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Maple Leaf Angus said:
DiamondSCattleCo said:
Ditto with the intensive ranching we see these days. I keep large pens with few animals in each in order to minimize sickness, and they are only in pens during calving season, but certainly others do not. And if the margins keep shrinking, beef production will soon go the way of hog and chicken barns. Thousands of animals crammed into small barns, loaded full of antibiotics and new strains of viruses cropping up nearly daily. Its the corporate mentality, and probably even "more efficient in the long run", but at what cost?

Rod

I agree with you Rod. Have you thought about ways to present and promote alternatives?

Therein lies the difficulty. The best science promotes all these drugs, pour-ons, and intensive livestock methods as being completely safe. No residues left behind, no problems.

While I believe in the old-fashioned (ie: organic) methods of food production, its difficult to present those ideas and not be thought a quack because we have a dozen "flat earth" scientists bellaring that current production methods are perfectly fine.

So, I think a starting point would be an organic producers organization. Not separate splinter groups like we have now with grain producers in one, fruit producers in another and so on, but 1 large organic producers association entailing every segment of food production: grain, proteins, fruit, dairy. And the spokespeople must be realists. No radical "we must change everything today" types, but rather pragmatists who can work within the current system while trying to enforce reasonable change.

The initial purpose of this organization would be to get public and private grants to fund research into the true side effects of the current production methods. There must be sound science involved and ready proof. The scientists that are hired must be of "sound mind and judgement". No sky is falling quacks who jump on the latest environmental bandwagon, but rather scientists who are truly interested in the truth.

When, or rather, IF proof is found, the second purpose of the organization will be to deseminate the information to the people, and to the powers that be though radio, TV, Internet, and papers.

Your question left me unprepared; to tell the truth, I hadn't given alot of thought to the promotion of healthy food production. My first thought was that this big ol' organic producers association would first head to the farms and promote organic methods of production, however without real proof, real evidence, I suspect that would be counter-productive. Organic beef has been tried, and has by and large failed miserably. Its not economically feasible, and if the organic association sat and screamed murder, without solid proof, they'd just fade away and be background noise.

While I'm sure most beef producers would prefer to not be injecting their cattle with arrays of drugs, its an economic reality right now. Margins are very slim, and getting slimmer all the time, and producers have families to feed. So your best 8 month pregnant cow comes up with a bug, and you shoot her up to preserve her, her calf, and all the calves that come later. Its pretty tough to convince a producer that that animal should be culled out since she's shown that she is susceptible to a certain kind of disease.

So we're left with getting solid evidence as a first step.

Maple Leaf Angus said:
And while you are thinking, have you tried thinking the current trends through to their inevitable outcomes?

Maybe this should be a new thread.

My crystal ball doesn't work all that well but I think we're going to see beef production slowly go the way of the hog barns and chicken plants. I saw a horse meat ranch once in Montana and was sickened by it. Horses that were rarely allowed to exercise, all crammed into small pens, fed medicated feed to keep them on their feet.

And with the move towards assembly line beef production, I think we're going to keep seeing more and more virulent strains of bacteria and viruses, but I also think that medical science will prevail, if the bean counters let them. I don't believe the doomsdayers who tell of an evil virus that will wipe out mankind. The human species will survive and adapt, but I'm not sure if I like where we'll be a couple hundred years from now.

Rod
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