERING 2006 (UK) ; UN report warns of overuse of water ; The supersizing of America's livestock farms: For cheaper grocery prices, are we risking our health, the environment and squeezing out small farmers?; Action petition - Save South African Primates!;UPC FORUM PROGRAM AND PRESENTATIONS March 22, 2006 ;Bullfighting for teenage kicks in Spain ; Harrods Court Case update UK ; Thanks to Contributors; to unsubscribe ; Disclaimer. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Quotes: "An animal experiment cannot be justifiable unless the experiment is so important that the use of a brain-damaged human would be justifiable." ~` Peter Singer "War will only be stopped when the conscience of mankind (sic) has become sufficiently elevated to recognize the undisputed supremacy of the Law of Love in all the walks of life. Some say this will never come to pass. I shall retain the faith till the end of my earthly existence that it shall come to pass. " - Mahatma Gandhi "All the arguments to prove man's superiority cannot shatter this hard fact: in suffering the animals are our equals." Peter Singer "[The introduction includes a quote from Alice Walker that says animals] were not made for humans any more than black people were made for whites. ... can only be compared with that which resulted from the centuries of tyranny by white humans over black humans.” Peter Singer V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Browse at own risk - Animals Voice image gallery. Over 5000 + images of Animals being used for everything. http://www.atourhands.com/archive_index.html V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N **** National Day of Action Saturday (AU) Sat 25 Mar 2006 ****** From AAQ & ALQ Call for Ban of all live animal exports Join us in Brisbane (Qld AU) : this Saturday Morning for a peaceful action against live exports. Time: 10:30 am Location: Bottom of the King George sq steps, Adelaide st, Brisbane. Clothing: black Contact: Karen Nilsen, 0401928188 This Saturday, March 25th: “National Day of Action” (Australia) against Live Animal Exports Hello Members and Supporters An Australian national day of action is planned for Saturday March 25 to help end live export. This day of action involves many animal rights/welfare groups and will not only show the great support Animals Australia and their work has in the community, it will also tell the Federal Government that we really do want this trade stopped NOW! This is a chance for everyone to participate in the ending of this barbaric trade. So please come along and help out. If you can't be there on the day but would still like to help out, why not download your own petition from Animals Australia on http://www.animalsaustralia.org/ref_docs/Petition%20-%20End%20Live%20Export.pdf and place it in your workplace, every signature counts. Thanks Annette >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Confined on suffocating ships, in soaring temperatures, with tens of thousands of terrified strangers, all will suffer greatly. Many will die on the voyage. The strongest will survive, only to be met with further torture and deprivation, to be followed by a barbaric death, while fully conscious... This nightmare is a reality for millions of Australian animals. For a few dollars, they are abandoned to Middle Eastern countries with no animal welfare standards. This disgrace is Australia's live export trade. It is morally corrupt, totally unnecessary, and you can help to end it. ---------- Please lend your support in the coming days to help send a strong message to the Australian Government that an educated public will not tolerate barbaric cruelty and suffering in the name of profits. There is no better time than now, and there are many things you as an individual can do to support these animals: Join us in Brisbane: this Saturday Morning for a peaceful action against live exports. Time: 10:30 am Location: Bottom of the King George sq steps, Adelaide st, Brisbane. Clothing: black Contact: Karen Nilsen, 0401928188 Join in solidarity with many individuals who have stood up to live export cruelty in our town. This official event will also be attended by 'live export escapees' — costumed cows and street theatre. We will have an information table with video CD-Roms, stickers, posters, leaflets and petitions. We need supporters to collect petition signatures, hold posters and banners, distribute leaflets, or just show up to boost our numbers. Clipboards & all other materials will be provided. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Why I don’t wear wool: Take a hard look at how sheep are treated down under by Amy Elizabeth published March 21, 2006 6:00 am http://citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060321/OPINION03/60320039/1123 for more www.savethesheep.com V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Please write to the editor and give your opinion on factory farming. to find out more : www.factoryfarming.com www.savebabe.com Factory farming: A moraI issue http://www.mndaily.com/articles/2006/03/21/67620 March 22, 2006 by Peter Singer is a philosopher and professor of bioethics at Princeton University and laureate professor at the University of Melbourne. Please send comments to letters@mndaily.com. For low meat prices, the animals, the environment and rural neighborhoods pay steeply. There is a growing consensus that factory farming of animals — also known as CAFOs, or concentrated animal feeding operations — is morally wrong. The American animal rights movement, which in its early years focused largely on the use of animals in research, now has come to see that factory farming represents by far the greater abuse of animals. The numbers speak for themselves. In the United States somewhere between 20 million and 40 million birds and mammals are killed for research every year. That might seem like a lot — and it far exceeds the number of animals killed for their fur, let alone the relatively tiny number used in circuses — but 40 million represents less than two days’ toll in America’s slaughterhouses, which kill about 10 billion animals each year. The overwhelming majority of these animals have spent their entire lives confined inside sheds, never going outdoors for a single hour. Their suffering isn’t just for a few hours or days, but for all their lives. Sows and veal calves are confined in crates too narrow for them even to turn around, let alone walk a few steps. Egg-laying hens are unable to stretch their wings because their cages are too small and too crowded. With nothing to do all day, they become frustrated and attack each other. To prevent losses, producers sear off their beaks with a hot knife, cutting through sensitive nerves. Chickens, reared in sheds that hold 20,000 birds, now are bred to grow so fast that most of them develop leg problems because their immature bones cannot bear the weight of their bodies. Professor John Webster of the University of Bristol’s School of Veterinary Science said: “Broilers are the only livestock that are in chronic pain for the last 20 percent of their lives. They don’t move around, not because they are overstocked, but because it hurts their joints so much.” Sometimes their legs collapse under them, causing them to starve to death because they cannot reach their food. Of course, the producers then cannot sell these birds, but economically, they are still better off with the freakishly fast-growing breeds they use. As an article in an industry journal noted, “simple calculations” lead to the conclusion that often “it is better to get the weight and ignore the mortality.” Another consequence of the genetics of these birds is that the breeding birds — the parents of the ones sold in supermarkets — constantly are hungry, because, unlike their offspring that are slaughtered at just 45 days old, they have to live long enough to reach sexual maturity. If fed as much as they are programmed to eat, they soon would be grotesquely obese and die or be unable to ma52te. So they are kept on strict rations that leave them always looking in vain for food. Opposition to factory farming, once associated mostly with animal rights activists, now is shared by many conservatives, among them Matthew Scully, a former speech writer in President George W. Bush’s White House and the author of “Dominion: The Power of Man, The Suffering of Animals, and the Call to Mercy.” In Scully’s view, even though God has given us “dominion” over the animals, we should exercise that dominion with mercy — and factory farming fails to do so. Scully’s writings have found support from other conservatives, like Pat Buchanan, editor of The American Conservative, which gave cover-story prominence to Scully’s essay “Fear Factories: The Case for Compassionate Conservatism — for Animals,” and George F. Will, who used his Newsweek column to recommend Scully’s book. No less a religious authority than Pope Benedict XVI has stated that human “dominion” over animals does not justify factory farming. While head of the Roman Catholic Church’s Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the future pope condemned the “industrial use of creatures, so that geese are fed in such a way as to produce as large a liver as possible, or hens live so packed together that they become just caricatures of birds.” This “degrading of living creatures to a commodity” seemed to him “to contradict the relationship of mutuality that comes across in the Bible.” Some people think that factory farming is necessary to feed the growing population of our planet. The truth, however, is the opposite. No matter how efficient intensive pork, beef, chicken, egg and milk production becomes, in the narrow sense of producing more meat, eggs or milk for each pound of grain we feed the animals, raising animals on grain remains wasteful. Far from increasing the total amount of food available for human consumption, it reduces it. A concentrated animal feeding operation is, as the name implies, an operation in which we concentrate the animals and feed them. Unlike cattle or sheep on pasture, they don’t feed themselves. There lies the fundamental environmental flaw: Every CAFO relies on cropland, on which the food the animals eat is grown. Because the animals, even when confined, use much of the nutritional value of their food to move, keep warm and form bone and other inedible parts of their bodies, the entire operation is an inefficient way of feeding humans. It places greater demands on the environment in terms of land, energy and water than other forms of farming. It would be more efficient to use the cropland to grow food for humans to eat. Factory farming, overwhelmingly dominated by huge corporations like Tyson, Smithfield, ConAgra and Seaboard, has contributed to rural depopulation and the decline of the family farm. It has nothing going for it except that it produces food that is, at the point of sale, cheap. But for that low price, the animals, the environment and rural neighborhoods have to pay steeply. Fortunately there are alternatives, including eating a vegan diet, or buying animal products only from producers who allow their animals to go outside and live a minimally decent life. It is time for a shift in our values. While our society focuses on issues like gay marriage and the use of embryos for research, we are overlooking one of the big moral issues of our day. We should see the purchase and consumption of factory-farm products, whether by an individual or by an institution like a university, as a violation of the most basic ethical standards of how we should treat animals and the environment. I will be speaking at 7 p.m. Thursday at Ted Mann Concert Hall. Peter Singer is a philosopher and professor of bioethics at Princeton University and laureate professor at the University of Melbourne. Please send comments to letters@mndaily.com. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Arizona citizens mobilize to defeat factory farm control http://www.motherjones.com/mojoblog/archives/2006/03/arizona_citizen.html Arizona is a major factory-farming state. At some hog-breeding farms, gestation crates http://www.farmsanctuary.org/campaign/gestation_evidence.htm are used. These two-foot wide crates keep the hogs confined to a tiny space their entire lives, much the same as hen battery cages http://www.freefarmanimals.org/ and veal crates. http://www.freefarmanimals.org/vc_intro.htm To read full article http://www.motherjones.com/mojoblog/archives/2006/03/arizona_citizen.html V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Current In Defense of Animals Action Alerts Support Bill to Ban Blood Sport that Kills Rabbits http://ga0.org/campaign/BanOpenFieldCoursing2/ Urge Medical Schools to Drop Live Dog Labs http://ga0.org/campaign/DropLiveDogLabs/ Urge Governor Murkowski to Stop Aerial Shooting of Wolves http://ga0.org/campaign/StopAerialHuntingNow_2/ Urge Secretary of the Interior to Stop Aerial Shooting of Wolves http://ga0.org/campaign/StopAerialHuntingNow/ Urge Canadian Prime Minister to End Seal Slaughter http://ga0.org/campaign/SealMassacre/ Stop the Slaughter of Yellowstone's Wild Bison http://ga0.org/campaign/YellowstoneBison/ Help Stop the Slaughter of Point Reyes Exotic Deer http://ga0.org/campaign/pointreyespetition/ Protect the Public from Chronic Wasting Disease http://ga0.org/campaign/CWD/ Stop Breeders from Selling Unweaned Baby Birds http://ga0.org/campaign/UnweanedBabyBirdBill/ Urge Secretary of the Interior to Stop Aerial Shooting of Wolves http://ga0.org/campaign/StopAerialHunting/ Stop Idaho's Plans to Kill 50 Wolves http://ga0.org/campaign/IdahoWolves/ Urge the National Zoo to Re-Examine Elephant Exhibit Expansion Plan http://ga0.org/campaign/NationalZooElephants/ Support the Ban on U.S. Horse Slaughter http://ga0.org/campaign/HorseSlaughterBan/ Urge SF Supervisors to Protect Landmark Trees http://ga0.org/campaign/SFLandmarkTrees/ Tell USDA Officials to Regulate Interstate Trucking of Animals http://ga0.org/campaign/FarmedAnimalTransport/ Help End Abuse of Apes by the Entertainment Industry http://ga0.org/campaign/NoReelApes/ Truth in Fur Labeling Act Can Save Cats and Dogs Urge Your Representative to Support Animal and Consumer Protection Bill http://ga0.org/indefenseofanimals/notice-description.tcl?newsletter_id=4148073 Every year in China, millions of cats and dogs are killed for their fur which is then exported to countries around the world, including the U.S. While it is strictly illegal to sell cat and dog fur in America, there is a loophole that makes the law almost impossible to enforce. That is, clothing stores are allowed to sell fur garments without specifying whether the fur is real or synthetic, the species of animal the fur comes from or the country where the garments were made as long as the fur's value is $150 or less. This means that as many as 500,000 or one in seven fur garments sold in the U.S. lack labels specifying this important information. This leaves most American consumers unaware that their clothing could contain dog and cat fur, but most would be disgusted and outraged if they knew. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Toll Free poll on animal Cruelty laws (AU) Yesterday Adelaide Advertiser featured a story on page 32 about the rise in animal cruelty reports and cases before the courts this year. They are running a poll asking whether penalties for Animal Cruelty should be increased: The number is still running this morning (Friday) so please if you can make a phone call to the yes line. To VOTE YES call 1900 966 330 You don't have to say anything and it's toll free. Please do it asap as these polls don't stay open long. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Action Alerts Tell Wal-Mart that Palm Oil Kills Orangutans http://takeaction.cspinet.org/campaign/WalMartPalmOilKills?rk=V7acJj51%5fzEME Support The Truth in Fur Labeling Act http://ga0.org/campaign/HR4904 Poll please vote - Please vote YES, and distribute far and wide. Should Canadian officials yield to celebrity and world pressure and stop the seal hunt? www.ctv.ca <http://www.ctv.ca/> V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Jamie Oliver encouraging squirrel-eating http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4835690.stm V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Animals Voice Newsletter http://www.animalsvoice.com/PAGES/home.html ACTION ALERTS... ITEMS OF INTEREST... Law Schools Offering Animal Law Courses SHAC 7 Updates More... SOME UPCOMING EVENTS... email us to add your events March 24-26 International Primate Protection League Conference, Summerville SC March 25 Farm Animal Forum San Francisco April 8 — 9 United Poultry Concerns 6th Annual Forum Columbus OH More events... THIS WEEK'S FEATURE — TIGERS Information Links Helping Tigers Worldwide The Roar Foundation, Shambala Preserve Releasing Captive Tigers Related Headlines Bird flu may prove big threat to biological diversity Big Cats at risk of bird flu Tigers a hit at Cherry Blossom Festival Five Tiger deaths in Uttaranchal in two months Protecting endangered species helps reduce poverty A GLIMPSE AT ANIMALS IN MAINSTREAM MEDIA ANIMALS AS FOOD Kansas company will sue government to test for mad Cow Cheap food has environmental cost More... ANIMAL EXPERIMENTATION Colgate to buy majority stake in Tom's of Maine L’Oreal’s Body Shop acquisition meets with mixed reaction More... ANIMALS USED FOR SPORTS AND ENTERTAINMENT Bullfighting for Teenage kicks in Spain Animal rights groups decry Bear wrestling More... ANIMALS AS COMMODITIES All paws for the Judge Seal Hunt Quota: Politics triumphs over science More... COMPANION ANIMALS Loving Pets are a blessing that deserve caring City Kitty sweep angers Activists More... LEGAL ISSUES Cat killer sentenced to two years Jail for Man who stamped Puppy to death in rage More... LEGISLATIVE ISSUES Fort Lauderdale votes to restrict tying up of Animals in yards State considers mandatory training for Animal control Officers More... MEDIA COMMENTARY & FEATURES American consumers abuse Animals Factory farming: A moral issue More... NOTEWORTHY Scotland's endangered wildlife: the good, the bad and the ugly Animal Welfare Law in China: Are we there yet? More... RESCUE & REHABILITATION Wounded Lab finds love Group to care for Animals surviving future disasters More... WILDLIFE ISSUES Cruelty of a few sealed tormented Cliff's fate Park captures 300 more Bison More... VICTORIES & OTHER GOOD NEWS Penelope Cruz insists no Animals were harmed on set of 'Manolete' Harshest sentence in state hisory given in Animal cruelty case More... V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N A COK Update: “45 Days” Broiler Chicken Documentary at the Tiburon International Film Festival Our eye-opening documentary, 45 Days: The Life and Death of a Broiler Chicken, has been accepted into the Tiburon International Film Festival http://www.tiburonfilmfestival.com/filmInfo.php?film_id=2502 in California! This 12-minute film, which features COK’s undercover footage from chicken factory farms and slaughterhouses, will be shown on Friday, March 10. View clips or watch the full documentary online. http://www.chickenindustry.com/cfi/videogallery/ V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N ABC MP wants action to stop animal deaths (AU) A Western Australian Liberal MP wants the state Environment Minister to do something about wild animals on former pastoral stations suffering inhumane deaths. The Department of Conservation and Land Management (CALM) has been buying stations in the Murchison region of mid west WA to reintroduce native fauna to the area. The initiative involves cutting off man-made water sources and in some instances wild horses and other animals have died of dehydration. The horses are the same breed used by light-horsemen during World War I and 14 have so far been rescued by the WA Outback Heritage Horse Association. They are now living on properties in WA's south-west. The Liberal Member for the state seat of Moore, Gary Snook, says the Environment Minister should take a greater interest in the issue. "Those horses carried us to war, they carried us to water, they carried us to safety and I just think that what the Outback Heritage Horse Association is doing is a marvellous act of national spirit that we need to really sit up and take notice of," he said. Environment Minister Mark McGowan has not returned the ABC's calls. CALM says the dams have been closed off gradually over seven years and it has a suitable shooting program for feral animals and animals which are in distress. It says it does its best to avoid any animals having to suffer a slow death. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N From UPC: Poultry Industry Experimenters Promote Fire-Fighting Foam as a “Humane” Method of Mass Extermination of Chickens Used in Meat Production, Calling It a Form of “Euthanasia” Excerpt: "The term “euthanasia,” meaning a merciful death, has become a standard synonym in the animal production industries for killing animals by any means regardless of how cruel. The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) has facilitated misuse and degradation of the term euthanasia. When the word appears in agribusiness and experimental research discourse, it’s likely to be a cover for the infliction of a horrible death on animals, as in the case below. – UPC Editor " Another Excerpt: " “An experimental method for emergency euthanasia of infected poultry is being developed using fire fighting foam. This method covers birds in a protective blanket of high expansion foam enriched with carbon dioxide. In three experimental trials, the method has been shown to provide effective euthanasia. The foam with varying concentrations of carbon dioxide was directly compared to a currently used industry technique of overlapping layers of polyethylene to cover birds and gassing with carbon dioxide. The foam and polyethylene methods resulted in euthanasia in less than three minutes. . . . On-going research is designed to evaluate the humane aspects of this procedure and develop the equipment for commercial application. Additional technical details of this patent-pending process will be reported in subsequent presentations.” To read full report http://www.upc-online.org/poultry_diseases/31506foam.html V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N In the Turkey Breeding Factory http://www.upc-online.org/fall94/breeding.html By Frank Observer A friend heard an advertisement on the local radio about the Butterball Turkey Company needing workers in artificial insemination, called "AI" for short. So I went to the personnel office across the street from the turkey killing plant in this small midwestern town. Latinos, Asians and poor whites filled the waiting room. Everybody wore rubber boots and big, puffy white hairnets--both men and women. "Bob," the AI boss, explained that the modern turkey business is about the "most high-technical" of all the animal operations. "The turkey is a creation of modern science and industry," he said. "It's been out of the wild only about 1OO years, the last animal to be domesticated. Because of that wildness, it tends to go 'broody,' which means it lays a few eggs once a year and quits. We have to trick it into laying all the time." Bob told me that the company's birds are much bigger and more clumsy than the original turkey--so much so that they can't breed by themselves anymore. So the company has to use AI to produce the fertile eggs that hatch the chicks that then go into "grow-out" houses and grow up to be slaughtered and processed. The Butterball Turkey Company is a division of ConAgra Turkey Co., a division of ConAgra Poultry Co., a division of ConAgra, Inc. of Omaha, NE--the agribusiness conglomerate. They hired me. I reported for work at 4:45 AM. I was told to go with "Joe" and his crew. Joe grunted at me, then barked, "follow me in your car." Down a gravel road, the lights of a turkey building glowed ahead. We parked. Joe handed me a dust mask and grunted something. When I didn't move, he yelled, "Get ahold of this and help me take it in." It was the insemination machine, about the size of a TV set. As we walked toward the building, a worker came out and pitched two dead birds out the door. Inside the building, I saw a sea of white hens. (3,OOO I was told later.) The flock was divided in half by a double row of metal "nests" down the middle of the building. From these nests, a row of conveyer belts carried eggs. Joe did not explain the work to come, nor did he introduce me to the other crew members--all silent, surly-looking white men in their 2Os. They set up the AI machine quickly and went to work. Two men herded birds--a hundred or so at a time--into a makeshift pen along one side of the house. From there, these "drivers" forced 5-6 birds at a time into a chute, which opened onto a 5 X 5-foot concrete-lined pit sunken into the floor of the house. Three men worked belly-deep in the pit: Two grabbed birds from the chute and held them for the third, Joe, the inseminator. They put me to work first in the pit, grabbing and "breaking" hens. One "breaks" a hen by holding her breast down, legs down, tail up so that her cloaca or "vent" opens. This makes it easier for the inseminator to insert the tub and deliver a "shot" of semen. "Breaking" hens was hard, fast, dirty work. I had to reach into the chute, grab a hen by the legs, and hold her--ankles crossed--in one hand. Then, as I held her on the edge of the pit, I wiped my other hand over her rear, which pushed up her tail feathers and exposed her vent opening. The birds weighed 20 to 30 lbs., were terrified, and beat their wings and struggled in panic. They were very strong and hard to hold. With the hen thus "broken," the inseminator stuck his thumb right under her vent and pushed, which opened the vent and forced the end of the oviduct a bit. Into this, he inserted the semen tube and released the semen. Then both men let go and the hen flopped away onto the house floor. The insemination machine's job was to put a calibrated amount of semen into small, plastic "straws" for the inseminator. Each straw was about the size of a drinking straw 3-4 inches long. The machine drew semen from a 6 cc. syringe and loaded the straws one at a time. With the tip of a rubber hose, the inseminator took a straw, inserted it in the hen, and gave her a "shot." Routinely, rhythmically, like a well-oiled machine, the breakers and the inseminator did this over and over, bird by bird, until all birds in the house had run through this gauntlet. The semen came from the "tom house" where the males are housed. Here "Bill" extracted the semen bird by bird. He worked on a bench which has a vacuum pump and a rubber-padded clamp to hold the tom by the legs. From the vacuum pump, a small rubber hose ran to a "handset." With it, Bill "milked" each tom. The handset was fitted with glass tubes and a syringe body; it sucked semen from the tom and poured it into a syringe body. I helped Bill for a while. My job was to catch a tom by the legs, hold him upside down, lift him by the legs and one wing, and set him up on the bench on his chest/neck, with his rear-end sticking up facing Bill. He took each tom, locked his crossed feet and legs into the padded clamp, then lifted his leg over the bird's head and neck to hold him. Bill had the handset on his right hand. With his left hand, he squeezed the tom's vent until it opened up and the white semen oozed forth. He held the sucking end of a glass tube just below the opening and sucked up the few drops of semen. It looked like half & half cream, white and thick. We did this over and over, bird by bird, until the syringe body filled up. Each syringe body was already loaded with a couple of cubic centimeters of "extender," a watery, bluish mixture of antibiotics and saline solution. As each syringe was filled, I ran it over to the hen house and handed it to the inseminator and crew. Each tom house contained about 400 males, 20 to a pen. The toms are milked once or twice a week until they are about 64 weeks old (16 mo.), by which time they can weigh up to 80 lbs. The hens are inseminated usually once, sometimes twice a week, for about a year. When these breeding birds reach the end of their cycle, they are killed and turned into lunch meat, pot pies, and pet food. The insemination crew did 2 houses a day--6000 hens a day. Figuring a 10-hour day, that's 600 hens per hour, ten a minute. Two breakers did 10 hens a minute, or each breaker "broke" 5 hens a minute--one hen every 12 seconds. This pace pressured the drivers to keep a steady flow of birds into the chute to supply the pit. Having been through this week after week, the birds feared the chute and bulked and huddled up. The drivers literally kicked them into the chute. The idea seemed to be to terrify at least one bird, who squawked, beat her wings in panic, and terrified the others in her group. In this way the drivers created such pain and terror behind the birds that it forced them to plunge ahead to the pain and terror they knew to be in the chute and pit ahead. The crews worked at this pace from 5 AM until 2 PM, when I left. They had 2 more hours of work to finish off the second hen house. That's 11 hours at a stretch with no formal breaks. No morning breakfast, no lunch hour. The only breaks came by chance, when a machine malfunctioned or when the semen syringes were slow to come. At about 12 or 1, the bad-tempered Joe got suddenly generous after yelling and barking orders all day, and bought everyone a "sody." He was not our buddy, but our paternalistic leader. We got to sit outside among the swarms of flies buzzing over a pile of dead birds and drink cokes for 10 to 15 minutes while Joe and another guy ran an errand. I asked the least belligerent co-worker about the workload and the pace, the no-breaks routine. He told me that the crews are given 30 minutes off for lunch, but that his crew (under Big Bad Joe) worked through this lunch break in order to get paid for the time. These guys worked at this pace 10 to 12 hours straight without a break or a bite to eat just to get another $3 on their paycheck. I put up with this for a day because I thought I might learn lots of secret stuff from the crews. Fat chance. Nobody talked. Nobody talked about anything. The few times I tried to make conversation, all I got was surly, glowering looks and a grunt or two. I have never done such hard, fast, dirty, disgusting work in my life. Ten hours of pushing birds, grabbing birds, wrestling birds, jerking them upside down, pushing open their vents, dodging their panic-blown excrement, breathing the dust stirred up by terrified birds, ignoring verbal abuse from Joe and the others on the crew--all of this without a break or a bite to eat (not that I could have eaten anything amongst all this). Working under these conditions week after week (Bill had been there for 4 years), these men had grown callous, rough, and brutal. Every bird went through their merciless hands at least once a week, week after week, until they were loaded up to be killed. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N LET'S HELP KEI OUT ON HER BIRTHDAY! Kei is a 13 year old female North American Eastern Timber Wolf who has lived virtually her entire life on a 7 x 4 meter concrete slab in almost total isolation from others of her species at the Okinawa City Kodomo no Kuni Zoo in Okinawa, Japan. There, she is routinely barked and howled at and spends most of her time pacing in the hot sub-tropical climate of Okinawa. ============================================== Easy and quick Action YOU Can Take: April 4 is Kei`s birthday. She will be turning 14 years old. Please send a card to Kei to show the zoo that the world is watching them and still caring about her. It usually takes about 7 days for an international letter to arrive to Okinawa, so there is still more than enough time. If cards are a little late, that is ok as well. Address the envelope as: Yoshinobu Higa, Executive Administrator, or Genwa Higa, Zoo Director, Okinawa Kodomo no Kuni Address: 5-7-1 Goya Okinawa-shi Okinawa City, Okinawa Pref., Japan Be sure that the card is clearly addressed to Kei inside the envelope. It is best to not put Kei`s name on the outside of the envelope for they may be tempted to lay it in a pile set aside specifically for her incoming mail. Addressing it to either of the two men above will insure that time is spent routing it to them and them opening it. Demand that Kei be released to sanctuary. If you can't send a card, email here: info@kodomo.city.okinawa.okinawa.jp Until she is released to sanctuary, these things should be done to improve her enclosure: 1. Provide wood-chips. 2. Take down the plexi-glass panels that surround her bars that prevent a fresh breeze from blowing through her enclosure. 3. Groom her. 4. Make sure she is de-ticked and provided with tick powder to repell ticks and fleas. 5. Leash her and walk her outside her enclosure prior to the park opening and after the park closes each day to provide exercise for her and mental stimulation. More info: www.keithewolf.com V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N From Farmed Animal Watch Newsletter Poultry Welfare: Euthanasia and Effects of Lighting, Overcrowding, and Food In February 2006, Farmed Animal Watch reported on the use of carbon dioxide (CO2)-based firefighting foam to mass slaughter flocks of poultry infected with disease. (See FAW 6-8). An abstract published by the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers says that "preliminary results indicate that the fire fighting foam is as or more effective and humane than conventional CO2 polyethylene bagging." The "conventional" method referred to involves layering sheets of plastic over the birds and gassing them with CO2, but the process is sometimes difficult to implement and requires many people. According to the researchers, "The foam and polyethylene methods resulted in euthanasia in less than three minutes (CO2 polyethylene 2:08 minutes, foam with CO2 2:09 minutes, foam without CO2 2:54 minute)." The new process (patent pending) was shared at the annual conference of the US-based Poultry Science Association in August 2005 along with other research papers related to poultry welfare. Abstracts of the presentations are available by following the first link below; we have summarized several of the most interesting presentations in the following paragraphs. Light and Intensity: Researchers from Auburn University studied 12 groups of male and female "broiler" chickens to measure growth and stress levels relative to long or short "daylengths" and bright or dim environments. The study showed that bodyweight decreased as daylength and light intensity decrease. Food consumption also decreased for the shorter daylengths and dimmer environments; "consumption was 0.16 lb/bird less in the short-dim treatment than the long-bright treatment." The researchers also attempted to calculate impact on the birds' stress by measuring heterophil/lymphocyte (H/L) ratios at day 40 of the experiment. According to the abstract," H/L ratios averaged 0.45 and were not affected by treatments... Daylength and intensity differences tested did not affect stress levels." Effects of Overcrowding: Scientists at Mississippi State University studied the "live performance and processing yields" of male chickens raised in four different levels of crowding. The different "stocking densities" included 25, 30, 35, and 40 kilograms of bodyweight per square meter, with 75-120 chickens housed in each 5.5 square meter pen. Lighting was also varied and studied for effect. According to the abstract, "From 1 to 35 d(ays), bodyweight gain, feed consumption, and feed conversion were adversely affected with increasing stocking densities." The researchers noted more foot pad lesions and lower bodyweight for birds subjected to increased crowding. They concluded that "increasing stocking density beyond 30 kg BW/m2 adversely affects growth responses and meat yield of broilers grown to 1.8 kg." Another study of overcrowding effects on "broiler" chickens and related social factors was presented by researchers from the University of Maryland. They used groups of 30 or 60 birds and computer modeling to determine chickens' use of spatial availability, impact on aggression, etc., under varying conditions. The researchers concluded that "the analysis of core areas suggest that birds at higher densities use a wider range of space, possibly as result of the presence of other birds in their path of movement." However, they say that social factors associated with increased "stocking density" do not impact the birds' movement or use of space. Feeding and Overcrowding: Also from the University of Maryland, researchers presented results from a study measuring the impact on food consumption when non-edible filler material is added. The study was based on three different food ratios including 25%, 50%, or 75% filler material and found that the ratio has a significant impact on chickens' feeding responses. The researchers also found that time spent eating decreased with increased group size. They concluded that "despite generations of intense artificial genetic selection for heightened performance, broilers are immediately able to distinguish feeder quality based upon the effort required to obtain a food reward." They also noted that chickens adjust their strategies according to food quality and the "number of competitors present." 1. "Abstracts of Papers," Poultry Science Association Annual Meeting, August 2005 PDF (82k): http://www.poultryscience.org/psa05/abstracts/psabs60.pdf 2. Also see: "Evaluating the Use of Fire Fighting Foam in Mass Poultry Euthanasia," American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers, 3/6/06 http://asae.frymulti.com/abstract.asp?aid=19470 2. Environmental News: U.S. Conservation Subsidies; Global Methane Emissions Conservation Subsidies: The US Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service (ERS) has released a five-part series of "economic briefs" describing government payments and subsidies to farmers. The series details differences between "commodity payments" designed to increase farmer income levels, and "conservation payments" intended to reduce environmental degradation. The first brief in the series says that "nearly all crop and livestock producers are eligible for at least one conservation program." More specifically: "About 40% of US farms, representing 60% of all agricultural production, receive some type of government payment. Of the 40% of farms that do receive some type of government payment, only 15% - about 6% of all farms - receive both commodity and conservation payments... However, less than half of current conservation payments (43%) go to farms that also receive commodity payments... Farms receiving commodity payments encompass about 75% of agricultural land and account for 55% of crop production and 45% of livestock production." The primary funding for farmed animal operations is the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), for which 60% of all funding must be paid to animal farmers. Greenhouse Gases: A new report from the Switzerland-based World Meteorological Organization (WMO) says that all primary "greenhouse gases" responsible for ozone depletion have "reached new highs." The gases include carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and methane (CH4), with farming cited as a leading cause of methane pollution. WMO reports that the "mixing ratio" for methane was measured at 1,783 parts per billion in 2004, which is 155% higher than "pre-industrial times." Methane is said to contribute an estimated 20% of the "direct radiating forcing" caused by greenhouse gases attributed to human activities. About 60% of all methane production is caused by humans, with the primary sources listed as "fossil fuel exploitation, rice agriculture, ruminant animals, biomass burning, and landfills." 1. Series of Economic Briefs (Five Parts), USDA / ERS, 3/14/06 - Greening Income Support and Supporting Green: http://ers.usda.gov/Publications/EB1/ - Better Targeting, Better Outcomes: http://ers.usda.gov/Publications/EB2/ - Participant Bidding Enhances Cost Effectiveness: http://ers.usda.gov/Publications/EB3/ - Contrasting Working-Land and Land Retirement Programs: http://ers.usda.gov/Publications/EB4/ - Rewarding Farm Practices Versus Environmental Performance: http://ers.usda.gov/Publications/EB5/ 2. "Greenhouse Gas Bulletin," World Meteorological Organization, 3/14/06 PDF file (3.9 MB): http://www.wmo.int/web/arep/gaw/ghg/ghg-bulletin-en-03-06.pdf 3. New BSE Discovery in U.S. Reignites Debates about Testing and "Downer" Cows US agriculture officials on March 13 confirmed the country's second native case of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) after testing the corpse of an Alabama cow. While still alive, the cow was described by veterinarians as "non-ambulatory," also known as a "downer" cow who is too sick or injured to stand under her or his own power. The discovery resulted in a chorus of complaints from government officials as well as animal and consumer advocates calling for increased BSE tests and a permanent ban on non-ambulatory animals entering the human food supply. Representative Ackerman (D-NY) said, "For the sake of the health and safety of the American people as well as for humane reasons, it should be absolutely obvious to the bureaucrats and lawmakers that there is no way that any downer should be allowed to enter the food chain and that these animals must be humanely euthanized, rather than eaten." The discovery comes amidst an announcement from the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) that it may reduce the number of BSE tests conducted in 2006 and 2007. The USDA has conducted an estimated 650,000 tests as part of an "enhanced testing program" during the past two years, and the program remains in place. However, the USDA hinted at the program's "conclusion" during a telephone news conference discussing the new BSE case. The advocacy group Consumers Union says that the US fiscal 2007 budget includes sufficient funds to test only 40,000 cows for BSE, representing only 0.1% of the 35 million cows slaughtered annually in the country. In response to the newest discovery, some government officials are also calling for a mandatory national animal identification system and, separately, a ban on feeding poultry litter to ruminant animals. 1. "BSE Case Draws Criticism of USDA, FDA," Meatingplace.com, 3/16/06 http://www.meatingplace.com/MembersOnly/webNews/details.aspx?item=15668 (Registration) 2. "Consumer Groups Urge US Not to Cut Mad Cow Tests," Reuters, 3/14/06 http://tinyurl.com/mzbkh (reuters.com) 3. "Farm Sanctuary Renews Call for No Downer Policy amid Discovery of Mad Cow Disease," E-wire / Farm Sanctuary, 3/15/06 http://www.ewire.com/display.cfm/Wire_ID/3026 4. Farmed Animal Statistics: Poultry Data from U.S. Department of Agriculture The following are poultry-related excerpts from the US Department of Agriculture's "Livestock, Dairy, and Poultry Outlook" (March 2006); see link to full document below for details. "Broiler" Chickens: "Broiler meat production for January 2006 was reported at 3.0 billion pounds, up 5.7% from last year. The increase in meat production was a result of both a higher number of broilers being slaughtered (up 3.4%) and higher average weights (up 2.4% to 5.5 pounds). "With the production increase in January and an expected comparable increase in February, the estimated meat production for first-quarter 2006 was increased to 8.9 million pounds, a 3.6% increase from a year earlier. "However, weekly chick placements for growout over the last 5 weeks (February 4 to March 4) averaged 174 million birds, fractionally below same period in 2005, indicating that producers have begun to slow production growth in response to lower prices. "Even with slightly lower bird numbers, meat production is expected to increase in the second quarter due to higher average weights at slaughter. The overall broiler meat production estimate for 2006 is now 36.2 billion pounds, up 2.3% from 2005." Hens' Eggs: "Total egg production in 2005 was a record high of 7,504 million dozen, compared with 7,440 million dozen in 2004, or a growth of just under 1%. In 2006, total egg production is expected to increase by more than 2%, to set a record high of about 7,645 million dozen, reflecting the building of the laying flocks in the second-half 2005. "U.S. exports of total shell eggs and products (in shell egg equivalent) rose from 167.6 million dozens in 2004 to 205.9 million dozen in 2005, or nearly 2%. This is the highest export level since 1998, when exports were 219 million dozen." Turkeys: "Turkey meat production in 2006 is forecast at 5.58 billion pounds, up 1% from 2005, but still lower than in 2002 or 2003. "The increase in meat production in 2006 is expected to come from a combination of a higher number of birds slaughtered and higher weights, although weights in the first quarter of 2006 are not expected to be significantly higher than in the first quarter of 2005. "During 2005, placements of turkey poults for growout totaled 276 million, slightly below 2004. However, in December 2005 and January 2006 placements were up significantly. "In January 2006, turkey meat production was 447 million pounds, down 1.8% from a year earlier as a 2% gain in average slaughter weight was offset by a 3.6% decline in the number of birds being slaughtered." "Livestock, Dairy, and Poultry Outlook," USDA / ERS, 3/17/06 PDF file (199k): http://www.ers.usda.gov/Publications/LDP/Mar06/LDPM141T.pdf 5. Other Items of Interest "Kill Off Most to Save Bison Herd, Researchers Say," National Post, 3/20/06 Canadian agriculture officials are considering a plan to slaughter 4,000 bison belonging to the world's largest free-roaming herd because of cross-infection from grazing cows. The proposed plan calls for a 10-year "depopulation" or killing of the entire bison herd, following by another 10 years of "repopulation" with healthy animals. Most of the herd is now infected with brucellosis and tuberculosis contracted from farmed cows grazing in the region, and supporters of the plan say the diseases could cost Canadian farmers $1 billion over 20 years. http://tinyurl.com/q2do3 (Canada.com) OPINION: "End the Rough Ride for Farm Animals," The Globe and Mail, 3/15/06 An editorial by directors of the Canadian Coalition for Farm Animals says "more than two million farm animals arrived dead at federally inspected slaughterhouses" in 2004 due to outdated transport laws. In Canada, they say, ruminant animals may be transported up to 52 hours without water or rest, while pigs may be transported up to 36 hours. The editorial notes that these regulations are far behind Europe, which currently requires much more frequent resting and watering breaks. http://tinyurl.com/qmn7m (theglobeandmail.com) OPINION: "Factory Farming: A Moral Issue," Minnesota Daily, 3/22/06 Philosopher, professor, and author Peter Singer describes growing sentiment against "factory farms" from a broad segment of society beyond only animal protection advocates. Increased visibility among conservatives and some religious officials (i.e., The Pope) has led some to question the humaneness and efficiency of concentrated animal farming. Singer writes, "(Factory farming) has nothing going for it except that it produces food that is, at the point of sale, cheap. But for that low price, the animals, the environment and rural neighborhoods have to pay steeply." http://www.mndaily.com/articles/2006/03/21/67620 End Farmed Animal Watch Newsletter. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Bangalore McDonald's goes 'vegan' http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/402200603212177.htm Bangalore, March. 21 (PTI): It may come as a surprise to many that McDonald's, the company known worldwide for its meat burgers and milkshakes, celebrated "Meatout", an annual affair by advocates of vegetarianism, at select outlets here and Thane by offering a "Vegan Meal" for two days this week. It was made possible thanks to the efforts of "vegan" advocates from Bangalore-based activist group DIYA (Do It Yourself Activists). "Vegan" is a lifestyle choice in which no animal products are consumed and no animals are harmed. Mcdonald's Vegan Meal promotion in the country consisted of a regular iced tea and medium fries which could be used to complete a meal of one of the many McDonald's India vegan dishes including "McVeggie McAloo Tikki" and "Cripsy Chinese", which comes on a bun and are also egg and milk tree, a People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) release said. PETA points out that chicken and fish "suffer incredibly" in meat production. "Health experts agree that going vegetarian is the single best thing we can do for ourselves and our families. The consumption of meat and diary products has been conclusively linked with heart disease, obesity, arthritis, osteoporosis, Alzheimer's, asthma and impotence," the release said. On average, vegetarians and vegans live six to 10 years longer than meat-eaters, the statement claimed. McDonald's India is not the only company to offer products labelled as "vegan" in India. Popular chain Cafe Coffee Day offers a "vegan shake" sans milk or other animal products. Lush India marks many of its soaps with a green "V" indicating they contain no animal-derived ingredients. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N From: < <mailto:arevents@lists.rbgi.net> arevents@lists.rbgi.net> To: < <mailto:arevents@lists.rbgi.net> arevents@lists.rbgi.net> Sent: Wednesday, March 22, 2006 8:27 PM Subject: [ARevents] INTERNATIONAL ANIMAL RIGHTS GATHERING 2006 INTERNATIONAL ANIMAL RIGHTS GATHERING 2006 From the Website; <http://www.ar2006.info> www.ar2006.info Welcome to AR 2006! This year's gathering is taking place between Friday 23rd and Monday 26th June in south-east England. Further details, directions and guidelines will be announced over the coming months, but please keep these dates free and start making travel plans now. Last year's event, AR2005, was a milestone in the history of the animal rights/liberation movement. Over 500 activists attended the four day gathering from at least 25 countries. There was a full program of workshops, speeches and lectures, great vegan food at low prices, as well as lots of entertainment and opportunities for socialising and networking. For a report see last year's gathering page. Activists went away from AR2005 inspired and informed, and throughout the world the movement has continued to grow and thrive. We expect even more activists from more countries to attend this year's event. This year's Timetable Although we can organise the site and the infrastructure, the Timetable will need input and ideas from you the activists. Whilst we will repeat some of the popular features of last year's gathering, and hope to improve some others, we are very keen to approach this year's gathering with a fresh and innovative outlook. We have some ideas ourselves but we need ideas from activists planning to attend. After all it is your gathering so let us know the things you want to see included, and how we can improve on recent years. Accommodation Accommodation on site will be camping. There will be a quiet area set aside for those who want to get an early night. If you don't like camping , please contact us and we will send you a list of Hotel and Bed & Breakfast accommodation in the area. Food Once again, three vegan meals will be provided on site every day for a reasonable sum, about £5. Volunteering During the gathering, there will be plenty of volunteering jobs for activists to help make the event a success. As well as contributing to the success of the gathering it's a great way of meeting new people and making new contacts. A list of volunteering tasks will be on the website soon. Arriving early or staying late As well as volunteering during the event, activists are very welcome to stay at the site for up to two weeks before the gathering in order to help prepare the site, erect the marquees etc. We will also be at the site for a few days afterwards to help clean and tidy up the site and take down the marquees, so you will be welcome to stay then too. (If you come to help before or after the gathering we will be able to provide food and accommodation, but you also need to be ready to do some work as there will be lots to do) Arriving Directions to the gathering will be announced in the next few weeks. The site will be about an hour by train from London. If you are intending to fly, you can take a flight to any of the London airports, (Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted or Luton). Last year we were able to meet almost all the activists at the airports and take them directly to the site, and we intend to do so again this year, so please give us as much advance notice as possible. It would help us to plan the event if we know many are turning up and from which countries, please let us know on <mailto:info@ar2006.info> info@ar2006.info. National Demo in Oxford Saturday July 1st The week following the gathering there is a national protest in Oxford against the building of a new animal research centre being planned by the Oxford University, so when planning your stay why not plan to stay a little longer for this important demo. We will be able to help with accommodation until after the Oxford Demo at least. Funds We are volunteer activists from various grass roots groups who are putting on this major event and bringing together activists from across the world. Our aim is to further the cause of animal liberation by fostering co-operation and contact between activists from as many different countries as possible. If you share our vision for this event, perhaps you or your group could help towards costs. Things like hiring of marquees, transport and video equipment don't come cheap. Maybe you could donate the proceeds of a street stall or other fundraising event. All donations, no matter how small would be welcome. Send cheques/POs payable to 'AR2006', BM Box 2636, London, WC1N 3XX. More information will be added to the website in the coming weeks and months, we look forward to seeing all our old friends and lots of new ones this Summer. If you want any more info, please get in touch <mailto:info@ar2006.info> info@ar2006.info. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N UN report warns of overuse of water http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2006/03/21/1142703331173.html March 21, 2006 - 12:09PM The overuse of water for farming is the biggest environmental threat to the world's freshwater resources and damage is likely to worsen until 2020, according to a new international report. The UN-led Global International Waters Assessment, a review compiled by 1,500 experts, also concluded overfishing was the main problem affecting the health of the oceans. A leading academic who helped draw up the report predicted more frequent conflicts over water in the future as supplies became scarcer. "Overall, agriculture ranks highest as the key concern on the freshwater front," the UN Environment Program said of the conclusions of the report, which also examined risks such as pollution and global warming until 2020. "Falls in river flows, rising saltiness of estuaries, loss of fish and aquatic plant species and reductions in sediments to the coast are expected to rise in many areas of the globe by 2020," it said of the side-effects of irrigation. "These will in turn intensify farmland losses, food insecurity and damage to fisheries along with rises in malnutrition and disease," it said. In many cases, problems could be solved by better planning, often simply by growing crops in regions where they did not demand vast irrigation. The report said that more dams and deeper wells were not the answer. Gotthilf Hempel, professor emeritus of biological oceanography at Germany's Kiel University and a leader of the study, said water shortages could spur more human conflicts in future. "The fight for water will be more dramatic than the fight for oil in the long run. For oil we have substitutes, for water we have none," he told Reuters. "Conflicts in parts of Africa between herdsmen and farmers have always partly been a fight for water," he said. "I think that we will see those conflicts more and more." The study was issued ahead of March 22 - the UN's annual World Water Day. The report said rising demand for fresh water was caused partly by demand for food from an increasing human population of 6.5 billion and a "shift to more water-intensive food such as meat rather than vegetables and fruit rather than cereals." "We are over-using our freshwater resources, particularly for irrigation in areas where a crop just cannot be produced in a reasonable way because evaporation is too high," Hempel said. He said that many farms in hot climates depended on little-understood aquifers holding water that had been in the ground for perhaps 10,000 years. "This is not a resource that can be replenished quickly," he said. The report said that overfishing of species ranging from cod to tuna was stripping the seas. Excessive catches were stoked by $US20 billion ($A27.8 billion) in annual fishing subsidies, poor enforcement of fishing laws and destructive practices like blast fishing with dynamite that can wreck coral reefs, it said. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N The supersizing of America's livestock farms: For cheaper grocery prices, are we risking our health, the environment and squeezing out small farmers? http://www.greenlink.org/public/hotissues/farm1.html by By Mike Wagner and Ben Sutherly, Dayton Daily News Link to the series at the Dayton Daily News SOUTH CHARLESTON (Dec. 1, 2002) - For three years, Ohio regulators didn't know what was going on inside the long white barns of the state’s largest cattle farm. They didn’t know the farm was storing uncovered piles of manure, stacked higher than a basketball hoop, on a cement slab outside. Or that rain was washing some of that waste into the nearby Little Miami, a national scenic river. They didn't know about Ohio Feedlot Inc. even though its 9,000 cattle generated about 131,000 tons of manure a year, almost double the amount produced by Dayton's 166,000 residents. They didn't know because the owner didn't tell them. Regulators didn't discover the long-closed Clark County feedlot had reopened until a prospective buyer contacted the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency to see whether the 185-acre farm met state regulations. V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Save South African Primates! <http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/932716846> http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/932716846 V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N UPC FORUM PROGRAM AND PRESENTATIONS March 22, 2006 UNITED POULTRY CONCERNS SIXTH ANNUAL FORUM 2006 Register online at www.upc-online.org Using the Media Effectively to Promote Farmed Animal & Vegetarian Issues Saturday, April 8 – Sunday April 9, 2006 University Plaza Hotel & Conference Center 3110 Olentangy River Road Columbus, Ohio Toll-free: 877-677-5292 PROGRAM Saturday, April 8, 2006 Morning 8:00 - 8:30 Registration, Continental Breakfast, Exhibit Tables 8:30 - 8:40 Welcome by Karen Davis, President of United Poultry Concerns 8:45 - 9:25 Jeff Sharp and Holli Kendall - “Ohioans’ Views of Livestock And Animal Welfare” 9:30 -10:10 Kim Sturla - “Are You Media Savvy? – a 5-Question Quiz” 10:15 -10:25 BREAK 10:30 -11:10 Dr. Sherri Tenpenny - “Bird Flu: It’s Not What You Think”| 11:15 - 11:50 Open Panel Discussion on Morning Presentations| Noon - 1:00 Buffet Luncheon Afternoon 1:15 -1:30 Announcements, Introduce Afternoon Session 1:35 - 2:15 – Nathan Runkle - “Effectively Exposing Factory Farm Cruelty” 2:20 - 3:00 – Karen Dawn - “Moving the Media” 3:00 - 3:15 BREAK 3:15 - 4:00 Open Panel Discussion & Q&A 4:00 - 4:15 Closing Remarks 4:15 - 5:00 Book Signing, Visit Exhibit Tables, Socialize 7:00 - 9:00 Film Presentation: The Emotional World of Farm Animals” PROGRAM Sunday, April 9, 2006 Morning 8:00 - 8:30 Registration, Continental Breakfast, Exhibit Tables 8:30 - 8:40 Welcome by Karen Davis, President of United Poultry Concerns 8:45 - 9:25 Louie b.Free - “How to Be a Great Guest on Talk Radio” 9:30 - 10:10 Debra Probert - “Turning Chickens Into Elephants” 10:15 - 10-25 BREAK 10:30 - 11:10 Bruce Friedrich - “PETA’s Fast Food Campaigns: Case Studies in Working with the Media” 11:15 - 11:50 Open Panel Discussion on Morning Presentations Noon - 1:00 Buffet Luncheon Afternoon 1:15 - 1:30 Announcements, Introduce Afternoon Session 1:35 - 2:15 Paul Shapiro - “Putting the Chicken Before the Egg: The Campaign To Ban Battery Cages” 2:20 - 3:00 Karen Davis - “Stick Up For Chickens – Don’t Apologize!” 3:00 - 3:15 BREAK 3:15 - 4:00 Open Panel Discussion, Q&A 4:00 - 4:15 Closing Remarks 4:15 - 5:00 Book Signing, Visit Exhibit Tables, Socialize Speakers & Topics In “Stick Up for Chickens – Don’t Apologize!” Karen Davis will present her 8-point program for speaking confidently and affirmatively to the media and the public on behalf of animals. First presented as a speech at the 7th Annual International Animal Rights Symposium in Washington, DC, Karen’s “Rhetoric of Apology in Animal Rights” gives specific examples of how activists often inadvertently, sometimes intentionally, deprecate animals and their own advocacy in order to placate the media/public and try to win support – a big mistake. Affirmative counter strategies will be presented. Karen Davis, PhD is the founder and President of United Poultry Concerns, a nonprofit organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of domestic fowl. She is the founding editor of UPC’s quarterly magazine Poultry Press, selected by Utne magazine in 2005 as one of the best nonprofit publications in North America. Her books include Prisoned Chickens, Poisoned Eggs: An Inside Look at the Modern Poultry Industry; More Than a Meal: The Turkey in History, Myth, Ritual, and Reality; and The Holocaust and the Henmaid’s Tale. A member of the Animal Rights Hall of Fame and featured in many media outlets over the years, Karen maintains a sanctuary for chickens at UPC’s headquarters in Virginia. In “Moving the Media,” Karen Dawn will talk about the ways in which activists can influence media coverage via the power of feedback. She will show how positive feedback for hard-hitting animal cruelty stories can give reporters license to do follow-ups, and how constructive criticism can change the slant of the coverage in major media outlets. She will also cover letters to the editor, discussing how different types of stories can serve as jump off points for comments about institutionalized animal cruelty or about the pleasures of plant-based diets. Karen Dawn created and runs the animal advocacy media watch DawnWatch.com which updates subscribers on media stories relevant to animal rights issues and encourages them to respond with feedback to shows or letters to the editor. Her commentaries have appeared in The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, New York’s Newsday and the UK Guardian, and she was featured in a New York Times piece on the Hurricane Katrina Animal disaster. As a spokesperson for the animal protection movement, Karen has appeared on MTV, published essays in current anthologies, and lectures at national animal rights conferences. In 2004 Karen hosted a 16-week animal issues series on the Los Angeles Pacifica station, KPFK. It is archived at WatchdogRadio.com. In “How to Be a Great Guest on Talk Radio,” Louie b.Free will explain how to be a successful guest and call-in speaker on talk radio. Using example from the Louie Free Radio Show and other radio venues, he’ll explain the dos and don’ts of speaking credibly and with confidence in the often contentious dialogue format of the talk radio show. What should you do? What should you never do? How do you handle it when the radio show host tries to put you down, cuts you off, or says you have just 30 seconds to wrap up? How do you stay serious and focused without coming off as a scold or a prig? Louie b.Free is the host of the Louie b.Free Radio Show in Youngstown, Ohio. His “Brainfood From the Heartland” daily show is a mix of politics from local to international, plus social and spiritual issues, including animal rights and vegetarianism, that are close to his heart and reflect his belief that there’s an audience interested in an “intelligent alternative to the pablum which passes as talk radio today.” Louie’s perseverance in exposing former U.S. Congressman James Traficant’s corruption caused him to be fired from 3 different radio stations and led to national exposure as Louie appeared on ABC’s Nightline and was quoted in U.S. News and World Report, The Nation, and other publications. In “PETA’s Fast Food Campaigns: Case Studies in Working with the Media,” Bruce Friedrich will discuss the media component of PETA’s campaigns focused on convincing fast food outlets and other corporations to improve their animal welfare standards. He’ll discuss what worked, what didn’t, and how to handle interviews and work with your local media on stories and broadcast appearances that will best help animals. Bruce Friedrich is the director of farmed animal and vegan campaigns for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). He has overseen some of PETA’s most successful campaigns, has been responsible for many articles in all of North America’s top newspapers, and has appeared on a variety of TV programs, from the Today Show to the O’Reilly Factor. In “Turning Chickens into Elephants, or, If You Want to Become Famous, Be a Chicken Lady,” Debra Probert will focus on what worked, what didn’t and why during three recent very different media campaigns coordinated by the Vancouver Humane Society. The first, to galvanize public pressure to have an ailing captive elephant surrendered to a sanctuary rather than sold to another zoo; the second, to reveal the horrible cruelty of the mass slaughter of chickens during the avian flu outbreak in British Columbia; and the third, the release of the first-ever video expose of a filthy, but commonplace, battery-hen farm in Canada owned by a poultry veterinarian. Debra Probert has been a passionate defender of animals all her life and has been Executive Director of the Vancouver Humane Society since 1996. She took VHS from a small grassroots group to become one of the most respected animal protection organizations in Canada. A primary focus of VHS is the Chicken Out! Project, which endeavors to educate the public about the cruelty involved in egg production. Debra is a committed vegetarian, having stopped eating meat after seeing a truckload of chickens on their way to a slaughterhouse. She is proud to be referred to as a “spent hen” by her staff. In “Effectively Exposing Factory Farm Cruelty – How to Open Hearts and Minds Using Undercover Investigations, Open Rescues, TV Advertisements, and Grassroots Activism,” Nathan Runkle will show why undercover investigations are important to the animal protection movement and how to effectively gain media attention through news conferences and newspapers and TV exclusives. Find out what an open rescue is, how they are conducted, how they are portrayed in the media, and the history and success of this tactic. Also learn how to become the media through TV advertisements. Nathan will discuss the creation, cost, and placement of ads and how to reach your target audience effectively. Nathan Runkle is the founder and Executive Director of the nonprofit animal advocacy organization Mercy For Animals. Nathan has helped organize and execute MFA’s undercover investigations at Ohio’s four largest egg factory farms. Through his work with MFA, Nathan has appeared in stories by dozens of newspapers and radio programs, as well as on PBS, NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox affiliates. He has organized hundreds of demonstrations and educational outreach events throughout Ohio and is a frequent speaker on farmed animal issues at national conferences, as well as at high schools and colleges. In “Putting the Chicken Before the Egg: The Campaign to Ban Battery Cages,” Paul Shapiro will show how the campaign by The Humane Society of the United States is utilizing a variety of strategies to keep battery-cage cruelty in the news and egg-laying hens out of battery cages. For more than a year, HSUS has pursued an aggressive agenda to end the egregious factory farming practice of confining nearly 300 million hens in cages so restrictive they can’t even spread their wings. Paul will also discuss the role press releases play in gaining media attention and what activists need to know about writing and distributing an effective press release. Paul Shapiro is the manager of the Factory Farming Campaign of The Humane Society of the United States. He has spearheaded successful campaigns to improve the plight of farmed animals, most notably a four-month campaign that led Trader Joe’s to stop selling battery-cage eggs under its label. Prior to working for HSUS, Paul was the campaigns director of Compassion Over Killing, where he helped lead campaigns such as the successful effort to end the use of the misleading “Animal Care Certified” logo on battery-cage egg cartons. In “Ohioans’ Views of Livestock and Animal Welfare,” Jeff Sharp and Holli Kendall will draw on data from the Ohio Survey of Food, Agriculture and Environmental Issues of 2002 and 2004 to describe views Ohioans have about livestock production in Ohio as well as Ohioans’ views of select aspects of farm animal welfare. The presentation also draws on select national and international public survey results to further illuminate aspects of public views about the livestock industry and farm animal welfare. Jeff Sharp is associate professor of Rural Sociology in the Department of Human and Community Resource Development at Ohio State University. There are two core themes of his research: 1) understanding the evolution of agriculture at the rural-urban interface, with special attention to local food system development and 2) measuring public attitudes about topical food, agriculture, and environmental issues. Data for the latter activity are from the biennial Ohio Survey of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Issues, which he directs. Holli Kendall is a PhD candidate in Rural Sociology at Ohio State University. Her specialty areas are social stratification and social change and development. Her research involves human/non-human animal relationships in modern society, with an emphasis on attitudes toward animals and examining animals’ place in society from an inequality perspective. In “Are You Media Savvy?” Kim Sturla will present a 5-question comical quiz that will focus on: Contacts: who do you contact when you want media coverage? Release: How do you pitch your story? Knowledge: do you have all the facts? Stage fright: camera is shoved in front of you – what do you do? Presentation: day of your media event, what preparation is in place and who is your spokesperson? Kim will start with the quiz, use it to launch discussion of some main points, then show 6-minutes DVD of a chicken rescue and live interview she did that showed footage inside the factory, ending with why this rescue was such a success media-wise. Kim Sturla is the Executive Director of Animal Place – a sanctuary and education center for farmed animals that she co-founded in 1989. Kim has worked in animal protection for 30 years, beginning in the animal shelter field. Animal Place is an urban sanctuary located in northern California just 40 miles from San Francisco and Sacramento. In “Bird Flu: It’s Not What You Think,” Dr. Sherri J. Tenpenny will highlight important themes from her new book Fowl! The avian flu scare is the latest act in an ongoing world government drama involving betrayals on many levels. Sherri will expose: Who wants chickens dead? Who benefits from the destruction of the family farm? What are the real reasons that domestic chickens and ducks are sick? What is the connection between toxic environmental conditions and the death of migratory birds? Why are human deaths associated with bird flu concentrated in Southeast Asia? Who benefits from the manufacture of a “pandemic vaccine”? What can we do? Sherri J. Tenpenny, D.O. is the President and CEO of OsteoMed II, a clinic established in 1996 to provide integrative medicine, a combination of conventional and alternative medicine, for patient care. Dr. Tenpenny is an established expert in the area of alternative medicine who, in addition to appearing on many radio and television talk shows, has had articles published in national magazines and newspapers. She’s lectured at Cleveland State University and Case Western Reserve Medical School, and has spoken at many conventions on topics related to health and problems associated with mass vaccination not generally portrayed by conventional medicine. United Poultry Concerns is a nonprofit organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of domestic fowl. http://www.upc- online.org Don't just switch from beef to chicken. Go Vegan. United Poultry Concerns Karen Davis President Email: karen@upc-online.org Phone: 757-678-7875 Fax: 757-678-5070 PO Box 150 Machipongo, VA 23405 V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Bullfighting for teenage kicks in Spain Written by Miriam Romero in Madrid Wednesday, 22 March 2006 For many Spaniards bullfighting is an honorable, centuries old tradition. Meet the teenagers who hope to follow their forefathers into the ring... In Chinchon, Spain, 45km south-east of Madrid, it is a beautiful sun-drenched day with a carnival atmosphere in the city centre. It seems everyone, from the oldest resident to the youngest infant, has come to the Plaza Mayor where the feast of St James is being celebrated with bullfighting. Next is a 'novillada' - a fight between a young matador - normally about 16 years old and fresh out of bullfighting school - and a young bull. The sombre-looking boy checks his flamboyant suit and sharpens his sword, interrupted occasionally by girls jostling to have their pictures taken with him. As music rings out around the stadium, safety checks are completed, gates are fastened and the novillero and his team gather at the ringside. Seconds later the stable guard pulls a catch and an angry young bull comes crashing out of the toril gate to the thrilled screams of young children on their parents' shoulders. As the bull gathers its bearings, the young matador approaches with banderillas (barbed sticks) in each of his hands. When the bull charges, attempting to gore him with its horns, the boy leaps aside and plunges the sticks into its back. Then in the final third of the fight, with the bull's back pin-cushioned with decorated spears, the young man demonstrates his skill with the muleta - a red flannel on a wooden stick - seemingly dancing with the wounded bull before plunging his sword between the animal's shoulder blades, severing the aorta. Horses then drag the carcass out of the ring to butchers waiting outside where it is sold as meat, and the novillero tosses its severed ears to boys in the crowd who jump to catch them. This is a right of passage and a gathering of generations ending in, ultimately, a bloody ritual of death. This is the 'planeta de los toros' - the world of the bulls. According to Manuel Sánchez, a 15-year old bullfighting student at the Escuela de Tauromaquia in Madrid, the attraction to the sport is a mixture of national pride and respect. "The whole town loves you when you are a matador," he explains. "You are upholding a very important national tradition and people respect that. They respect that you are risking your life to entertain them, and it makes you a very honourable person." Sánchez' father was a matador before him and Manuel is keen to follow in his footsteps. "I watched my father fight bulls when I was a boy and I heard how the crowd reacted when he played to them, I wanted to be just like him," he says, smiling. Asked whether he's pursuing a sport regarded by many to belong to the older generation, he laughs. "An old man wouldn't last very long in the bullring," he says. "Go to any fight and look at the crowds. There are many young families with children, and the matadors themselves must be fit and agile. It's a sexy sport, and it draws a lot of female interest." While Manuel's father is now retired, his son will, this coming season, fight his first bull in front of an audience. He will be looking to make his mark on the 'escalafon' or league table reserved for professional matadors and novilleros. As a novillero he must take the alternativa, a ceremony in which he is proposed and seconded by two other matadors if he wishes to become a matador himself. Further along the path to recognition and, hopefully, a long life of bullfighting is 17-year-old José Rios. José has already undertaken a number of fights, and spends the majority of his spare time either training or watching videos of bullfights. "I don't mind the demands it makes on my time," he says. "I'll be a great matador or I'll do something else. If you want to do this job professionally, you have to be very serious about it. Many people have been killed or injured badly because they let their concentration slip for just one second." José believes bullfighting now is as popular as it ever was, but admits some of his peers have not been receptive to his choice of career. "Many young people are competing to study at the best [bullfighting] schools," he says. "It is an important cultural tradition for all Spanish people and it remains popular, otherwise the bullrings would have been pulled down to make way for something else." He acknowledges that it not for everybody. "It's a personal choice," he shrugs. "I have taken some abuse from some of my peers, but this is a part of my culture and it's not for one group to tell another group what they can and cannot do. If they want to opt out, then fine, but bullfighting is part of what our country is." With TV companies fighting to air live bullfighting in Spain; schools turning away students in France, Latin America, and more recently in the US; and, specialist enthusiasts' organisations in countries as diverse as Sweden and Indonesia, interest in bullfighting appears to be on the increase. José maintains that at the end of the day, he doesn't feel bad for the bulls he will slaughter in the ring. "If a bull displays exceptional bravery and the crowd petitions the president of the bullring towards the end of the fight, he will grant a pardon and spare the bull's life. "The bull then becomes a stud. So it has every chance to live," he says. http://greatreporter.com/mambo/content/view/1200/2/ Letters to the Editor Editorial: editorial@greatreporter.com V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Harrods Court Case update. any enquiries please address to: CAFT (Coalition to Abolish the Fur Trade) brian@caft.org.uk www.caft.org.uk ******************************************************************** Harrods Court Case update. Just a brief update on the legal action brought by Harrods department store against anti-fur protesters. In October 2005, anti fur protesters began a campaign to persuade the upmarket department store, Harrods to stop selling fur. In the 1980's Harrods had gone fur-free when it was the flagship store of the House of Fraser group, which went fur free in 1989. However in 1993, Harrods became separate from House of Fraser, and soon went back on its fur-free policy. (House of Fraser remains fur-free) Following successful campaigns in the past few years against department stores Harvey Nichols, Selfridges and Liberty, Harrods became the last department store in the country to sell real fur. To make matters worse, it was announced in Spring 2005 that Harrods was teaming up with the chairman of the British Fur Trade Association (BFTA) to launch a new British fur label. (see below for more background on this) In December 2005 just a few months into the campaign, Harrods, Europe's largest department store, used its financial muscle, and went to the High Court to seek an injunction against the protesters under the Protection from Harassment Act, 1997. Harrods applied to have an no-protest exclusion zone around their store in Knightsbridge, London, which would have effectively forced any protests well away from the store on the opposite side of the road. The action was taken against 3 individual campaigners, and also named London Animal Action, a local group which had already been long defunct by this time. For good measure a 5th defendant was added, named as 'the unknown members of the Animal Liberation Front', even though there has been no damage as part of the campaign. This was a blatant tactic so they could put lots of crimimal direct action reports into the evidence to try to influence the judge, . The three protesters appeared High Court to defend the action, two were granted legal aid while the third defended himself. Predictably Harrods were represented by the infamous anti-animal rights lawyer, Timothy Lawson-Cruttenden. At the hearing on 21st December, the Judge granted an interim injunction, but it was far from the exclusion zone which Harrods applied for. It allowed 3 protesters by each of Harrods 12 entrances, but did create an exclusion zone of 10 metres around each entrance for all other protesters. At a subsequent hearing in January, the Defendants managed to get this zone reduced to 5 metres, allowing protests to continue much as they had done before the action had been brought. With two very expensive hearings, and very little benefit for Harrods, they decided to sack Lawson Cruttenden as their lawyers, and appoint a fresh firm of solicitors. By the time of the third hearing in March, it had been agreed that the ALF and LAA would have nothing to do with the proceedings, and they were struck out, reducing the amount of evidence by well over half. However a new fourth defendant, CAFT (Coalition to Abolish the Fur Trade) was added to the action. A date for a final hearing is now set for June, but it is by no means certain it will get that far. Meanwhile the protests have continued regularly at Harrods despite the legal action. We would appreciate some support from other groups in solidarity against this blatant attack on our right to protest. If you or your group can spare a Saturday to support our campaign, whether it's for an hour or the whole day, please get in touch by replying to this email. Please contact Harrods ask them to adopt a fur-free policy. PLEASE KEEP ALL EMAILS POLITE, any abusive emails will be used by Harrods in the legal action. If you get any replies please forward them to us. Harrods Ltd 87-135 Brompton Road Knightsbridge London SW1X 7XL Telephone 020 7730 1234 Fax 020 7581 0470 customer.services@harrods.com Harrods Corporate Service corporate.service@harrods +44 (0)20 7225 5843 Other email addresses Ladies.fashion@harrods.com service@harrods-casino.com direct.mail@harrods.com Harrods and the Fur Trade (some of the same info with a bit more background) In the 1980's, Harrods, Europe's largest department store, was the flagship store of the House of Fraser group, which was itself the largest department store chain in Europe. Following years of protests by anti-fur campaigners, House of Fraser announced it would no longer sell fur in any of its stores, ncluding Harrods. At the time, the store's owner, Mohammed al Fayed was quoted as saying "Our colour is green and it is my determination to make it greener. House of Fraser is Europe's biggest department stores group and we have a great responsibility." Their then media director Michael Cole stated "The trade is not as acceptable now as it used to be". In 1993, Al Fayed and Harrods split from the House of Fraser group. Whilst the House of Fraser group has stuck to its no fur policy, Harrods has gradually allowed fur to creep back into the store. In 2001, the UK government took the decision to ban the farming of animals for fur, but fur continued to be sold at Harrods. By the summer of 2005, following successful campaigns against Harvey Nichols, Selfridges and Liberty, Harrods became the only major department store in the UK which still sold real fur. In Autumn 2005, Harrods teamed up with the chairman of the British Fur Trade Association to launch a new fur collection. Frank Zilberkweit, owner of Hockley Furs in London as well as head of BFTA, launched a new British fur label, and the collection went on sale in Autumn 2005, available exclusively at Hockleys shop and Harrods. In October, local campaigners began to organise regular and frequent protests at Harrods. During the Anti-Fur week, 22nd to 29th October there were protests every day. Protesters were shocked to discover the large amount and the wide range of sale on fur at Harrods, including various kinds of fox, rabbit, raccoon, mink and musquash. By November the company became worried about the protests, and a board meeting was held at which it was decided to go to the High Court to seek an injunction to stop the protests, which were having an effect on their winter sales. As the legal action drags on through the courts, the campaign continues much as before. Please contact Harrods ask them to adopt a fur-free policy. PLEASE KEEP ALL EMAILS POLITE, any abusive emails will be used by Harrods in the legal action. If you get any replies please forward them to us. Harrods Ltd 87-135 Brompton Road Knightsbridge London SW1X 7XL Telephone 020 7730 1234 Fax 020 7581 0470 customer.services@harrods.com Harrods Corporate Service corporate.service@harrods +44 (0)20 7225 5843 Other email addresses Ladies.fashion@harrods.com service@harrods-casino.com direct.mail@harrods.com V ~^+^~~^+^~ E ~^+^~~^+^~ G ~^+^~~^+^~ A ~^+^~~^+^~ N Thanks to Mass. Coalition for Animal Rights, Animal Net, Farm Santuary, IDA, and many other sources. . "Buddhism regards all living creatures as being endowed with the Buddha nature and the potential to become Buddhas. That's why Buddhism teaches us to refrain from killing and to liberate creatures instead." ~ Venerable Master Hsuan Hua Liberating Life. Liberation for Our Brother & Sister
Animals Thank you for all you do for our non human Thanks to all contributors, Animal Concerns, Animals
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