Hog Watch Manitoba News August 2002 |
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Experts hunt for cause of manure spill Four million liters contaminated wells after tank peeled 'like a banana' By Aldo Santin Winnipeg Free Press Friday 12 August 2002 OPPONENTS to the hog industry
were given fresh ammunition this week with the news that Manitoba's Conservation
department has been unable to determine the cause of the largest liquid-manure
spill in recent memory. aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca Justice
of the peace delays sentencing in pollution case Local News - It won’t be until the fall before a justice of the
peace pronounces sentence on a controversial Napanee-area pig farm and
two of it’s owner- operators. CBC-TV
THE NATIONAL Aug 05,2002 Factory Farms DAVID COMMON (Reporter): His closest neighbours are more than a kilometer away. Still Wayne McArthur has a big problem with them. WAYNE MCARTHUR (Pig Farm Neighbour): It's sickening. It's really sickening. It gets in your clothes, your skin, your hair, like it stays with you. COMMON: It is the smell from this barn. Inside, a scene like this. Dozens of factory farms are intensive livestock operations, as they're called, exist across the Prairies, each one with thousands of pigs producing hydrogen sulphide, ammonia and nitrogen in their manure. In the past few years, odor complaints have become more frequent. That's prompted Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan to launch a task force to study what effect that stench has on people. TERRY HANLEY (Saskatchewan Environment): That nuisance factor. You can have potentially health effects down the line because if you're exposed to something that you consider a smell that you're uncomfortable with and are exposed to it, over a period of time, it can cause you stress. COMMON: One recent study from the University of North Carolina found people who lived near hog barns are twice as likely to have headaches, sore throats and nausea, four times as likely to have diarrhea and five times as likely to stay indoors with the windows closed. But that study only looked at air quality issues, not at water. Since manure from the pigs is kept in giant sewage lagoons or spread over farmers fields as a fertilizer, there are concerns it could get into the water supply. MCARTHUR: The run off comes right in to our land here. So like we're concerned about that. I mean they just started. It's only going to get worse. COMMON: The pork industry, which is worth billions to provincial economies welcomes the study. MARCEL HACAULT (Manitoba Pork Council): The government, I guess with this task force, is trying to find some answers similar to us. If there's a problem, we want to be able to deal with it. COMMON: The prairie task force will begin the bulk of its work later this year. But with governments trying to attract more factory farms, this may come down to a battle between the economy and the environment. David Common, CBC News, Regina. Minnesota
Files Suit to declare Renville County Hog Producer a Public Nuisance Taking
the Stink Away Manure
tank bursts near MacGregor Huge
Manure Spill Contaminates Rural Wells Cliff Lee, acting regional director for the Red River Region with Manitoba
Conservation, says it is a serious accident. "We estimate approximately
slightly less than a million gallons of manure was spilled onto the ground,"
he says. More
questionable manure tanks likely out there Manitoba could be in for another catastrophic manure spill. That's what one businessman in the manure management industry is saying after four million litres of hog manure burst from an above-ground storage tank last month. Two wells were contaminated on the farm near MacGregor, west of Portage la Prairie. Tom Struthers is president of Managro, a company that assembles steel storage tanks for hog barns. Since 1998, the government has required permits for such tanks. But Struthers says the tank that burst was installed before that, and there are many others just like it. "There was a lot of tanks built prior to the regulations, and I would have to think that some of those tanks have not been built to specifications. And you know, the fact that this tank is burst likely means that there's a possibility there's others that may potentially be there waiting to happen." Struthers looked at the tank after it was bulldozed into a pile of rubble after the spill. He says the tank was put together with recycled materials, and it was built before government permits were required. The provincial conservation department says tanks built after 1998 undergo a rigorous permit process. But spokesman Dennis Brown admits those built before then are only checked "as time permits." Brown also says the MacGregor hog facility, called "Bits o' Pork",
has been ordered to "remediate and replace" the tank that burst.
It seems the tank was severely corroded. Neighbours
wary of proposed animal dump (NIMBY) People who live in one corner of southeast Manitoba are wondering whether their area will become a dumping ground for thousands of dead animals. Government officials are thinking about designating a half dozen sites around rural Manitoba that could be used to bury animal carcasses in an emergency. "It's important to have these sites because if we were faced with a major disposal situation with a mass number of livestock carcasses, we¹re going to have to do something with them," says Dr. Wayne Clayton, a federal veterinarian in charge of the site selection process. "So it¹s better for us to be prepared ahead of time to know what we could do with them if our other methods of disposal, for example rendering, are overwhelmed. We're better to make the decisions when we can do it in a calm, orderly fashion." Clayton points out that in the event of an outbreak of a disease such as foot-and-mouth, it's not just the diseased animals that have to be disposed of, but also thousands of healthy ones which can't be sold because the markets have shut down. One possible site is a quarter-section of Crown land in the rural municipality of De Salaberry, just outside the community of Arnaud. Robert Kathler is a farmer who lives two kilometres from the proposed site. He's worried about the potential for diseases being imported to the region, possible flooding at the site, and – most of all – how officials will define an "emergency." "We probably need something like that for these emergency-type situations
like happened in Europe, but I'm also afraid they're going to be used
a little more on a daily basis for handling the overload that the rendering
plants can't handle," Kathler says. Fish
Kill in the Bouctouche River Over the past three years, concerns have been raised by area citizens about the spraying of hog feces and urine from the largest hog operation east of Manitoba. One of the biggest concerns is the history of hog feces and urine runoff on watersheds. Statements by the Department of Environment and Local Government have done little to assure citizens of the benign nature of hog feces and urine spraying. Moreover, the delay in releasing water monitoring performed by the Department as far back as June 2001 has added to citizens concerns. Department officials have stated that water monitoring related to Metz Farms II Ltd. has cost over $200,000 since 1999. The $70,000 Expert Committee Report commissioned by Premier Bernard Lord to address citizens concerns has been shelved from public scrutiny. And most recently, $1.5 million has been thrown into Metz Farms II Ltd. operation "to help" address serious issues related to the environment. Despite these large sums of money being spent, citizens feel the lack of concrete data and sloppy process leaves them wondering whom the Department is really protecting. Now there is a fish kill in the river. Finding dead fish in a river in which area children swim is a concern for the Association. The cause of death of the fish has not yet been determined. The Association will continue to monitor the situation closely. Contacts: Jerry Cook 506-955-3686 Association for the Preservation of the Bouctouche Watershed Web: http://www.mondata.com/action Doctors
want moratorium on new hog farms Doctors feel they don't know enough about the real health risks involved in industrial hog farming. They want the CMA to recognize that and to support them in their concern. Dr. Les Allaby, a New Brunswick physician, says he's concerned because
doctors don't know enough about what damage is done. More significantly, the doctors want a moratorium on hog farms until studies relieve their concerns. Written by CBC News Online staff New
Rules to Govern Factory farms; The stories say that proposals under the Nutrient Management Act would require most of the province's farmers to submit detailed information about the number of livestock and the types and amount of nutrients they use on their farms. The new rules were prompted by recommendations from Justice Dennis O'Connor that stemmed from his inquiry into the Walkerton tragedy, Johns said. Seven people died in May, 2000 after cow manure washed into the water supply during a torrential downpour, contaminating the water with a deadly bacteria. Environment Minister Chris Stockwell was quoted as saying, "We are expecting the decision that we take will allow us not to have a repeat of Walkerton." Under the proposals, farms will be divided into categories based on nutrient units - the amount of nitrogen or phosphorus produced in the manure of their farm animals. Johns was further quoted as saying, "We are also going to (be)consulting on the standards for nutrient applications to the land. We are going to be talking about setback distances for applying nutrients around waterways, the restrictions for spreading nutrients on snow-covered land, record keeping and data filing." The agriculture ministry will approve the plans and the environment ministry will enforce the regulations. Ms. Johns said farmers and municipalities are being consulted to ensure the regulations "protect our water and the environment as well as maintain the competitiveness of agri-food industry," but she emphasized all parts of Ontario must be abide by the same rules. "The regulations ... have a standardized effect across the province, so what happens is the bylaws that are in place in local municipalities will be replaced by a standardized set of provincial regulations," she said. Mr. Stockwell also announced the Conservatives' Safe Drinking Water Act
will be introduced in the Ontario Legislature in the upcoming session
of Parliament, which begins on Sept. 23. Trial
Begins over Odor Control Issues The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages and asks that the defendants be prohibited from continuing operations at the pork production facilities. David Domina, an attorney representing the partnerships, said the hog units are in a sparsely populated area and are in operational compliance with state permit requirements. The trial is expected to take about a week. In a related story researchers now say ultrasound may help remove some of the odor from hog manure. David Soll, a biological sciences professor at the University of Iowa, has applied for a patent on ultrasound technology that cuts in half the buildup of hydrogen sulfide, a major odor-producing ingredient in hog manure (the "rotten egg" smell). Scientists and industry officials say the technology could be an inexpensive, way to minimize a major complaint against CAFOs and may be also effective in treating waste from dairy, beef cattle and poultry operations. "When [manure] has been treated, it definitely has a 'softer fragrance' to it," Bruce Rastetter, president of Heartland Pork Enterprises, the nation's No. 9 pork producer, told AP. In tests on small amounts of frozen manure, Soll found that ultrasound increased the solubility of the manure, slowed production of ammonia and speeded up oxidation. A large-scale test is under way at a 1,300-head confinement barn south of Alden, Iowa, where manure in a storage pit has been piped through a "sonification chamber" before being pumped to a nearby lagoon. Acoustic waves generated by titanium tubes vibrating 20,000 times a second penetrate the manure, breaking chemical bonds and triggering reactions that alter the normal decomposition process. This spring, researchers will test ultrasound on larger confinement lots and lagoons. A panel of professional smell testers will judge the effectiveness of the technology, comparing the aroma of the treated manure with that of untreated confinement pens and lagoons, Soll said. Opponents of large-scale hog farming are skeptical. Hugh Espey, rural
project director for Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement in Des Moines,
said making large operations smell better doesn't solve other problems,
such as water pollution and the threat posed to smaller, family hog producers.
"Our bottom line is Iowa has too many factory hog farms in the first
place," Espey said. "We should be looking at ways to improve
sustainable farming by smaller, independent producers."
World
Meat Demand to Rise, Animal Disease Fears - FAO will trade in meat and meat products," the United Nations agency
said. "However, increased volume of trade and improvements in transportation,
infrastructure and technology hold potential risks of spreading of animal
diseases rapidly worldwide." FAO said recent animal disease outbreaks
in major meat exporting countries, such as mad cow disease, or bovine
spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), had accelerated a shift in consumption
away from red meat to poultry.
Three years ago, a large hog farm housing 10,000 pigs opened 5 km down
the road from Jerry Cook's home. He likes rural living and the clean environment
that goes with it but not the pig farm. Cook and dozens of others became well known protesters, lobbying government to get rid of the pig farm. Some worried about its effect on the environment. Others about its effect on people. Now, the group has received some indirect support from the Canadian Medical Association. The CMA has passed three motions: Dr. Les Allaby, head of the New Brunswick Medical Association, supports the motion. "There's been a big expansion in industrial hog farming in Ontario and Quebec apparently. It's encroaching on neighbouring communities and it's causing concern." Allaby says currently there may not be a problem in New Brunswick, but industrial hog farms should be investigated. But provincial Agriculture Minister Rodney Weston says he won't call for a moratorium. Weston says one large pig farm in New Brunswick has been studied and there isn't a problem. To Jerry Cook, that's hogwash. "I wondered if he was cleaning sand out of his ears because the policy of the province is just to bury its head and pretend this whole thing isn't happening." Cook says the CMA's comments are another weapon in his group's arsenal and may help to close the nearby hog farm. The
Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities says red tape is holding
this province back from a booming business. The group wants to make it easier for large hog and cattle operations to get the go-ahead to build in Saskatchewan. The association's president, Neal Hardy, says right now it can take up to three years for a developer to set up shop, because most municipalities don't have any zoning for intensive livestock operations. The association would like to see communities decide ahead of time whether they want cattle and hog barns, and then put the appropriate zoning in place. "We want to get rid of the red tape as much as we can," explains Hardy. "But [deal with] environmental concerns, water pollution and all the rest. Look after that because that's very important." "At the same time, don't make a developer spend hundreds of thousands of dollars going through a bunch of red tape that doesn't do anything for anybody when they could be spending it into the developing themselves," he urges. Hardy believes a plan like this would boost the economy and create jobs and he says the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities has been holding meetings with government officials and others on the issue. The group plans to have a set of proposed bylaws developed for its mid-term convention in November. The idea is not without its opponents, however. Isabel Muzichuk farms near a large hog operation and runs a group called "The Concerned Citizens for a Safe and Healthy Environment." She's frustrated that the public isn't being consulted on this issue. "It really concerns me that meetings are going on behind doors with governments and municipalities without even consulting with farm families in this province," exclaims Muzichuk. "They'd better remember that the taxpayers are still out here, and
we do not want this kind of pollution going on in our backyard."
An
expert panel in drug immunity and agriculture told Health Canada that
it should tighten up certain rules or Canadians may become immune to certain
antibiotics. Penicillin and other drugs for animals can be purchased at many farm supply stores and gas stations. The panel reccommends making all animal drugs prescription-only. Curt Hagele is with the Saskatchewan Veterinary Medicine Association. He says farmers risk losing all access to antibiotics if they're not used carefully. "You know the average producer, to protect his industry, is responsibly using these drugs, but sometimes the information isn't there that a veterinarian might be able to provide them with to make sure that he's doing what's really the best thing to do with those drug" says Hagale. Donald Low is a microbiologist at Toronto's Mount Sinai hospital. He is also a member of the panel that made the recommendations. He says it's too easy for farmers to buy injectable drugs to treat sick animals. "Well we found it was difficult to know that because there's no way of tracking microbial use in Canada and that was one of the reccomendations, that we should be able to track use," says Low Low's panel told Health Canada it would be safer to sell animal drugs by prescription only. They also want to study the antibiotics that are constantly being mixed into livestock feed. Michel Lepage farms east of Saskatoon. He has 60 head of cattle, but he doesn't believe in fattening them with drugs. He says he gets a better price for his meat that way. He warns food will cost more if authorities make every producer follow more stringent rules. "I think the consumer might have to think of that and the end result would be higher prices for the meat," says Lepage. Health Canada says it is planning an education campaign for livestock
producers. Department officials say they are still reviewing the rest
of the panel's recommendations. Drug
traces surfacing in Saskatchewan river Water samples have shown small amounts of various pharmaceuticals in the river, everything from birth-control hormones to cholesterol-lowering drugs. Mark Servos of the National Water Research Institute says it's nothing to worry about. "There's very little evidence to suggest that these chemicals make it through water treatment facilities", says Servos. "There's only few indications and very unique cases where drinking water seems to have been contaminated." Servos says traces of pharmaceuticals are turning up in rivers across North America and Europe. But the amounts are so small, they don't pose any immediate risks to the Environment. Curb
farm antibiotics, Ottawa told The use of antibiotics by Canadian farmers should be significantly reduced and placed under tighter controls, says a report prepared for Health Canada by an expert panel. The recommendations come as fears rise that the heavy use of antibiotics in farming is placing humans at risk from infection by dangerous, drug-resistant superbugs. The 19-member group, which included representatives of agricultural organizations, spent two years preparing its report, which has yet to be publicly released. The panel's six major recommendations: Antibiotics for agricultural use should be obtained only by prescription. Antibiotics can be bought from feed stores and co-ops, and are routinely added to feed. The import of antibiotics should be regulated. Antibiotics are imported without the requirement of licences from countries such as China and Taiwan. Antibiotics should be used only for the purposes for which they have been approved. Some antibiotics are administered to animals not to fight disease but to help fatten them. The widespread use of antibiotics for this purpose is estimated to increase an animal's weight by 1 per cent to 11 per cent. The mechanism by which antibiotics promote growth is not known. However, there are strong suspicions that continued low dosages diminish the effects of endemic diseases, ramp up the immune system or kill digestion-inhibiting bacteria in the gut. Growth-promoting antibiotics should be tested to determine which are effective. "I think farmers will favour this because they don't want to be paying for things which are not truly effective," said panel-member Donald Low, chief microbiologist at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto and a world expert in antibiotic resistance. "If we have data saying they are wasting their time here, they won't want to use these drugs." The use of antibiotics by farmers and ranchers should be monitored. No one knows the amounts, but estimates have pegged use in North America at 80 per cent to 87 per cent by weight of all antibiotics sold. However, this estimate could be misleading because when antibiotics are used for growth promotion, dosages tend to be very low. The rise of antibiotic resistance in farm animals should be monitored. While there are no useful figures, a study published last year in the New England Journal of Medicine says that in the area of Washington, D.C., drug-resistant strains of salmonella related to food poisoning were found in about 17 per cent of chopped meats and 17 per cent of chickens. "If you don't know what the problem is, it is hard to solve it," Dr. Low said. A recent study in the United States suggests that animal-induced resistance to just one common antibiotic -- fluoroquinolone -- results in 400,000 excess days of diarrhea a year. The Canadian approach of increased vigilance and regulation cuts a middle course through a range of possible responses by government. In 1998, the European Union banned for use as animal-growth promoters antibiotics that are important in human medicine. Recent studies in Denmark, which initiated a similar ban in 1995, indicate the effectiveness of such a ban. Resistance by chickens to one common antibiotic fell to 6 per cent from 73 per cent, and by pigs to 28 per cent from 94 per cent. The recommendations are not a "Draconian approach," Dr. Low
said. But they likely will not constitute the last word in a rapidly evolving
field. He said the collection of more animal data on farm-animal antibiotic
resistance here and in the United States could move scientific sentiment
toward a European-like ban.
These plants, called confined animal feeding operations, or CAFO's, now exist in 44 states. The question is how to minimize their harmful environmental effects and prevent them from putting a final squeeze on smaller farmers, especially those who raise animals in more traditional, grass-based ways. Factory farms have taken root mainly where zoning laws were lax or nonexistent, or in states where citizens were prevented from filing suits against agricultural operations. The inevitable byproduct of huge concentrations of animals is huge concentrations of manure, which is stored in open lagoons and eventually sprayed on farmland, though there is usually far more manure than local fields can absorb. In such quantities, manure becomes a toxic substance. Spills are always a risk, as is groundwater contamination. The bigger danger is airborne contamination of water from ammonia, which rises from the lagoons and falls into low-lying rivers and estuaries. A new report from the Sierra Club, titled "The Rapsheet on Animal Factories," draws a vivid portrait of the environmental violations caused by factory farms, many of which are owned by some of America's largest agricultural corporations, including ConAgra, Tyson Foods, Cargill and Smithfield Farms. What brought these factory farms to the Sierra Club's attention was a pattern of violations that resulted in criminal charges and fines, most often caused by toxic spills. The federal government should at minimum serve as a neutral umpire in the fight between big and small farmers. In the case of factory farms it should try to control their threat to the environment through broader, more vigorous application of the Clean Water Act, typically invoked only in the most egregious cases. And it should never use taxpayer money to encourage a method of farming that works against the public's desire for open space, biodiversity and clean, non-malodorous air. Unfortunately, the government has been putting its weight behind big business. The Environmental Protection Agency has issued basically toothless rules under which the states give permits to any factory farm that comes up with a plan for handling manure, mainly by building larger lagoons to hold it. The new farm bill that President Bush signed in May adds further insult by paying farmers up to $450,000 apiece to help them comply with regulations that don't mean much to begin with. The regressive farm bill also continues the government's policy of throwing its weight behind the already hefty industrial farms and helping to drive smaller farmers out of business. In Iowa, for instance, the number of hog farms has dropped from 64,500 in 1980 to 10,500 in 2000, though the number of hogs, about 15 million, remains the same. The public's money, in this fight, is going in the opposite direction of the public interest. The concentration typical of factory farms extends to the genetic level as well. The poultry and pork industries depend on just a handful of different types of turkeys, chickens and pigs, and the beef industry is headed in that direction too. There has been a precarious narrowing of the genetic resources that supply most of America's meat. The danger is that of an inverted pyramid, an enormous number of animals all resting on the same narrow genetic base, exposing them to the risk of catastrophic disease and requiring an inappropriate use of antibiotics to ensure their health. Genetic diversity is no less important in domesticated animals, like hogs and chickens, than it is in wild animals. The best way to guarantee it is to guarantee a diversity of farmers. Last updated: September 8, 2002 |