NYT columnist Nick Kristoff called attention today to CA Prop 1:
The stunning passage in California, by nearly a 2-to-1 majority, of an animal rights ballot initiative that will ban factory farms from keeping calves, pregnant hogs or egg-laying hens in tiny pens or cages in which they can’t stretch out or turn around. It was an element of a broad push in Europe and America alike to grant increasing legal protections to animals.
This movement plays to Massachusetts’ economic strengths: small farms that produce high-quality products — and must compete with brutal out of state factory farms like those CA-1 will regulate in California.
We should do everything we can to support our many thousands of farmers and agricultural workers: those jobs are important. Since, as previous discussion here has established, we don’t have any giant factory farms how about a local version of Question 1 to make sure we don’t get any, regulate any operations that might come close to the line, and strengthen the position of our small farmers. Any other ideas?
marcus-graly says
I can see why having other states pass this law would help our farmers, but it doesn’t make sense that just passing it alone would help us.
stomv says
If it’s a small farm which is already in compliance because it’s not a factory farm, then the farmer working it gains an advantage because it drives up the cost of his competitors. Heck, it may only apply to farms which have more than x animals on the lot at any time.
<
p>Clearly, if more workers are required per animal, then the regional employee base is helped (increased demand for their labor) but the price of food will go up too.
<
p>Food is cheap because of the factory farms. Food may also be less healthy in both the nutrient sense and the carrying-disease sense because of factory farms. Factory farm food certainly doesn’t taste as good. Factory farms tend to be more likely to cause groundwater pollution, river pollution, and have nasty stenches which travel farther. So, it’s a trade off. Given that these farms impact the general public, a public policy regulation may make sense.
<
p>In the mean time, I can’t wait for my local farmer’s market to open so I can spend more money to buy tastier, fresher, more healthy produce, cheese, meat, and ice cream.
syphax says
I’m all for efficient operations- I make my living helping to make supply chains more efficient.
<
p>And I’m all for eating meat. I’ve been a vegetarian in the past, but now am a latent one- I don’t go seeking meat often, but I don’t turn down a good hamburger if offered.
<
p>But I do believe in basic humane treatment for farm animals.
<
p>Besides, although factory farms appear efficient, they really aren’t. There are a lot of external costs and market distortions that make the cost/lb of e.g. beef from a factory farm artificially low.
smashrgrl says
Another more local way to support Massachusetts farmers would be to call the Boston City Council members and Mayor to support a public Farmers Market in Boston.
sethjp says
I love farmers markets but I don’t understand what the difference would be between a “public” farmers market and the farmers markets that take place at Haymarket or on Copley Plaza.
howardjp says
When people talk about “public markets”, they are usually describing the year-round markets that you find in Seattle, Philly, Detroit, San Francisco, Rochester, NYC, etc. In addition to fruits and vegetables, you might find local meats, cheeses, baked goods, art work and more. Farmers markets are generally more seasonal, especially in this region. There’s clearly a lot of overlap — The Boston Public Market, for example, has run and will this year run a farmers market in Dewey Square/South Station, but their long term goal is to create a permanent market.
<
p>Haymarket, by the way, is neither, as product comes from the warehouses over in Chelsea from around the globe and is sold on Fridays and Saturdays by the pushcart vendors year-round.
howardjp says
The BRA is supporting the creation of a “Market District” in the Haymarket area that would add a public market featuring local products to the mix there (pushcarts plus planned supermarket nearby). Last year, the Legislature passed a $10 million authorization for the creation of a public market as part of the Environmental Bond Bill. Efforts are now under way by the Boston Public Market Association to: 1) Secure space for a year-round market in Parcel 7, the Haymarket Garage Building which is vacant (not to be confused with the larger Government Center Garage, which the Raymond Group wishes to redevelop, and 2) secure some of the funding passed by the Legislature for the build out of the market, which would serve as a “hub” for local and regional products and generate a projected $16 million in sales per year. (Note: the author has worked with BPM over the past few years)
kbusch says
What do we eat in February?
stomv says
jane says
and whatever you’ve frozen or canned.
bostonshepherd says
Wouldn’t these costly restrictions simply shift production to other states?
<
p>Seems to me it’s not very effective unless all the states pass the same legislation. And even then, that may mean more beef from Canada, and more chickens from Mexico. Unless you want to start a trade war.
ryepower12 says
according to Bob and others, we don’t have factory farms in this state yet, then no, it won’t “shift production to other states.” What it would do is help protect local farms, that sell to local companies, but could cease to exist if factory farms moved in… which would presumably sell to those same, local companies — for less.
<
p>Honestly, I don’t think this legislation should be a priority, but it seems like a good idea. And it also seems like many states are in the process of committing to this legislation, with California (a huge farming state) being just the best example.
kbusch says
Proposition 1 sounds like something where the heart was in the right place but the practical, real-world consequences went unexplored. I write that even as one not particularly open to animal rights arguments.
<
p>Heart in the right place. Reading Pollen’s Omnivore’s Dilemna and In Defense of Food or Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation, one learns that the beef we get from the supermarket comes from animals forced to live unnaturally close to one another and forced to eat corn. They are so unable to digest corn that they develop horrid digestive problems that require out-sized pharmaceutical intervention. Cows were made to eat grass — and curiously grass co-evolved to be eaten by ruminants. Cows were not made to eat corn with a side of antibiotics.
<
p>The government-subsidized, artificial cheapness of corn has caused all kinds of distortions in the American diet. The fact that the price of meat has declined relative to the price of vegetables means that we can afford to eat too much of it. It has ceased to be something special and has in an unhealthy way become something we overeat.
<
p>In In Defense of Food, Pollen makes the case that the horror about saturated fat was the result of political pressure. No politician was going to say, “Eat less meat.” Yet, studies are clear on the dangers of meat, but surprisingly ambiguous on saturated fat.
<
p>Brain missing. That said, the Soviet Union learned the hard way that social experiments with food production can have bad side-effects. Most notably famine. Repairing an economy dependent on unnaturally cheap unnatural food had better be done delicately.
demredsox says
I understand your argument for a slippery slope here, but since you are criticizing this specific piece of legislation, this must be said.
<
p>Compare:
<
p>
Preventing animals from being stuck into tiny cages-legislation that barely affects small farmers.<
p>-Taking small farmers, stealing their land, and demonizing an entire segment of the population, often sending them to prison camps.
kbusch says
I’m saying that the economics of this kind of thing are treacherous. (By the way, I’d expect that CPSU imagined that collectivization would mostly be peaceful and straightforward. Edgarthearmenian may know this history better than I do. I read it a while ago.)
<
p>The economics are tricky first because there’s not a lot of agility. I cannot decide this week to have a field full of wheat next week; I cannot suddenly change my inventory of chickens or pigs.
<
p>Further, most people buy most food based on price. Has Stop & Shop ever said its broccoli tasted more delicious than Shaw’s? Does Market Basket tout the superior flavor of its sirloins? Have you ever heard of a shipment of some really excellent canned tomatoes with a superb balance of acidity and sweetness?
<
p>No, no, and no. We hear only about price.
<
p>That’s because most of the market is driven a whole lot by price and only a very little bit by quality. Imposing a change on farms that improves quality but increases price would seem to me to be reckless if not thought through carefully.
<
p>However evil they may be, those agribusinesses currently feed a lot of people. I’d like to see them change. Really. But not recklessly.
kbusch says
The New York Times editorial page has an interesting op ed that suggests that free-range pork is more likely to carry trichinosis than the factory stuff.
bob-neer says
Even though we know you like your politics bloody đŸ˜‰
kbusch says
Yes, one must cook pork before eating it. This is also true of fava beans and taro. The question isn’t cooking. It’s what constitutes undercooking and overcooking.
<
p>However many Americans cook pork way beyond the point of safety and serve something quite unpalatable. (Child, Beck, and Bertholde, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, volume 1.)
<
p>Further, one of the successes of factory pig farming has been the near elimination of trichinosis from the food supply.
<
p>This has lead to a considerable relaxation of what counts as undercooking. I’m often amazed at the degree of pink Cooks Illustrated will advocate.
john-beresford-tipton says
From what I understand of HR 872 and S 425, Agribusiness interests may well cancel local farming. There is a lot of money on the table and a lot of our elected bought and paid for. Once out of committee, look for this to pass easily. Agribusiness has this sewed up.