The Columbus Dispatch
Letters To The Editor
Factory farms' ethical problems all too real
Friday, May 3, 2002
Thanks to The Dispatch for its April 23 editorial "State crackdown."
As well as the farm's atrocious environmental record, the editorial noted
that Germany twice convicted Buckeye Egg's owner, Anton Pohlmann, of
cruelty to animals for abuse of the company's hens. Germany is way ahead
of the United States in its protection of egg-producing hens.
The National Public Radio show Living on Earth aired a report April 19 on
Germany's decision to ban cages for laying hens by 2012. Caged hens,
according to the European Scientific Veterinary Committee, "suffer
intensely and continuously."
While addressing the environmental issues, we need to consider the
husbandry from which factory farms' environmental mess is flowing.
Buckeye Egg Farm exhibits the link between the way hens are being forced
to live and the pollution that people are increasingly experiencing as a
result.
Under the new German law, farmers will not be permitted to house more
than 6,000 hens together in one building. This measure alone will benefit
hens and the environment at the same time.
It's deplorable that children are fighting off flies at school, but the
hens in cages have no escape from those same flies buzzing in their eyes
and spawning maggots in the corpses beside them. In short, there's an
ethical problem as well as an environmental problem that demands our
attention.
Karen Davis, president
United Poultry Concerns
Machipongo, Va.
United Poultry Concerns, Inc.
PO Box 150
Machipongo, VA 23405-0150
757-678-7875
FAX: 757-678-5070
www.upc-online.org
(UPC Letter on Buckeye Egg Farm in Columbus Dispatch)
|
|