Don’t Put All Your Eggs In One Basket

Don’t Put All Your Eggs In One BasketHow the factory farm model exacerbates the Bird Flu Epidemic

Chicken and turkey factory farms cram thousands, even millions, of birds into one facility.  This model of raising livestock creates the perfect conditions for diseases like the Avian Bird Flu that has spread across Iowa and Minnesota.

• Birds in factory farms are unhealthy to begin with. Birds in confined unsanitary conditions have decreased immune systems that make it more difficult to fight off disease. This means the disease can spread quickly, infecting every bird in the facility before it’s detected.  Birds on small family farms are less dense and controlling the spread of the disease could be easier.
• Birds in factory farms are almost genetically identical. This means when one bird becomes infected the entire flock will become infected. Birds on small family farms have varying genetics so some birds may not be affected by the spread of the disease.
• Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. The factory farm model of raising chickens and turkeys creates a system that could collapse and create an economic crisis as we’re seeing with the recent Avian Bird Flu Epidemic. Small family farms can be quarantined quicker and because they are spread out, could isolate the crisis without taking a big hit to the market.

Before Iowa Governor Branstad throws more taxpayer money and resources in to cleaning up this factory farm created crisis Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, Iowa Department of Natural Resources, United State Department of Agriculture, and other involved agencies need to answer the following questions publically to ensure these factory farms do not cut environmental corners in the cleanup just to get birds back into the building:

• What is the full emergency plan to fix this crisis?
• What methods/chemicals/gases will be used to kill all the birds?
• What will happen to the birds after they are dead?
• Will the dead birds be spread on the land and if so, what effects will the chemicals used to kill the birds have on soil, water and air? What chemicals are in the fire retardant foam and will this be spread on the land?
• Will the dead birds be tested for remnants of the virus before being spread on the land?
• Millions of dead birds will create quite a stink in rural Iowa, what is your plan to ensure neighbors will not lose their quality of life while the birds are decomposing?
• Are there any reports of natural birds being affected by this flu?
• If industry and government officials say this was caused by migratory birds, where are the dead migratory birds and how many have you found?
• Are any of the factory farms receiving their chicks from the same hatchery?
• What is the expected cost to taxpayers for this clean-up? (This is an industry that is already heavily subsidized by taxpayers.)
• How will the industry be held accountable for creating the conditions where disease, like the Avian Bird Flu, can spread rampant and crash an entire sector of the economy?
• How much are factory farm owners receiving per bird in compensation costs? What’s the total payout so far?

How the industry is already heavily taxpayer subsidized:

• sales tax exemptions on feed; ($219.6 million in 2010 across all factory farms)
• sales tax exemption on energy used to heat and cool buildings; ($9.1 million in 2010 across all factory farms)
• sales tax exemption on implements of animal husbandry ($34.4 million in 2010 across all ag)
• sales tax exemption on domesticated fowl ($8.9 million in 2010)
• sales tax exemption on lab tests for livestock (including fowl) ($3.5 million in 2010)
• other sales tax exemptions… (fowl bedding, etc)
• property tax exemptions allowing them to be taxed at the rate of the ag land they occupy, rather than the taxable “productivity” value of the building.