Animal welfare: the right thing to do

I applied, and thankfully was accepted, for the National Beef Speakers Bureau.  The program is an exceptional fit for my passions and interests considering I am a fourth generation Arizona beef producer.  I am excited to have the opportunity to share why and how beef should be a part of an individuals day.  I am also thankful for my supportive husband who is currently holding down the fort with our 14-year old, 9-month old and flock of ewes who just started our early lambing season.  My man is quite the catch.  And I love him all the more for supporting me like this!

I am at a 3-day training for this year long commitment and I wanted to share a Temple Grandin quote with you that was shared with our group during a meeting with a group of individuals who oversee quality assurance, animal welfare and food safety for JBS - one of the world's largest protein suppliers. For those of you who may not know, Temple Grandin revolutionized animal handling methods to make them more humane and low stress.  She said, "I think using animals for food is an ethical thing to do, but we've got to do it right.  We've got to give those animals a decent life, and we've got to give them a painless death.  We owe the animals respect."

If you think using animals for food is unethical, well, I don't know what to say to you because we are on opposite sides of the fence because I don't believe that consuming animal proteins is an ethical issue.  However, I come from the camp that thinks using animals for food brings purpose to their life and abundant blessing to ours as humans.  I appreciate the good things that harvesting animals brings to my life like a nutritious protein source and many useful by-products.  In saying that though, I believe that treating animals with respect as we harvest them is the right thing to do and Temple Grandin said it very well.

I look forward to learning more during our training and will hopefully take some time to share the information with you.  I would love to hear from you if you  have questions about modern beef production.  What are your thoughts on how beef is produced today and what concerns do you have?

Rock on Feedlots

Arizona Young Cattlemen's Initiative (YCI) distributes a weekly email that is packed full of great information. Recently, this email contained a link to an article written for Precision Nutrition by vegetarian author, Ryan Andrews. Andrews was given an exclusive tour of the Magnum Feedyard in Wiggins, Colorado. He was stoked about the opportunity and had no clue about what his experience would be like. Fortunately for us (us = beef producers and other agricultural operations), Andrews was impressed by the healthcare, nutrition and sanitation that all cattle at that feedyard are exposed to. I am confident when I say that I think we would have found similar experiences at feedyards across the US. Props to Magmum Feedyard for doing an awesome job of representing one segment of the beef industry, and props to Mr. Andrews for his willingness to seek the truth when it comes to animal production in the United States. You can read the article for yourself here. A short excerpt is listed below to wet your appetite.

And, I have to say it. If my experience at Magnum is representative of other cattle farms, all those accounts of the dismal, depressing, disastrous cattle conditions seem to be exaggerated.
No, I’m not going to start eating meat again.

However, if I did eat meat, my visit to Magnum would have made me feel great about eating non-organic, non-grass-fed beef. Seriously. I can’t imagine the quality of meat would be substantially better with organic and grass-fed. Nor can I imagine the living conditions would be substantially better for the cattle.

Now, to be clear, we don’t require meat in our diet. And I don’t think we should be using cows for food, doesn’t matter if the cattle are kept on a feedlot or chilling in a waterbed listening to John Tesh. But that’s my own value system and I’m well aware that 97% of people in the U.S. eat meat on a regular basis.

However, considering the amount we procreate in the U.S. (there’s a birth every 8 seconds and a death every 12 seconds); and the amount of meat we eat (222 pounds per person, per year – not including marine life); and the small amount of money we’re willing to spend on food (we spend 9.6% of our disposable income on food, the lowest in the world. India spends 53%, Venezuela 34%, Italy 26%, Japan 19%, France 16%); feedlots have it right.

People want meat. And Magnum’s feedlot system is dialed in. They’re producing safe and cost-effective meat in, arguably, the most cattle-conscious way (short of opening up those pens and letting them run free). Rock on Magnum.

Progressive? I think not!

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) gave Baltimore Public Schools the "Proggy" Award for 2009 for establishing Meatless Mondays in their school system this year. Tony Geraci, the school district’s food and nutrition director was quoted in the Baltimore Sun as saying: “Tapping into a national campaign, the ‘Meatless Monday’ program is intended to make lunches more healthful, stretch the district's food budget and raise awareness about the environmental impact of large-scale meat production.”

Progressive? What?! Instead of progressive, I would desribe that as ignorant. The sole part of Geraci's quote that I can agree with is the part about stretching the budget. Protein is understandably the most expensive part of any diet. Expensive but necessary. But making it more healthful? Environmental impact? What about telling both sides of the story? Unfortunately though, where PETA is concerned, there is only one side to tell.

While I fully support the inclusion of an animal protein source in diets, the following points specifically speak to the value of including beef.

• Eating less lean beef will not solve the greenhouse gas problem, but it will negatively affect our diet quality by restricting a rich source of important nutrients. Iron deficiency is the most common nutritional deficiency worldwide, and beef provides the most readily available and easily absorbed source of iron.
• For America’s farming and ranching families, our land is not just where we raise cattle, it’s also where we raise our families. That means we have a personal stake in the quality of our environment; we always are looking for new ways to improve the air, land and water on or near our property.

I'm not so much disappointed in PETA as I am the move that Baltimore Public Schools made in pursuing this so called progressive decision. Maybe next time they will do a little more research when it comes to doing something that affects the 82,500 students in that district.