Support of Veal Crates Violates Ohio Compromise.

In Ohio last June, a compromise was reached between animal welfare groups, the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation, and big agribusiness interests in which a ballot initiative was withheld in exchange for minor improvements to animal welfare. Animal welfare groups are claiming that a recent vote to support veal crates has violated the terms of the compromise and they are preparing to do battle.

Last June’s compromise was meant to ban extreme confinement in the form of battery cages, gestation crates, and veal crates. Just this past week, the Ohio Livestock Standards Care Board (OLSCB) voted 8 to 5 against the veal crate provision of the compromise thus continuing to promote the confinement of veal calves.

The whole reason for the compromise in the first place was so agribusiness could avoid being the targets of an embarrassing ballot initiative that would have caused voters to ban the most serious factory farm abuses such as they did in California with Prop 2.  Not only was Prop 2 effective at getting the worst abuses banned, it also caused a drop in total sales of animal products because people started thinking before they ate.

With the Ohio compromise looking like it’s dead, animal welfare activists are preparing for a massive campaign.  

Gene Baur, President of Farm Sanctuary, released a statement that is sure to raise the hair on the back of the animal industry’s neck.  In it he said: 

“The OLSCB cannot both defend veal crates and claim to have an interest in promoting animal welfare.  Hopefully, the OLSCB will reverse its ill-conceived endorsement of veal creates, but if it doesn’t, Ohio’s humane mined citizens will.”

Oh snap!

I kind of hope they don’t reverse their decision just so we can see the factory farm industry brought further into the light for all to see.  If the ballot initiative goes through, factory farms will have even less freedom to abuse than they did under the compromise.