UK downgrades animal welfare agency

A re-organization of public agencies advising the British government on farm animal welfare has been announced in the UK as part of the administration’s round of spending cuts to reduce the national debt burden. A decision had already been reached to abolish one panel that has been advising government ministers on matters of animal welfare, but the new announcement says that the separate independent advisory body known as the Farm Animal Welfare Council will be reconstituted in the lesser form of an expert committee.
In existence since 1979, the Farm Animal Welfare Council’s tasks have been to monitor the welfare of animals in the farm-to-food chain and to advise the government of any legislative or other changes that may be necessary.
Harvey Locke, president of the British Veterinary Association, expressed relief that the welfare council  would not be abolished entirely, but warned that its new committee format must maintain its independence and expertise. “We would be very concerned if this move indicated a downgrading of the importance of farm animal welfare, especially in the current economic climate, which will be pushing farmers to drive down costs on farm,” he added. “FAWC has played an essential role in the way the government thinks about farm animal welfare and has succeeded in challenging both the government and the farming industry on matters of huge importance.”

Humane certified OK’s FASS standards

The Federation of Animal Science Societies (FASS) announced that its animal welfare standards have been approved by the Scientific Advisory Committee of the American Humane Association’s American Humane Certified farm animal program. This endorsement by an independent group of scientists gives the guide added credence, FASS said.
The standards were developed by a group of 62 professional animal, dairy and poultry scientists over a year that collaborated to write guidelines that capture the current state of science for farm animal care. The FASS Ag Guide was published in January this year.

Indiana legislature considers livestock care

Indiana House Bill 1099 and Senate Bill 116 will be debated in the Indiana legislature during the last week of February.
The intent of the parallel bills is to allow the state’s Board of Animal Health to regulate care of livestock and poultry. Bob Kraft, the spokesman for the Indiana Farm Bureau, said, “these bills establish the Indiana Board of Animal Health as the regulatory authority on animal care.” He added, “we support this legislation so that what happened in Michigan will not happen in Indiana.” In 2009, Michigan passed legislation that phases out veal crates, certain cages for poultry and gestation crates for sows.

Proposed 2011 USDA budget increases user fees

The U.S. Department of Agriculture 2011 budget sent to Congress this week includes an increase for the Food Safety and Inspection Service, which would be recouped from increased user fees. The Agriculture Marketing Service received a slight increase in total budget and is anticipated to collect $148M from the Commodities Grading Services Program. An increase in user fees for grading is therefore not anticipated for fiscal 2011.
The budget for the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service was lowered by $35M with an approximately 10% reduction in expenditures for avian influenza. Funds for Veterinary Biologics and Diagnostics would increase slightly to $47M. The budget for the Agricultural Research Service would rise by $20M over fiscal 2010 to include $3M for research on preventive measures against infectious diseases of poultry and livestock.
The budget for the Market Access Program was reduced by 20% to $160M and the Foreign Market Development Program was funded at a slightly higher level of $34.5M. The last two allocations relate to export of agricultural commodities and indirectly influence trade.

Petition seeks to add farm animal welfare regulations to the Ohio constitution

Activists have proposed a constitutional amendment in the state of Ohio that would effectively overturn the November 2009 voter initiative establishing the state’s Livestock Care Standards Board as the final authority in establishing farm animal welfare regulations. The voter initiative passed by a two-to-one margin in November 2009.
The proposed amendment is similar to California’s Proposition 2. It would put restraints on the housing of calves, poultry and hogs and place certain restrictions on on-farm slaughter of livestock. Proponents of the constitutional amendment must collect 400,000 signatures to place the proposal on the November 2010 ballot.
The petition move was widely anticipated following the preemptive measure adopted by voters in 2009 establishing the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board. Petition supporters include local humane societies, the Center for Science in the Public Interest and United Farm Workers. The Ohio Veterinary Medical Association is expected to respond negatively to the petition.
Recently the American Veterinary Medical Association announced a policy position against using ballot initiatives to reform animal welfare. The association favors expert bodies to set animal welfare standards, stating, “veterinarians and animal welfare scientists, who have been professionally trained to responsibly advance animal care, should thereby be given substantial opportunity for representation on welfare boards.”
The State Agriculture and Rural Leaders Organization encourages development of welfare standards through legislative committee processes with expert input. This organization considers that “ballot initiatives are poorly designed for addressing complex issues” such as establishing standards for welfare.

Farm group: UK animal welfare regulations inhibit competition

The United Kingdom has stricter livestock welfare laws than most countries inside and outside of the European Union, and a recent investigation by the Guardian newspaper found that a quarter of meat and poultry sold in the country comes from foreign farms that do not meet UK animal welfare standards.
UK agricultural groups are calling for better labeling of imported products and a move to make standards more uniform across the European Union.
"If consumers know anything about it, they probably think all the standards are the same," said Kevin Pearce, head of food and farming at the National Farmers Union. "We want to be able to compete fairly. If the customers say 'that's the standard we want', we want to do our best to produce it. Where we have a problem is if the price is too high or the supply too short, they'll go elsewhere to get it."
According to his organization, half of the pork production that feeds the United Kingdom moved to other countries after UK laws went into effect prohibiting sow pens and tethering. The Guardian confirmed that more than 50% of bacon and 43% of pork comes from countries that allow sows to be housed in smaller pens.
UK standards allow about 15 full-size chickens (38 kilograms total) per square meter of housing, while EU standards permit about 20 full-size birds (about 50 kilograms total) in the same space, the Guardian reported.
Organic certification standards also pose issues. The United Kingdom’s largest certifying body requires pigs to have free access to the outdoors and limits the size of poultry flocks to 500. Other certifying bodies permit limited outdoor access for pigs and do not put caps on the size of poultry flocks, the newspaper reported.