IATP Hog Report - Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

Section 6
with respect and patience. Now we are looking at a pork
industry in this country that looks at their pigs in terms of
how much money they will generate first and the pigs' wellbeing
second. I see an industry that is quickly alienating its
customers and is starting to worry about the quality of its
product too late. 102
Why Farm Animal Welfare is Today an Urgent Issue
Over the past 10 years, with little local opposition, factory farm owners
and supporters have fought for and won major revisions in state
anticruelty laws, arguing that their cruel practices are standard in the
industry. In some states, farm animals have been the losers in political
tradeoffs between state humane societies (not affiliated with the H.S.U.S.),
that want stronger penalties for cruelty to pets, and agribusiness interests,
that want to weaken cruelty statutes for farm animals. In place in 30 states
(as of 1999) are laws exempting farm animals from those states' anticruelty
statutes. 103 Twenty-five states prohibit the application of their anticruelty
statute to all accepted, common, customary, or normal farming
practices. Idaho's amended statute states that when these practices are
applied to farm animals, "they are not construed to be cruel nor shall they
be defined as cruelty to animals, nor shall any person engaged in the
practices, procedures, or activities be charged with cruelty." 104
In revising state animal cruelty laws, state legislatures have handed the
agribusiness community "the power to decide for itself what constitutes
cruelty to animals." 105 This argument was rejected by Mr. Justice Bell in
the "McLibel" verdict: 106
[the argument was presented that] any practice which
accorded with the norm in modern farming or slaughter
practices was thereby acceptable and not to be criticized
as cruel. I cannot accept this approach. To do so would be
to hand the decision as to what is cruel to the food industry
completely, moved as it must be by economic as well as
animal welfare considerations.
In a number of states only veterinarians or agricultural extension agents
are allowed to make a determination of cruelty with respect to a farming
practice, while state humane societies retain jurisdiction over acts
committed against non-farm animals. The animal agriculture industry thus
not only controls the definition of what is cruelty to farm animals, but,
"effectively build[s] a barricade to prevent anyone but the farming
community discovering what actually occurs on the farm. The role of a
prosecutor or judge is nonexistent." 107
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