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Index:
Public Registry
- February 28, 2002
Public Registry - February 25,
2002
Public Registry
- Permits to build earthen structures - 18 January, 2002
Hog
Watch Manitoba presents "Golden Pig Award"
February
22, 2002
Pork
farming leaves a bad smell and an environmental mess. Feb 06 2002
OTTAWA CITIZEN
RM
halts further pig barn projects Rivers MB February 13, 2002 Brandon
Sun
Air-quality standards for CAFOs in Iowa. February
8, 2002
Hog ponds endanger Iowa water, study says Des
Moines Register 01/31/2002
US Study reveals Anti-Corporate Farming Laws bring economic
stability to rural communities.
Pig
statistics in Canada compiled
from Stats Canada February 2002
Federal
Report - Huge
pig farms are health menace - Ottawa Citizen
For immediate release….
February 22, 2002
Hog
Watch Manitoba presents "Golden Pig Award"
Citizens from all regions of the province will be gathering outside of
the NDP Convention to express their concerns about the rapid expansion
of factory farming in Manitoba.
According to Statistics
Canada, seven million pigs were born in Manitoba last year alone, which
is a phenomenal 16% increase from the previous year. Manitoba currently
has the fastest growing hog industry of any state or province in North
America.
It is also expected
that by this time next year, Manitoba will become the largest hog producer
in the country.
Thank-you Gary Doer
and the New Democratic Party of Manitoba.
Short presentations
by:
David Brooks
- Grunthal, MB; Garnet Lee - Darlingford, MB; Frieda Krpan, St. Laurent,
MB; Cindy Murray, Erickson, MB; Harley Shephard, Kola, MB; Ken Sigurdson,
Swan River; MB
Where: Ramada Marlborough
Hotel (331 Smith Street - outside main doors)
When: Saturday, February 23, 2002
Time: 12 noon
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Pig
Farming
Rod McDonald writes in a commentary for the Ottawa
Citizen that there will be more and more angry demonstrations like the
recent one outside Ottawa City Hall, opposing a factory farm in Sarsfield.
The editorial says that unless measures are taken, the intensive pig farming
in the province will continue to pose the growing dilemma of pig-manure
leakage into rivers and streams, where the phosphorous wreaks havoc on
aquatic life and poses a major health threat to nearby water supplies
(Ctz B4).
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RM
halts further pig barn projects
February 13, 2002
By Peter Dalla-Vicenza Brandon Sun
RIVERS - Overwhelming public opposition to hog barns has forced
the Rural Municipality of Daly to put the brakes on all intensive livestock
development. Daly council placed a moratorium on large livestock projects
yesterday after pig barn opponents packed its tiny office in Rivers. "There
was so much pressure they didn't have much choice," said Reed Wolfe,
one organizer of Concerned Daly Ratepayers group. Following its marathon
session, council halted new projects for 90 days. It will put together
new rules governing large livestock projects during the time.
Thirty people came
to council armed with a petition with 402 names of municipal residents
worried about the impact of hog barns. "Over 90 per cent of residents
and owners contacted agree with us," said farmer and area resident
Alex Gerrard. "Among the signatures are some of the most progressive-minded
producers in Daly and the province." To illustrate its point, the
group brought a municipal map to council, shading in all its supporters'
land in red. The sea of crimson was impossible for council to ignore,
said Coun. Harold Dyck, who championed the moratorium cause. "I think
by the colour of the map that we need to make changes," Dyck said.
Reeve Marlin Beever disagreed. He said council's conditional use bylaw
had sufficient teeth to deal with the group's concerns about water quality
and odour. "In my mind, this is a non-confidence vote of council."
A proponent of livestock
development, Beever engaged in heated exchanges with group members. He
said few people participated in the process when the livestock bylaw was
drafted and charged opponents want rules that will prevent projects from
moving forward. "There is a sense that we'll approve anything that
comes to this table come hell or high water," he said. "I think
it's a gross mistake for you to feel that way." Ruth Pryzner said
Beever was putting too much faith in the process. Her group wants restrictions
about size of barn, distance from neighbours and concerns about water
quality in black and white. "We want some minimum standards before
we get to the conditional use process," she said.
Citizens and councillors
debated the issue for more than an hour before breaking for lunch. Following
the meal break, councillors went behind closed doors for another 65 minutes
to debate the issue while citizens waited in the lobby of the municipal
office. Councillors "wanted the opportunity for frank discussion,"
said John McLellan, chief executive officer of the RM. The decision to
shut out citizens from the discussion did not sit well with the group.
"If the process doesn't work, it will take away our faith in democracy,"
said Roger Mawer, one of four councillors who wanted changes to the bylaw.
Mawer and other group members plotted strategy in the hallway for much
of the afternoon, fearing their efforts for a a new bylaw would be shot
down.
However, when the
doors opened, they quickly learned that all but Beever and Coun. Wes Paddock
agreed changes were necessary. The proposal passed by a 5-2 motion. Dyck,
Dwight Verboom, Evan Smith, Dennis Veitch and Rod Veitch voted in favour.
They approved a motion giving the group 30 days to bring its ideas for
a new bylaw to the table. They also provided a further 60-day window for
the bylaw to be debated at a public meeting and vetted by a lawyer and
approved. The motion satisfied people in the group who feared any the
tabling of a decision would allow a development to be approved before
new guidelines are in place.
Although there is
no project currently on council's plate, the group says hog barn investors
have purchased land in the northwest corner of the municipality. "It
would be a half mile from my land," said Fred Geysen who lives in
Brandon but farms in the municipality. Members of Concerned Daily Ratepayers
say they're satisfied council is willing to listen to voters. However,
they felt they had to be dragged kicking and screaming through the democratic
process. "They came a long way today," said Marriane Gerrard.
Gerrard said people who supported her organization say new and better
rules will make the process of hog barn approval less divisive. "Many
of us aren't against intensive livestock operations," she said. "But
we don't want our community divided the way many others have."
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Report recommends air-quality standards for concentrated animal feeding
operations
IOWA CITY, Iowa
THE UNIVERSITY OF IOWA Health News
Iowa City, Iowa 52242 5203 Westlawn
Contact: Debra Venzke
UI College of Public Health
(319) 335-9647
Brian Meyer
Iowa State University
(515) 294-0706
Feb. 8, 2002
NOTE TO EDITORS: Peter
S. Thorne, Ph.D., UI professor of occupational and environmental health
and a member of the study group that prepared this report, is available
for comment. He can be reached at (319) 335-4216.
Report recommends air-quality standards for concentrated animal feeding
operations
IOWA CITY, Iowa
– A new joint report from a team of scientists at the University
of Iowa and Iowa State University recommends that the Iowa Department
of Natural Resources develop ambient air-quality standards for concentrated
animal feeding operations (CAFOs) in Iowa.
While stating that no specific diseases among community residents can
be linked to air emissions from CAFOs, the report states that "emissions
may constitute a public health hazard and that precautions should be taken
to minimize … exposures arising from CAFOs."
The study group recommended standards for measuring hydrogen sulfide and
ammonia at a CAFO property line and at a residence or public use area,
and provided two opinions on the regulation of odors.
"The report is based upon the best science available to ensure that
rural ambient air is as free of risk as possible in order to protect health
and the quality of life at the highest possible level," according
to James Merchant, M.D., Dr.P.H., dean of the UI College of Public Health,
and Richard Ross, D.V.M., Ph.D., former dean of the College of Agriculture
at Iowa State University, who together chaired the joint study group.
The report, developed by the universities at the request of Iowa Gov.
Tom Vilsack, states that hydrogen sulfide and ammonia have been measured
near livestock operations in concentrations that could be harmful to humans.
Both substances are pulmonary irritants.
Odors arising from concentrated animal feeding operations were reported
to be associated with increased eye and respiratory symptoms by rural
residents living near the facilities, the report states.
Besides air quality, the study group also was asked to address other emerging
issues related to CAFOs. The report identified water quality, worker health,
antibiotic resistance, "greenhouse gas" emissions, socioeconomic
impacts on rural communities, and livestock epidemic and disposal issues.
The study group also outlined policy strategies to improve the siting
of new confinement facilities.
Report recommends air-quality standards for concentrated animal feeding
operations - 2The
study group reported on technologies and management strategies that are
currently available to producers to reduce emissions. These include strategies
related to housing ventilation,
manure storage and handling.
The study group's full 10-chapter report and an executive summary will
be available online at www.public-health.uiowa.edu/ehsrc. For a printed
publication, please contact Deb Venzke at (319) 335-9647 or via e-mail
at debra-venzke@uiowa.edu.
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Hog
ponds endanger Iowa water, study says
By PERRY BEEMAN
Register Staff Writer
01/31/2002
Hog-manure lagoons threaten Iowa's drinking-water supplies and rivers,
and new ones should be kept out of flood plains and areas with leaky soil,
researchers say in a new analysis.
That would cover much
of central Iowa.
The report, released
Wednesday, is one of the most comprehensive looks yet at geological factors
that could worsen pollution from Iowa's 750 earthen livestock-waste lagoons.
Earthen lagoons generally are lined only with clay.
State legislators
are preparing to debate whether to impose new environmental controls on
Iowa's hog industry, the largest in the nation. It's the first time in
several years that leaders have been willing to consider the issue. Thousands
of Iowans have protested the odors and possible health threats from large
confinements.
Senate Majority Leader
Stewart Iverson of Dows has said lagoons should not be built in flood
plains.
The report was written
by Iowa State University hydrogeology professor William Simpkins and hydrologist
Michael Burkart of the ISU-based National Soil Tilth Laboratory. They
found many older lagoons were built in areas where groundwater sometimes
surrounded the structures. That means manure seeped through the lagoons,
which happens with all clay-lined structures, and contaminated ground
water. In other cases, water pressure weakened the lagoon walls. In still
others, floods threatened lagoons.
Particularly troubling,
Simpkins said, are spots in north central Iowa where lagoons sit atop
leaky soil and fractured rock, and in some cases near farm-field drainage
wells that could send the manure straight into groundwater.
"There are places
in north-central Iowa that just shouldn't have these things," Simpkins
said.
Standards in place
since 1995 have protected lagoons against cracks and liner failures, officials
with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources have said. Various studies
have shown that the earthen lagoons still leak, though, and the state
regulates how much manure can seep through.
Simpkins said state
regulations require private engineers to certify that lagoon bottoms are
built at a depth that underground water won't rise above. The problem,
Simpkins said, is that the method the engineers use to determine the proper
depth is crude and often inaccurate.
The natural resources
agency then inspects the lagoons once a year. But, Simpkins said, the
state doesn't regularly check the level of groundwater around most of
them.
"DNR oversight
has been nonexistent in this area," he said, because of weak laws
and a tight budget. "I don't want to blame DNR for doing a poor job,"
he said. "If they had the staff and the stick to look at these things,
we'd be a lot better off."
Wayne Gieselman, who
supervises DNR lagoon inspectors, said that six months ago the state began
requiring that each new earthen lagoon have monitoring wells.
Most new lagoons are
concrete, he said, and those offer more protection than clay. The state
does not require wells at established lagoons most prone to leakage and
probably never will, he said.
Gieselman said the
state also has 700 municipal and industrial sewage lagoons, and most of
those are next to rivers and streams. Municipal sewage is far less concentrated
than hog manure.
A bill championed
by some Democratic legislators would set up an advisory board that would
review possible hog-confinement sites to assess risks to the environment
and choose acceptable locations. Simpkins and Burkart suggest better water-table
monitoring, too.
The state up to now
hasn't taken soil structure, flood plains and other geological factors
into account in deciding where lagoons can be built, Simpkins said. Efforts
by the Department of Natural Resources and some lawmakers, including Rep.
William Witt, a Democrat from Cedar Falls, to do that were turned aside
by the Legislature the past few years. The Legislature paid $200,000 for
the ISU analysis; 34 lagoons were studied. The lagoons, whose locations
were not disclosed, were built between 1987 and 1994. As many as 94 percent
were built where groundwater rises above the lagoon bottom at times. Simpkins
said he released the study's findings now so lawmakers can take them into
account while debating new environmental rules. The paper is to be published
in the June issue of the Journal of the American Water Resources Association.
To see the original
article, click here
STUDY
REVEALS ANTI-CORPORATE FARMING LAWS
BRING ECONOMIC STABILITY TO RURAL COMMUNITIES
In
a study released by Cornell University and Clarkson University, rural
sociology researchers conclude that anti-corporate farming laws provide
economic stability to rural communities. The research, led by Professor
Thomas Lyson of Cornell University and Professor Rick Welsh of Clarkson
University of Potsdam, New York, analyzed a variety of economic indicators
for 433 counties located in the nine states which have adopted laws prohibiting
corporations from owning or controlling farms.
Those
nine states are Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South
Dakota, Kansas, Nebraska, and Wisconsin. Eight municipal governments in
Pennsylvania have also adopted local laws identical to South Dakota's
"Amendment E", adopted in 1998, and agribusiness interests have
sued to overturn those local laws in Belfast Township, Fulton County.
Generally,
those laws prohibit absentee corporate ownership and control of farms.
The laws have been challenged in a variety of state and federal courts,
and have been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court. In their research, Lyson
and Welsh discovered that "agricultural counties without corporate
farming laws generally had higher poverty and
unemployment rates and lower cash returns to farming." The study
found that Counties "suffer when industrial agriculture crowds out
less industrialized forms."
Based
on U.S. Census figures, the study was funded by the Rockefeller Family
Fund.
Thomas
Linzey, staff attorney for the Legal Defense Fund, stated that "this
Study simply confirms what most rural communities already know: the invasion
of communities by factory farm corporations results in real costs to local
economies and communities. It is time to assert democratic and community
control over factory farm corporations, and establish sustainable communities
which support local economies."
The
most famous study of industrial farming was by Walter Goldschmidt sixty
years ago. The California anthropologist concluded that communities surrounded
by large farms compared unfavorably to counties dominated by small and
medium farms.
Federal
Report - Huge
pig farms are health menace
- March 2002
Manure and urine pollute soil and water, fumes defile the air
Tom
Spears, The Ottawa Citizen, The Gazette
Pollution
from factory pig farms has been blamed for lung problems for farmers and
contamination of water supplies.
While the federal government promotes only "good news" stories
about giant hog farms, its own investigations show the industrial-scale
farms are causing air and water pollution and posing a significant health
hazard to people working in them.
Internal government documents show the huge operations have saturated
soils and streams with chemicals from manure. And concentrated manure
fumes cause asthma, bronchitis, depression and other health troubles in
farmers.
Meanwhile, Agriculture Canada says its role is to promote factory farms
and to do research supporting them, but not to regulate them. It hopes
for environmental improvements such as manure composting, but says they
are currently too expensive for farmers to use.
The 590 pages released under an Access to Information request paint a
picture of an uneasy change from traditional farms with a few hundred
pigs to "intensive livestock operations" with batches of 5,000
or more pigs, all the same age, in a single barn.
These large hog farms are in southern Alberta, southern Quebec, Manitoba,
New Brunswick, and, increasingly, in southern Ontario.
Agriculture Canada says the industry is having only limited success in
its struggle to overcome the environmental and health problems.
Yes, the industry can compost manure. It can breed genetically modified
pigs that produce cleaner manure. It can build sewage treatment plants
for farms, or artificial marshes to soak up manure.
Pollution
is Serious
The trouble is, farmers can't afford these high-tech solutions. And pollution
from the pork industry is already serious:
Where farmland lies close to cities, ammonia fumes from pig urine and
manure combine with industrial air pollutants and car exhaust to make
dangerous acidic compounds. "These microscopic particles are thought
to pose a significant human health risk because they can bypass the normal
defences of the respiratory system."
In B.C.'s Fraser Valley, this chemical soup is so thick it causes a visible
haze, and can make up 70 per cent of the airborne particles in summer.
The bad smell isn't just unpleasant. "There is new evidence ... that
the substances that give rise to odours can also affect human health,
causing nausea, headaches, sleep disturbances, upset stomach, loss of
appetite and depression." Workers in the barns can develop chronic
bronchitis and asthma.
"Health problems associated with odour-causing substances are the
leading cause for disability claims among hog producers in the Netherlands.
In Denmark, lung disease is a growing concern among hog barn workers."
The chemicals that make these odours are complex; there are more than
150 in all.
Even worse are the dust-like particles from barns -- moulds, fungus, fecal
matter, skin cells and bacteria. These concentrate odours and spread them.
"The concentration of odorants may be 40 million times greater on
dust particles than in an equal volume of air. Dust particles can carry
odours over long distances."
Phosphorus
is a menace
Phosphorus, one of the main chemicals in manure, is a fertilizer but also
a pollutant. The problem is that plants can only soak up about half the
phosphorus spread by many hog operations.
"Unused phosphorus builds up in the soil year after year" and
has reached troublesome levels in Ontario and Quebec. Phosphorus leads
to uncontrolled algae and weed growth in water; it's one reason the Rideau
River chokes up with mats of algae in summer.
A study of Quebec watersheds with many hog farms found "a large increase
in phosphorus levels in the soil, as well as a decreased ability of the
soil to hold on to this phosphorus."
Phosphorus levels "much greater than the accepted safe limit"
are being found in Quebec rivers, including fish spawning areas.
Even following good farming practices can pollute waterways. Phosphates
leak from manure storage areas and drain off the farm fields into rivers,
leading to a loss of oxygen in the water, which kills fish.
"Plot studies have shown high levels of phosphorus in run-off water
(from farms) even when manure was applied at the recommended rate."
Walkerton
Disaster
Walkerton's E. coli outbreak came from cattle manure on a farm field,
"but the thing that's interesting is it was manured exactly according
to agricultural specifications. That ought to set off a bit of a warning
bell," said David Schindler of the University of Alberta, Canada's
best-known water pollution expert.
Research on manure handling has the potential to make the situation a
lot better, he said in an interview.
Learning to compost manure, reducing the water content and smell and killing
germs, "is the way to start, before we build 20,000-hog farms."
Pigs share eight to 10 of the most common bacteria and parasites that
infect humans, he said. "If these were humans that were crapping
all over the landscape, the whole population would be up in arms. With
the same pathogens and the same nutrients coming out of hogs and cattle,
why are we tolerating them?"
Agriculture Canada's answer to these issues? It launched a plan in 1997
to fund a wide range of research efforts at government labs and universities
-- but in the meantime told the public only "good news stories."
Government
Spending - where?
Over and over the documents stress that the federal government is spending
$1.3 million "to encourage environmentally sound practices in the
livestock sector," and $10 million more over four years "to
fund projects addressing national environmental priorities."
And while there are hopes of better technologies that may make the multi-million-litre
loads of manure smell better and pollute less, the documents warn they're
not that practical.
Many hog farms simply can't do a good environmental job, the department
concluded at the end of 1997.
"The industry has been challenged to fully address environmental
concerns because of a lack of cost-effective technologies and sound methods
of and-based manure management.
"Environmental standards are proliferating faster than the ability
of many enterprises to adapt."
The documents were written between 1997 and 2000.
Propaganda
Financed by Feds and Provincial Governments
But none of these concerns appear in the communications strategy for the
public.
Its objective is "to reduce public resistance to hog operations by
education and by showing that the economic benefits of a thriving pork
industry can be achieved without compromising the environment or rural
quality of life." It calls for reducing the number of "negative
news stories."
It calls for "parallel release of 'good news stories' on AAFC research
and technology transfer" on hogs. AAFC is Agriculture and Agri-Food
Canada.
For instance, here's one quoted from a newspaper in Red Deer: "Pig
poop smells. It smells like money. Lots of money. And a good future."
Pouring millions of litres of manure on fields isn't pollution, the documents
say. It's "contributing nutrients to the ecosystem."
In response to a letter from a resident of Hanover, Ont., six kilometres
east of Walkerton, the department writes: "It should be mentioned
that the federal government plays only a small part in the regulation
of manure management."
© Copyright 2002 The Ottawa Citizen
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