Hog Watch Manitoba News November 2002 |
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Can
we reform factory farming? Can we reform factory farming? By Lou Marano WASHINGTON, Nov. 15 (UPI) -- Will Matthew Scully's new book reform factory farming the way muckraking exposés of a century ago reformed the meatpacking industry? Scully, a former speechwriter and special assistant to President George W. Bush, sees his chapter on industrial farming to be the heart of "Dominion: The Power of Man, the Suffering of Animals, and the Call to Mercy." It also is the one that is likely to draw agreement among the broadest range of readers. In a phone interview, Scully cited a favorable review by Fred Barnes in the Oct. 30 edition of the Wall Street Journal. "Here you have a noted conservative in the business paper of the world who basically concedes that factory farming is cruel and morally troubling," he said. "The methods used in livestock agribusiness are inconsistent with any decent ethic of animal husbandry." Christopher Hitchens, in a review in the November issue of the Atlantic Monthly, wrote that when he reads of "the close confinement of pigs and calves in lightless pens, I feel myself confronted by human stupidity, which I recognize as an enemy." With such a range of agreement, what should be done? As usual, it comes down to both the personal and the political. "Duty requires that, individually, we distance ourselves from cruel practices," Scully told United Press International. The essential first step is going out of our way to buy meat from animals that have been humanely raised. "The law also should establish very clear standards in the care of animals," he said. "You have companies caught up in a frenzied competition. You have a certain sympathy for them, because if one company doesn't employ a particularly harsh and efficient measure, then the competitor will -- and will be able to sell the product for less. But if the law applies clear standards to all, then you will put an end to that moral race to the bottom." Scully is troubled that laws against cruelty to animals specifically exclude livestock. He favors federal statutes similar to the ballot initiative to amend the Florida constitution that voters passed on Nov. 5. It prohibits narrow gestation crates in which pregnant sows don't have enough room even to turn around. What about the objection that it's fine for yuppies to pay three times as much for eggs laid by free-ranging hens, but this penalizes working families on limited budgets? "I'm not sure there's a great deal of validity to that argument in America, where most people can afford those extra few dollars," replied Scully, a vegetarian. "But assuming that's true, it imposes a certain moderation on people. Maybe they will eat a little less meat, but the meat they eat won't have the taste of a bitter life." Chapter Six, "Deliver Me From My Necessities," evokes unease in even the most unregenerate omnivore. Bucolic images of grazing ungulates, barnyard chickens, and rooting swine are seriously out of date in modern agribusiness. In fact, it's hard to find a farmer, much less a visible animal. In January 2001, Scully pulled in at random to six hog farms in North Carolina without encountering a living soul. He eventually found storage facilities filled with 400 or 500 animals that are never let out. Scully wrote that what Smithfield Foods calls "vertical integration" is similar to what we used to call "monopoly." "Once the 'live' had been taken out of livestock, and all regard for the well-being of the animals had been abandoned, the next challenge was how to take the farmer out of farming," he wrote. This consists of absorbing rivals until only a few remain. In large areas, Smithfield controls the "farms," the transportation, the packing plants, the advertising, and -- through contracts with the grocers -- much of the market itself. "And finally," Scully wrote, "through its sheer size as a feature of the North Carolina economy and unsparing political contributions, Smithfield usually gets its way in the state's legislature and regulatory agencies." In this environment, small producers find it very difficult to compete. "In North Carolina, most who survived did so by signing up as contract farmers for Smithfield." "Only the least-cost producer survives in agriculture," a Smithfield executive told Scully. But no conspiracy was needed to build this behemoth. "Mass confinement met vertical integration to provide the cheapest goods for the greatest number in the most efficient way, and consumers rewarded it." For the animals, this efficiency takes the form of giant "finishing barns" where 500 hogs await slaughter. Into 25 strawless pens of only 7.5 square feet each, 20 pigs are packed. At a farm with "breeding, farrowing and nursing barns," Scully and the executive could find no one on duty except a slight man named (his badge revealed) Roberto who spoke no English. In a "gestation barn," 600 sows were encased in iron crates so small they could do nothing but sit and suffer and scream at the sight of humans. It gets worse, but you get the idea. For the gruesome details, read the book. For Scully, the natural cost of a product must be determined within the standards of decent animal husbandry. The price of meat raised under conditions of factory farming is unnaturally low, he argued. "Conceivably, you could make it even cheaper by inflicting even more severe privations on these animals. And no doubt somebody will dream them up. But at a certain point you have to ask yourself, 'What are the limits? And when do moral values take precedence over economic values?' "I think conservatives, above all, should understand that human beings aren't just consumers," he told UPI. "My basic position is that if you can't do something humanely and decently, then you shouldn't do it at all. Farmers have to observe that standard. You have to operate within reasonable moral boundaries. And if that means a higher cost of doing business, and a higher product price, then so be it." Scully called "abhorrent" the practice of feeding swine and poultry remains to their own kind and to cows, sheep and goats. "And you talk about unnatural. But there is this 'anything goes' mentality among corporate livestock producers that loses sight of the animals in their care as living creatures with minimal needs of their own." Scully asks only that general public standards be applied. "The argument
I attempt to make is very flexible," he said. "I don't require
that readers live up to my standards. I ask them to consult their own
standards. And I am absolutely certain nine of 10 people believe that
eating meat is essential and healthy and entirely legitimate provided
the animals are treated humanely. So we have a problem. The standards
of the public are not being observed." Raising
a Stink: The controversy over pig farms The biggest worry
for the people of St. Marie is their health. Maria Robichaud lives near
the spray fields. Last year, she developed weeping sores in her ears and
nose. This year, they wouldn't heal. So she visited her doctor. Migrant workers pack up their dreams and come to Manitoba to take jobs on farms and at Maple Leaf's pork-processing plant, but the rules that govern them are raising the hackles of labour leaders Roberto Rocha contemplated the job offer posted in a Mexican municipal office for six months before taking the plunge. With one suitcase, the soft-spoken 20-year-old travelled from the industrial mega-city of Leon to Brandon for a coveted job at Maple Leaf's pork-processing plant. "I came simply to work," said Rocha, a former employee of a Leon tannery. "The work I did in Mexico, I don't even want to think of it any more." Now, after six weeks of English classes and on-the-job training, he's one of the fastest cutters on Maple Leaf's production line, and is teased for spending his wages on sharp new clothes, including a brown, '70s-style leather jacket. There are more than 300 Mexican workers in Manitoba, most of whom toil on vegetable farms near Portage la Prairie as part of a decades-old government guest worker program. About 45 workers, though, are working in Brandon's state-of-the-art meat-processing plant, part of a controversial program that will expand fourfold next year. Another 200 Mexican workers are expected in 2003, as the company ramps up plans to add another shift to the plant, which now employs about 1,300 production workers. The first wave of Mexican workers arrived in January. For every one hired, 25 applied to a recruitment office in Leon. Most say they would like to become Canadian citizens. Unlike many new immigrants, the Mexican workers are not left to flail around on their own as they search for apartments, apply for health cards and set up bank accounts. The company offers intensive English classes, with more courses scheduled later at the union hall. Local Catholic churches, especially St. Augustine's, are opening their doors, and a Spanish-speaking Maple Leaf staffer acts as a liaison, helping the workers get settled and find their bearings in Brandon. Plus, a second wave of workers who arrived in August got advice and even a place to stay from those on the job since January. But, labour leaders and aboriginal groups say the practice of importing labour from poor countries drags down wages and nixes a worker's right to sell his or her labour elsewhere. The temporary work visa -- one or two years -- allows its holder to work only for Maple Leaf, meaning they cannot go down the road and work for meat packer Springhill Farms in Neepawa, where wages are $2-$3 per hour more than at Maple Leaf. That circumvents basic supply and demand forces between workers and employers, said Jan Chaboyer, Brandon Labour Council president. That could be fixed if the foreign workers were simply given landed immigrant status. "We're just saying that if they're good enough to work here, they're good enough to live here," said Chaboyer. "If employers can set up shop anywhere in the world under globalization, then likewise workers should be able to move freely, too, to where the salaries are." Maple Leaf's Steve LeBlanc said the company badly wants the Mexicans to immigrate and plans are in the works to have immigration papers in place once the temporary work permits expire. He said the company is also exploring Immigration Canada's new nomination program, which allows employers to sponsor skilled labour for waiting jobs. Another criticism goes like this: If Maple Leaf can't attract workers, it should simply increase salaries, which are among the lowest for Canadian meat packers. Leah Laplante, vice-president of the Manitoba Metis Federation-Southwest Region, says Maple Leaf's wages are simply too low to recruit workers. "To move a family into Brandon for $8.65 an hour, you can't do it. You just can't do it," she said. That wage works out to less than $18,000 per year. The MMF has also placed members in jobs with Maple Leaf. Maple Leaf's human resources manager Steve LeBlanc maintains wages are not the only way to attract employees. "Companies have to be careful. Just throwing money at the problem is not a solution," said LeBlanc. "We believe we're paying a very market-competitive rate. Many industries paying very competitive rates are still having a challenge finding employees." When Maple Leaf announced it would build its $120-million plant in Brandon, well-paying jobs were anticipated. Meat packing has always been a hard job but what kept workers loyal in the past was a pretty good wage. However, Maple Leaf slashed its wages by 40 per cent prior to opening in Brandon in 1999, dropping the starting salary down to just $8.65 today. It also enjoys a seven-year collective agreement it negotiated with the United Food and Commercial Workers -- one of Maple Leaf's demands before it agreed to open shop in Brandon. The contract doesn't expire until 2006. "The challenge for us is Brandon is a fairly tight labour market. Unemployment is about three or four per cent," said LeBlanc of Maple Leaf. Maple Leaf tried recruiting in the Maritimes, northwestern Manitoba and rural Saskatchewan and Alberta, with limited success, said LeBlanc. It then turned to the federal Human Resources Development Canada to find foreign labour. The Mexican labour also addresses Maple Leaf's other concern: high staff turnover. Their work visas lock in the Mexican workers for one or two years, and they have far lower no-show rates than Canadian workers. The Mexican workers who arrived in January all earned the six-month perfect attendance award which entitled them to a healthy bonus. Another concern: When the new shift is up and running, the union fears Brandon's infrastructure, especially its housing stock, won't be able to handle an influx of about 800 workers, both Canadian and Mexican. But the union says it is talking with the provincial government, pushing it to start looking at improving housing, child care and other services. Francisco Echeverria, who left behind a wife and two daughters in Leon, shrugs off the suggestion that the leap into life in Brandon was jarring. "I was looking for another job, and I saw the ad in the newspaper and I think 'Canada? Why not?'" said Echeverria, who checked Brandon out on the Internet before coming. "I like the town atmosphere. You don't see violence. You can walk anywhere at three or four in the morning and nothing will happen." Echeverria's English is strong, and he hopes to become a Canadian citizen, something Maple Leaf is lobbying the province and federal government for. Meanwhile, on the province's vegetable farms near Portage la Prairie, the practice of importing Mexican workers has been in place for decades. It mirrors a similar practice in the tobacco fields and greenhouses of southern Ontario, where concerns have been raised about the migrants' access to decent housing, employment standards regulations and basic community services. But labour and agriculture groups have raised no such concerns in Manitoba, and the men who spend six months at a time among the rows of cabbage, celery and carrots have a 70-per-cent return rate, said Darrell Fiel, the federal government's point man on the program in the region. As part of a contract, employers must provide the Mexican migrants with workers' compensation coverage, decent housing, a portion of their travel expenses and laundry facilities. maryagnes.welch@freepress.mb.ca
Groups
Seek Investigation of Hog Manure Lagoon According to Cook, the Conservation Council of New Brunswick, in cooperation with the Association for the Preservation of the Bouctouche Watershed, conducted a water sampling program for fecal coliforms along a small watercourse which once crossed an area now occupied by a large manure lagoon. "During the construction of the lagoon, this watercourse was diverted and a subsurface drainage pipe was installed as a mitigating measure", says Cook. The sampling program consisted of three sample sites along this watercourse: the spring, which is the source of the watercourse; the watercourse, before it enters the property where the lagoon is located; and near the pipe, where the watercourse is supposed to exit the property. These sites were sampled on three separate days (September 28, October 4 and October 21). Samples were analyzed at Atlantic Water Testing in Moncton and a private industry laboratory.
Milewski believes fecal coliforms are a "deleterious substance" as defined by section 36(3) of the Fisheries Act. AI have written to Environment Canada asking them to investigate the manure lagoon as a possible source of fecal coliform contamination. If this proves to be the case, then the operation is in violation of section 36(3) of the Fisheries Act and should be prosecuted accordingly, says Milewksi. Fecal coliform contamination
of shellfish beds is a chronic problem resulting in a significant loss
of livelihood, as well as recreation, for many local residents. According
to Milewski, large manure lagoons such as the one in Sainte Marie-de-Kent
pose a significant threat to water quality for humans and wildlife, particularly
shellfish. PRAIRIE
HOG BARNS Foes
says intensive livestock production harms environment
Schneider
Corp. buys out Mitchell "Beyond
Factory Farming." So-called "Intensive Livestock Operations" came in for a rough ride in Saskatoon this past weekend. Farmers, activists and water experts from the Prairies and U.S. came together for a conference called "Beyond Factory Farming." They roundly condemned the practice of housing large numbers of animals, whether they are chickens, turkeys, hogs or cattle in what are called "Confined Animal Feeding Operations," often owned by large corporations. People at the conference claimed the waste from these plants, which are more like industries than farms, is massive and harmful to the air, water, soil and people. The head of the Sierra Club of Canada, Elizabeth May, says Canada has become a major exporter of pork. But this has come about by taking production away from family farmers and concentrating it in the hands of a wealthy few. "No wonder that it's often the traditional pig farmer who objects to seeing an industrial livestock operation moving into his community or her community because they just know this defies any normal, sustainable order of things. This is going to, you know, the old cliché there, there goes the neighborhood. There goes your air quality, there goes your water quality, there goes a lot more health issues around antibiotics, antibiotic resistance, our accessibility to drugs we're going to need when we need them...the constant prophylactic use of antibiotics to increase production & boost growth in animals that really don't have much reason to grow, confined to the cages indoors all their lives. There are also animal issues, animal welfare, animal well being. Sierra Club of Can. Is not an animal rights organization but I just don't think any living, breathing, sentient human being can accept that animals as intelligent as pigs should be living in the kind of conditions that go on in those small cages. It's another issue but it needs to be said." Applause up & out.
"On July 21st at 9.15 in the evening, near the community of McGregor, not far from where I live, an above-ground manure storage tank burst. A million gallons of hog slurry dropped out onto a sandy aquifer. Immediately, all that was left on the surface was the solids, of course. 2 wells in the immediate area were contaminated. About 10 days later, a reporter 'foned me, & he said, I got an anonymous call that something went wrong at McGregor. He gave me a land description. I drove over. You could see what had happened. & so then it was exposed, the media jumped all over it, & the govt & the industry had time to put in force damage control. & they come out & they said well, yes, there was a spill but, you know, the system worked! Because it was reported within an hour & 15 mins. of the spill! What they didn't tell the public was, they didn't know that barn was there! Because any barn built before 1998 in Manitoba was not licensed. They don't know where they are! They're up in an airplane now, following Hogwatch around, lookin' for barns.! A member of the Waterkeeper Alliance in the 'States, Rick Dove, had an ominous warning for Canadians at the meeting. He says factory farms have already taken a devastating toll on the Neuse River in his State, North Carolina. He presented pictures and interviews, documenting the growth of pathogens which thrive in polluted waters there. Dove says a billion fish in the State have died from pollution which has come largely from big hogs operations. He says people who come into contact with the water such as fishermen, can develop nasty sores and even memory loss from airborne pathogens. "Any family farmer using family farmer practice can't compete with 'em at the market place. So where are they making all their money? They're making all their money by externalizing their costs to the environment which is our environment. You know that & everybody else knows that here today, so...we've learned those lessons so, now this industry is going all over the world telling us the lies they told us in North Carolina, trying to convince everybody that this is an ok thing to do. They are finished in North Carolina & in my opinion, they will never build the new technology in North Carolina kuz they can't afford to do it & they can't afford to do it because they can afford to do it cheaper if they take it to Canada. So I apologize to you all because we are driving 'em to you & we're driving them out of the country in my opinion kuz we're tightening down on the regulations & we're after them to the point where we're not going to let 'em get away with this pollution any more. So they're trying to do it to you & the question is, can you learn from our example." Among the sponsors
of the conference were the Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives and
the National Farmers' Union. Large
Pig Barns Spreading North The two-day meeting, called Beyond Factory Farming, included speakers from Canada and the U.S. Delegates said that many provinces have gone out of their way to attract large farming operations in order to boost the rural economy. But government inspectors rarely look at the big barns, and leave it up to companies to report on where the manure is being dumped and how it's affecting drinking water, they said. "As the industry expands, they don't increase their capacity to monitor and inspect," said Manitoba rancher Fred Tait. "In fact their capacity decreases." Limit barn size, improve inspections Tait, who is president of Hogwatch Manitoba, became concerned about environmental risks after a large hog barn's waste storage tank burst near his home last summer – polluting wells in the area. The above-ground container wasn't built properly, he said. On top of that, "the province didn't know the barn existed." Conference delegates said companies should not be allowed to build such large barns, and inspections should be conducted by people not connected to the owners. A man from North Carolina, Rick Dove, told the meeting about a river near his home that became contaminated by toxic levels of manure from a giant livestock operation. Land and water in Prairie provinces will also become polluted unless action is taken, he predicted. "It is insane to do this in Canada," Dove said. "Trying to raise these animals in these large, large numbers in such a cold climate. Where's all that waste going?" Written by CBC News
Online staff Animal
rights groups applaud Florida hog crate ban CHICAGO — Animal welfare groups, bolstered by a Florida vote that bans the popular swine industry practice of keeping pregnant pigs in small pens, said Wednesday they hope other states will follow to make hog farming more humane. Florida voters Tuesday approved a state constitutional amendment to prohibit commercial hog farmers from housing pregnant sows in cages that are too small to turn around in. The proposal, placed on the ballot by animal rights activists, passed 55 percent to 45 percent. The measure will have only limited effect in Florida. Among the state's 10 commercial hog farms, only two use the small stalls known as "gestation crates" to house pregnant pigs, and one of those is going out of business in December, the Miami Herald reported last week. Hog farmers say the stalls are necessary because sows are aggressive and will attack each other to get more food if housed together. Housed in separate cages, they receive individualized nutrition and cannot hurt each other, farmers have said. Animal welfare groups reject those arguments. "It is a national movement to prevent this type of cruelty on factory farms," said Wayne Pacelle, senior vice president of the Humane Society of the United States. "We won't be satisfied until all states ban the keeping of pigs in 2-foot-by-7-foot crates for the bulk of their lives." Another group, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, also cheered the Florida vote and said use of the crates is one of several practices in the livestock industry that harm animals. "If a dog or cat were treated similarly, people could go to jail," said Bruce Friedrich, a PETA spokesman. Pacelle said the Florida amendment should boost efforts to ban the practice in top hog-producing states such as Iowa, North Carolina, Nebraska, and Illinois, either with similar petition-based ballots or by working through state legislatures. "It certainly gives momentum to any effort that would be advanced to ban gestation crates in other states," Pacelle said. About 64 percent of the nation's roughly 80,000 hog farms use the gestation crates, pork industry officials said. "We've have both types of systems," said Missouri hog producer Kathy Chinn, who is also chairman of the National Pork Board's animal welfare committee. "We have moved progressively toward the stalled system as opposed to the group housing because we find it much better to care for our sows." The board is a farmer-funded industry group that works to promote pork and develop new pork products. In September, more
than 900,000 sows on U.S. farms "farrowed" or gave birth to
a litter of pigs, according to the latest monthly U.S. Agriculture Department
data. Each litter usually consists of seven to nine piglets. Top corporate
hog farmers include Smithfield Foods, Premium Standard Farms, and Seaboard
Corp. Last year, Virginia-based Smithfield owned 710,000 sows, Missouri-based
Premium Standard 211,000 sows, and Kansas-based Seaboard 185,000 sows,
according to industry statistics. Provincial
laws now available online, Manitobans looking for information about provincial laws that affect their daily life--from adoption to workplace safety--can now find it online at no charge. "Manitobans will now have free access to the content of Manitoba's provincial laws in both French and English," Eric Robinson, minister responsible for Statutory Publications, announced today. "This new Web site provides a real service for all Manitobans." The Web site contains the current version of over 450 acts and 800 regulations made under those acts. Current information and continuous updates were previously available by paid subscription only. The Web site includes up-to-date amendments to the acts in the Continuing Consolidation of the Statutes of Manitoba. The information addresses everything from the establishment of provincial parks and their hours of operation, to the filing of articles of incorporation. The statutes are available at www.gov.mb.ca. "Putting Manitoba's laws online enhances citizen access to justice in this province. This is an effective use of technology that connects Manitobans to their laws passed by the legislative assembly. It not only permits access to legislation, but also provides opportunities for Manitobans to form opinions on how various legislation can be improved," said Attorney General Gord Mackintosh. "This service
means Manitobans can get the information they need, when they need it,
free of charge," said Robinson. "The free online service is
part of the government's commitment to improving citizen access to key
government information and services."
Kentucky
"Right to Farm" Act In August 1997 the
Attorney General for Kentucky offered the following written opinion regarding
whether or not industrial-scale hog operations should be protected by
the "Right-to-Farm" Act in that state: Responding to low hog prices and soaring feed costs, Saskatchewan's provincial government has established a short-term loan program to help the province's pork producers. Deputy Premier and Agriculture, Food & Rural Revitalization Minister Clay Serby said he was "pleased to announce this program in response to the needs of Saskatchewan's hog industry." He said the short-term program will help the province maintain its hog industry and continue with plans to grow the industry in the long term while providing producers with up to $26 million (Canadian) in loans to "help them through the current low price/high feed cost situation." When hog prices are below $145/100 kg, the program will provide a loan -- of the difference between the average market price and $145/100 kg -- to a maximum of $50 per hog marketed. Weanling producers will also be eligible for loans up to $10 per weanling while the average market hog price in Saskatchewan is below $145. "The long-term profitability of hog production in Saskatchewan and the environment for creating jobs and opportunities in rural Saskatchewan remains strong," Serby said. Loans under the program will be available for hogs marketed beginning Sept. 3 this year through April 30, 2003, and will bear interest at bank prime rates. For the period to March 31, 2004, loans will be repaid when prices are above the $150 level, with one-third of the difference between the average hog price and $150 going toward loan payback. On April 1, 2004, the remaining loan amounts will be termed out over three years. The new loan program is similar to a program started by the provincial government in 1998-99, which helped pork producers address a similar market downturn. ©2002 Feedstuffs, Miller Publishing Company. Laura Krebsbach "Psychology
of Hog Barn Stench" To the editors, In practice, the Pork Council is merely doing what any other industry now considers normal public relations -- deny the complaints, and pay experts to put forward results which contradict studies not in their favour. Falding reports a less-than cosy relationship, but does a disservice to readers by not explicitly reporting on any conflict of interest that may have existed during Schiffman's studies. Well, who paid Schiffman to pay people to sniff pig poo? Schiffman's experiment, as reported, seems inadequate. One-time exposure to malodourous and corrosive gases is unlikely to find any harmful effects. Repeated, long-term exposures -- comparable to living next to a hog operation -- would more likely reveal what has been shown in more substantive studies: VOCs are readily absorbed by the bloodstream, and can saturate the brain; corrosive gases do result in tissue damage; toxic gases can cause harm in exposure levels far below the LD50 (mean concentration causing death); and any number of these substances can result in lowered liver function, or liver damage. Based on this Free Press report, I have to assume that Schiffman only intended to study the psychological effects of exposure to noxious smells. While this may be a small contribution to the larger debate, it cannot be substituted for studies which examine longer-term exposures. I do think Schiffman's study may have some merit -- determining that an odour by itself can affect people negatively. Sadly, we live in a society where calling something a 'psychological effect' is interpreted as non-serious. Certainly, revulsion is quite real and will -- for example -- interfere with the sale of a property. David Henry Government
is hiding information As this last sitting of the Legislature gets underway, the Lord government needs to be called to account on one issue that pervades several departments. The issue is secrecy. In withholding information from New Brunswick citizens, Bernard Lord’s ministers exhibit an attitude that is at best patronizing and at worst, downright anti-democratic. Here are some examples. Earlier this month, Education Minister Dennis Furlong refused to release a report by an Alberta education consultant who was hired to analyze why our students consistently perform very poorly on standardized tests. This is the very question New Brunswickers are asking and to which we would like some answers. After all, it’s our children and our tax dollars at stake. The Minister’s excuse for not releasing the report is that it is classified as “Advice to a Minister,” which under the Right to Information Act, is confidential. This is a gratuitous interpretation of the Act which in other jurisdictions has been successfully challenged. I seriously doubt if the report went to the Minister as advice. Instead it would have been chewed over by the senior policy bureaucrats, run through the political filter at the deputy minister level, and then presented to the Minister in the context of his department’s view on it. The real ‘advice’ would have come from his senior staff on what to do with the report, not the report itself. It appears, then, that the Minister is using the Right to Information Act to hide a report that contradicts the views and approach of his department. By not releasing the report, he is sending the message that he does not want an expert viewpoint in the hands of citizens, who might then use it to hold his government accountable for its policies and actions. A similar situation exists with the 10,000-head hog barn and open manure lagoon in Ste-Marie-de-Kent. Citizens of that community and neighbouring Bouctouche have complained bitterly about the air pollution and the threat to water from this operation. To respond, Premier Lord appointed a ‘expert’ panel to examine the issues and recommend what to do, promising to make the report public. Once delivered to the Agriculture Minister, the panel’s report quickly disappeared. After intense pressure, only the recommendations were released, the major one being that the barn be moved. The government rejected the recommendation and instead gave the barn owner $1.5 million to try to stop the stink and thus the opposition. On a recent CTV-W5 documentary, Agriculture Minister Rodney Weston revealed his allegiance on the issue when he stated that the barn owner was the victim, not the people who live with the nauseating air pollution. Given his predisposition, then, we can only conclude that the secret report incriminates the government and/or vindicates the citizens. By not releasing it, he avoids accountability for not accepting the panel’s recommendation to remove the barn, and dismisses the people who live there. The final example is the way government has protected the aquaculture industry from public scrutiny. Despite the fact that this industry operates in public waters, sweeping confidentiality clauses in the Aquaculture Act deny public access to information about what aquaculture companies propose to do, how they are doing it, and until recently, their environmental impact. Small steps have recently been taken to loosen up the grip on such information. The Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Aquaculture is now encouraging companies to ‘agree’ to release new site applications on request. Presumably, if they don’t agree, the information will continue to be withheld. Given the ludicrous situation that the public is invited to provide written comment on site applications, but cannot get the application documents to review, this is a tiny concession. It remains unacceptable that the discretion to release the documents rests with the individual company. As for environmental information, as of this year, each company will now submit its monitoring data to the Environment Department in accordance with the Clean Environment Act (until now the aquaculture industry was not subject to environmental regulations). According to a department official, this data will only be released to a citizen if they request it under the Right to Information Act. This carries with it a fee, a 30-day period for the department to respond, the possibility that the company will be informed and will object, a possible denial, appeals, etc. No other industry regulated under the Clean Environment Act has the government playing interference on its behalf. Even this goes further than aquaculture minister Rodney Weston would like. In a CBC interview, he said he sees no purpose to be served by releasing environmental information on aquaculture sites, as he sees no purpose in releasing the report on the Ste-Marie situation. It seems Mr. Lord’s government need a refresher course in democracy, which is, of course, the ultimate purpose to be served by public disclosure of information. Transparency makes for a better informed citizenry. Informed citizens hold governments more accountable for their actions to protect the public interest against private and bureaucratic interests. The more information people have, the better our government will be. An
argument against public disclosure, then, is an argument against better,
more accountable government. Is this how the Lord government wants to
be seen in the run-up to next year’s election? Can
municipalities live with Manitoba's new livestock initiative? Regardless of how they have reacted to the issue of expanding hog production recently, the response of many municipalities has clearly disappointed both the Province and the hog industry, as represented by the Manitoba Pork Council and Keystone Agricultural Producers (KAP). Although hog production grew by about 19 per cent in 2001, the Province and industry advocates believe the number should have been much higher. On July 22, the Hon. Rosann Wowchuk, Minister of Agriculture and Food, announced the Province's Livestock Stewardship Initiative (LSI). Its objective is to promote expansion of the livestock industry in an environmentally sustainable way. Among the planned changes: The Province will be lowering the threshold for the application of its manure management regulations from 400 animal units (AU) to 300 AU. This lower threshold, the requirements for commercial manure applicators to be certified and licensed and for manure management plans to be prepared by professional agronomists, and the ban on winter manure spreading are all intended to allay concerns about potential contamination of ground and surface water. The Province is also promising to expand research and monitoring of the long-term impacts of ILOs - again with the intention of calming the fears of local residents. The following changes are intended to standardize the approval process for ILOs among Manitoba municipalities, thus improving the prospects for ILOs to be approved by councils: The Province will require mandatory local planning and a livestock operations policy in the development plan. All local planning authorities must prepare and adopt development plans containing a livestock operations policy. This policy will identify areas where ILOs will be permitted, restricted or prohibited. Development plans will require approval from the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, and the livestock operation policy will be approved in partnership with the Province. After these requirements have been adopted in legislation, municipalities will have up to two years to prepare and adopt or revise their development plans to include a livestock operation policy. The Province will introduce standards on the siting, setback and separation distances that councils will use in livestock operation decision-making. These standards will be based on the existing farm practices guidelines and will override any distance requirements in existing zoning by-laws. Municipalities will, however, have the right to vary the standards slightly. The Province will also introduce a standard review process for ILOs that will replace the current municipal conditional use process. All ILO proposals of 300 AU or more will require public notice, a local hearing and a technical review committee report. Councils will be able to decide whether to vary the provincial standard, whether a development agreement is needed, or if other conditions must be met. There will be no appeal mechanism for the councils decision. Thats because the main purpose of the local hearing process will be to deal with the specifics of the ILO application, and the development plan has already addressed land use policy considerations. Is the Province's new approach one municipalities can live with? "I believe we can, although we'll have to wait until we see the final legislation,"says AMM President Stu Briese. "My hope was that it would take some of the pressure off local councils. If the environmental side is addressed properly, it may just do that." President Briese says one way to improve the climate around environmental concerns is for the Province to better communicate what it's doing in this area. "Let the public know when they are doing monitoring and enforcement, so people won't assume the Province does nothing after these proposals are approved." According to President Briese, the AMM is generally supportive of an expanded livestock industry. "But as the industry grows, the Province and that industry have responsibilities they must meet." Getting that point across has meant a major lobbying effort for the AMM. Minister Wowchuk's announcement in July followed months of consultations between the AMM, the Province, the Manitoba Pork Council and KAP. Some of that lobbying has paid dividends. When the AMM met with Minister Wowchuk last March, President Briese suggested that specific zoning could be created to designate where ILOs could be located safely an idea that the Province seems to have adopted. The AMM continually stressed the importance of municipalities having the final say over land use planning decisions; the lack of an appeal for the municipal decision also appears to reflect the AMM position. At the same time, President Briese and the rest of the executive repeatedly called on the Province to give municipalities and local residents as much information as possible so councils can make an informed decision. This suggestion appears to have gone unheeded. The Province is sticking to its plan of providing only a preliminary report by a technical review committee to councils facing an ILO proposal. In spite of that, provincial officials say it's all about finding a balance between community interests and the broader needs of the Manitoba economy. "Our government has always believed that local land use planning is the best mechanism through which local governments can manage development, including intensive livestock development," said Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Jean Friesen. "Our proposed changes to the approval process will ensure local control over land use, while giving the industry a sense of clarity and predictability." Friesen is referring to the proposal to allow municipalities to identify, in their development plan, areas where livestock operations may be permitted, permitted to a maximum of animal units or prohibited. "We're expecting that there will be some municipalities that will have a restrictive livestock policy in their development plan & but a municipality or planning district will need a rationale for that policy." The Province has proposed changes to the approval process that will:
Some of the changes have been undertaken to date and others will be implemented over the next 12 to 18 months. So the AMM will continue to have to monitor the proposed plan and any further possible changes to it in coming months. For their part, livestock industry advocates appear pleased with the plan. Weldon Newton, President of KAP, says his organization is supportive of what the Province has said they'll do. But he adds the possible delay in passing legislation makes him uncertain about how the new policy may impact the hog industry. "The disappointment is it's not going to be law for at least another year,"says Newton. "At this point, they still haven't dealt with the issue." He says that under the proposal, the government and some municipalities could face a period of conflict over their current anti-ILO bylaws. "If there are bylaws that go against the farm practices guidelines, they'll have to roll those back and that's not going to be a pleasant situation." But what does KAP have to say to those who believe municipalities should have the final say over all kinds of business development in their jurisdiction including hog operations? "I would turn that around,"says Newton. "How do you accommodate an industry that's prepared to meet reasonable environmental standards?" Many councils are
hoping they can find the answers to that question.
The following presentation was made before Ontario's General Government Committee on November 21, 2002. The submission comments on Bill 175, the Sustainable Water and Sewage Systems Act. Part
I: Lake Ontario Keeper has a unique perspective Lake Ontario Keeper works with individuals and groups in the United States and Canada – we monitor water quality, investigate polluted sites, and use environmental laws to protect our water and communities. We have two patrol boats out on Lake Ontario, and we visit dozens of communities each year. I think it is safe to say that Lake Ontario Keeper is likely one of the few groups this committee will encounter that knows first-hand what it’s like to stand in the water at the mouth of a combined sewer overflow. Our experience splashing through rivers in Toronto, Hamilton, and Kingston has taught us that our waste water operators are not paying at least one of the costs identified in Bill 175 – the cost of treating and discharging waste water. This experience is what we would like to share with you today. As I understand it, the purpose of Bill 175 is to identify the actual costs of providing water and waste water services and to ensure that system operators in some way recover those costs. Lake Ontario Keeper supports Bill 175 and its objectives because we believe that full cost accounting is the only way we can begin to appreciate the true costs of clean water. Full cost recovery is also the only way we can stop imposing these costs unfairly on others, especially communities with less political clout: poorer communities, immigrants – and the fish, wildlife and water that can’t vote. Lake Ontario Keeper’s submission is this:
Part II: Externalized
costs in our current waste water system This is certainly true in the case of Ontario’s sewage systems. Every time the City of Kingston dumps untreated sewage into the Cataraqui Harbour, it avoids one of the costs of providing a service. Every time Toronto’s Combined Sewer Overflows dump raw sewage into the Don River, the fishers, swimmers, and wildlife are pay our waste water treatment bill at the expense of their livelihoods, their community, and their health. During the course of these hearings, you will likely hear numerous descriptions of the state of our waste water treatment systems. It is possible you will hear about millions of dollars in upgrades which have been made, and the billions of dollars still waiting to be spent. Let me describe the system from the perspective of someone who spends a great deal of time on the water. In Ontario’s large cities, sewage pipes and stormwater pipes are connected underground. During the dry season, all of the wastewater in the pipes is supposed to be carried to sewage treatments plants where it is treated and then discharged into waterways. During wet weather, too much stormwater enters the system, exceeding its capacity. In order to prevent backups and basement floodings, the combination of stormwater and sewage is dumped into our rivers and into Lake Ontario through outfalls called “Combined Sewer Overflows” or “CSOs.” Lake Ontario Keeper spent much of this year monitoring Combined Sewer Overflows on the Red Hill Creek in Hamilton, the Don River in Toronto, and the Cataraqui Harbour in Kingston. In each city, we saw how waste water service providers regularly dump untreated sewage into local waterways – even during dry weather. In Hamilton, not one single Combined Sewer Overflow on the Red Hill Creek met Ontario Water Quality Objectives for E. Coli – and this was during the dry season when no bacteria discharges are expected. In Toronto, sewage pollution renders the Don River unsafe for body contact recreation every single day. City reports estimate that the Don will still be contaminated 100 years from now. In Kingston, raw sewage discharges have been closing beaches for half a century. Even here in Toronto, local government claims that beach closures are going down. This is not because our beaches are getting cleaner, but because the City of Toronto has permanently closed 50% of its beaches in less than ten years – the beaches that remained open were typically cleaner beaches, but even they have seen a steady rise in closures due to contamination. So what happens when service providers try to shirk these costs by dumping untreated or poorly treated waste water into our waterways? The costs do not disappear: The costs are borne
by citizens who cannot swim at public beaches. That’s why we need full cost accounting and recovery.
To safeguard against the misconception that government standards might be optional, sewage system operators should be required to consider the costs associated with treating and discharging waste water in compliance with government standards. In the current system, these standards are not being met. In 2000, there were 92 municipal sewage plants out of compliance or conformance. Preliminary figures for 2001 suggest plants have gotten worse (64 facilities, with 12 out of 22 regions reporting). Lake Ontario Keeper samples taking in Hamilton, Toronto, and Kingston reveal E. Coli levels ranging from 9,000 to 20,000 times Ontario Water Quality Objectives. The alternative to full cost recovery – that we lower our standards in order to appease polluters – is unthinkable. Waterways belong to the public at large, and any insult, any interference with public access is akin to an act of theft. In the 1980s, Ganonoque lost its beach because the municipality found it cheaper to shut it down than to stop polluting it. What the city failed to recognize was the fact that frequent beach closures were merely symptomatic of a larger problem.
The City of Toronto hopes to have the sewage discharges into the Don River stopped in 100 years. Given that water quality is so poor the river is not safe to touch today, those projections are appalling. We need reasonable timelines within which to upgrade out systems. The goal of Bill 175 is sustainability – it says so right in the title. Clear timelines will ensure long-term sustainability cannot be sacrificed for the allure of short-term gain.
Kincardine extends Liquid Manure moratorium till March 31, 2003 After presentations by OMAFRA, a local farmer group, Ontario Pork, and the local Concerned Citizens group, the Council of the Municipality of Kincardine voted 8 to 1 to extend the moratorium, in place since March 25, 2001, to next spring. Details of the meeting as well as the history behind this vote can be found at: http://www.bmts.com/~jkaminski/kincard/ One of the interesting
discussions came from Deputy Mayor Sharon Mooser. She asked whether Council
could set by-laws on areas where the provincial regulations were silent.
The answer was YES, and other councillors supported Sharon's concept of
determining what is left over once the province gives details of the Phase
2 and Phase 3 regulations. Council would then see if odour, water risk
assessments, and other topics could be covered by local by-laws.
W-Five show entitled "Raising a Stink" Go to the CTV website for great coverage on the W-Five show entitled "Raising a Stink" --- includes video links to 2 clips from the show. (1 - 12 minutes long the other 7 minutes long). You will require Windows Media Player installed on your computer to view the clip. Last updated: November 26, 2002
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