Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance

Fair food for all Australians

Response to the Proposed Draft Australian Animal Welfare Standards and Guidelines for Poultry

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View AFSA's entire submission here. 

The current review of the Model Code of Practice for the Welfare of Animals – Domestic Poultry offers the first opportunity in 15 years to improve the minimum welfare standards for domestic poultry in Australia. It provides the chance to modify Australian standards to reflect current animal welfare science and equivalent international developments.

The Proposed Draft is significantly more comprehensive than the previous welfare standards in the 4th Edition, as well as in other welfare codes for ostriches and emus, some of those standards dating back to mid-20th century management practices. We commend the collective and lateral efforts of the Animal Welfare Task Group (AWTG), the Stakeholder Advisory Group (SAG) and Animal Health 9 Australia (AHA), and welcome the opportunity to comment on the Draft during the 90 day public comment period.

It is necessary for Australia to lead a fundamental reshaping of animal welfare standards that meet international standards and community expectations, and that is based on scientific research and available data from Australian farms. Many farmers give ethical reasons for changing towards pastured poultry production methods because of the maximum animal welfare and provenance it offers if well managed.18

This submission aims to contribute on behalf of small-scale, pasture-based poultry producers so that best animal welfare standards can be achieved more readily and regulated appropriately.

In this submission, AFSA will primarily make comment relating to the standards and guidelines for domestic poultry due to scope of our representation of poultry farms extending to small producers of layers, broiler chickens and ducks. As principle, we support best animal welfare practices in the industry as a whole.

What the Proposed Draft means for Farmers- Farmers employing pasture-based practices will lose a once in a generation opportunity to be heard in the decision-making process relating to poultry welfare. Continued large-scale production of poultry will further dominate the market and drive small-scale farmers into ‘niche markets’.

What the Proposed Draft means for Eaters- It will turn a blind eye to popular demand for higher standards of welfare and eaters will continue to have low access to sustainably produced meat and/or eggs that positively impacts quality. Consumer quality perception when purchasing poultry will be informed by perceived standards of welfare and environmental factors that do not in fact meet their expectations.

What the Proposed Draft means for Poultry- Domestically raised poultry in conventional systems will continue to suffer from worse physical and mental states than those in countries with advanced animal welfare standards such as all nations of the EU, various states of the US, New Zealand and Canada.

What AFSA Members want- We demand that the Agriculture Ministers of all states and territories, Premiers and Local MPs support best examples of animal welfare standards using data relating to pasture-based systems. We urge that they back research into better solutions for livestock welfare to meet community expectations and public health interests. We support the development of a more inclusive, science-based system for setting animal welfare standards where an independent body monitors the animal welfare standards and investigates regulatory behaviour.


List of Recommendations

Recommendation 1: Phase out battery systems in the next 3 - 5 years and phase out all cage systems in the next 10 years. This should be done using a strategy to transition the industry such as that used in Austria (where battery cages were prohibited in 2009)19, and supporting long-term management of cage-free systems as done across the EU.

Recommendation 2: Transition poultry systems to free range over 10 years and during that transition reduce the maximum stocking density in barns or sheds (as they are phased out) for non-cage layer hens to 2 birds per metre squared and meat chickens 15kg per square metre. (Option E suggests reducing maximum stocking densities in barns or sheds for non-cage layer hens to 9 birds per m2 and meat chickens 30kg/m2)

Recommendation 3: Current practice of rearing poultry outdoors on pasture for egg and meat production be considered with the updated or new Regulatory Impact Statement and be added as a supporting paper to reflect the absent data on Australian poultry farms.

Recommendation 4: Establish an independent non-governmental body that oversees the development of animal welfare regulation and represents all relevant stakeholders including small-scale farm businesses.

Recommendation 5: Directly source data from Australian pasture-based farms and genuine free-range farms by visitation or by extended consultation in order to obtain correct information about the quality of alternative poultry production.

Recommendation 6: Explore research on alternative agricultural production occurring internationally in order to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the benefits of pasture-based poultry systems. Recommendation 7: Australia primarily sign the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare.

View AFSA's entire submission here. 

Small-scale, regenerative grain growers not supported by the GRDC

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The Australian Government's Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) recently released their Research, Development and Extension (RD&E) Plan for the next five years. The GRDC's purpose is to 'invest in research, development and extension to create enduring profitability for Australian grain growers'.

AFSA provided some feedback to the plan to ensure the plight of small-scale, regenerative grain growers are heard. It appears that the GRDC is only concerned with helping large-scale, industrialised and export oriented grain growers.

It was disappointing to find that the plan is solely focused on export markets and fails to address untapped domestic market potential. For example, there is a lack of 'heritage', single origin grains suitable for stoneground milling, wholegrain flours, sourdough baking and craft beer and whiskey production, among other uses. There's a shortage of Certified Organic and Biodynamic grains (such as cereal rye) for human consumption and stock feed (particularly for poultry and pigs). There is also an unmet demand for native grains like kangaroo grass and native millet. Native grains could provide a great opportunity for the industry to engage with the Indigenous community and contribute to a food system that empowers our country's Traditional Owners. Investing in native grains and other perennials is obviously also important for the health of our soils.

Rather than focusing purely on exports, Australia would benefit from fostering local grain economies, like what's happening in the States and parts of Europe. Similar to wine regions, we could be celebrating the regionality of our grains, the hard work of our farmers, and exploring the potential for a terroir. It would revitalise our rural grain growing areas by encouraging tourism and creating a sense of pride through the farm to table connection. The local food movement provides a great opportunity for growers to get a better price for their produce. CSAs and other alternative economic models could be explored to ensure security for growers.

Disappointingly, the GRDC's plan ignores the impact of various social issues that are prevalent in grain growing regions. For example, the loss of the family farm, gender imbalances, increasing farm debts, struggling towns, and community health issues, particularly mental health problems. These issues influence and are influenced by the grain industry which means the GRDC is obligated to address them in order ensure 'enduring profitability'.

The GRDC barely mentions climate change. This is extremely concerning as grain growers are likely to be severely impacted in a worst case climate change scenario. While they briefly talk about 'climate variability', it is not enough to prepare farmers for an uncertain future. The GRDC is obviously in a prime position to inform growers about climate change and assist in adaptation and mitigation efforts.

The plan fails to acknowledge the lack of small-scale machinery and equipment in Australia and the small number of processors available. Small-scale and entry level growers need access to appropriate machinery, lease and rental opportunities, storage solutions, and processors. The current system is clearly set up for large scale operations which means Australia is closing the door to a lot of innovation and growth in the industry.

The threat that GM and other technologies pose to Australia’s growing organic sector have also not been recognised in the plan. The GRDC needs to be engaging with growers on these issues as they will continue to be on the radar in the future. There is growing consumer awareness of GM and pesticide contamination, particularly glyphosate, in Australia and abroad. With their focus on exports, it's surprising that the GRDC is not concerned about countries considering to block imports containing GM and glyphosate residues.

More attention needs be paid to reducing costs to the farmer rather than the current productivist focus on ever larger yields in increasingly input heavy systems. The plan acknowledges that the cost of inputs have increased but fails to recognise that the use of inputs have increased too. The high cost of fertiliser and pesticides per tonne of grain produced in Australia, compared to other countries, suggests that R&D needs to be looking at ways to help growers move away from such a dependency on inputs instead of supporting cheaper products and innovation in the input sector.

The GRDC’s plan is clearly technocratic and does not recognise low cost, low tech alternatives that would benefit organic, regenerative and small-scale grain growers. Research needs to be geared towards value adding and closed loop systems, with extension services to help growers take control over their supply chains so that they are price makers rather than price takers.

Unsurprisingly, the GRDC aren't too concerned with diversification. Many growers are moving away from keeping livestock but this age old system of integrating crops with animals has many benefits if managed appropriately. The GRDC should invest in extension services to help farmers better integrate livestock within cropping systems through the use of holistic management techniques and pasture cropping. Research is also required to look at diversification of crop varieties over a rotation and also in situ. For example, mixtures of 'heritage' wheat varieties grown together can lead to increased yields, better resilience and enhanced soils.

Growers should be encouraged to consider ‘heritage’ and ‘ancient’ varieties for their marketable potential in terms of flavour and health benefits, and also the ecological benefits they provide on farm with increased biomass and extensive root systems. The greater the variety of grains grown in Australia, the more resilient our farmers and the industry at large will be.

With diverse seed in the hands of farmers, the GRDC could assist with the development of landrace varieties that are suitable for specific regions, rather than just investing in the current centralised, one-size-fits-all model of plant breeding. The GRDC could help facilitate relationships between small-scale growers, plant breeders, millers and chefs/bakers to work on developing varieties that tick all the boxes.

More research is required for no-kill and pasture cropping so that regenerative crop farmers can restore carbon in the soils and maintain soil structure without the use of pesticides. This will ensure stable yields over a long term and allow farmers to move away from costly, input heavy systems. Research and extension services are also required for organic pest management, with a focus on building resilient, biodiverse systems that prevent pest outbreaks.

It's clear that the GRDC is only concerned with creating 'enduring profitability' for industrial, export oriented, large scale growers. But with more and more small-scale farmers proving that you can run a viable business growing grain to feed your local community and regenerate the land, the GRDC may soon realise the consequences of its limited vision. Through collectivism and transparency, we'll have to build a local grain economy ourselves.

 

Courtney Young

You know it’s women’s work when everyone is working together

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You could see our diversity in the hodge podge, mismatched layers of clothing worn to protect us from the record-setting temperatures that never climbed above -8C, and later in our dorm rooms at night as the layers came off, leaving us as we were, stripped back to basics and a dozen tongues.

We gathered from 10 countries, with more than 10 languages, in the frozen heart of Seoul to share experiences, to globalize the struggle and to globalize hope, and while some of what we heard and saw caused collective despair, our solidarity rang of hopefulness and joy.

We farm, we cook, and we feed the world. We are peasant women farmers** of Asia Pacific.

This meeting was the second women’s workshop of La Via Campesina (LVC) in Southeast and East Asia*. We gathered in recognition of the struggles women particularly face as peasants – women are overwhelmingly the victims of domestic and institutional violence, have shamefully low rates of land ownership—in spite of constituting more than 50% of the farmers in the region—and earn as little as half what our male counterparts earn. Women bear the burden of the vast majority of domestic labour, in addition to our labour on farms and in other forms of employment.

 

In solidarity with the women who shared their stories, some will not be named here, as they are targets of military governments.

We heard that in Thailand, whole villages have been displaced by the current military government. One village is trying to re-group so that they might go back to producing food collectively as they used to do, and where food is produced collectively, all profits go towards their shared struggle. When the military confronts them, their strategy is to put the women in front, as it reduces the incidence and levels of violence. Women are therefore the first to be injured, but fewer are hurt if women lead the way.

We listened as our Filipino sister told us that their current President openly endorses rape as a tool of war, telling Filipino soldiers he would back them up if they raped women while enforcing martial law.

Every woman present had stories of unfair division of domestic labour – it was probably our biggest commonality – and it is so endemic that the Korean Women Peasants Association (KWPA – our wonderful hosts for the week) have been lobbying for free school lunches to support female farmers who struggle to find time to make lunch for their children.

The 60-year-old farmer from Taiwan Huang Hsiang told us that while she loves her mother dearly, she doesn’t want to be like her because she would rise at 3am every day to cook and feed chickens and cows, before going out to work in the fields with her husband, who woke at 5am after the domestic chores were done. Hsiang has done incredible work against land grabbing with the Taiwan Rural Front, and her own son now rises early to sweep the floor and feed the baby.

In addition to our struggles as women farmers, we heard many organisations share that women are leading the way in saving seeds and preserving genetic diversity in agriculture across our region. And they are collectivizing and working together for change – not only for feminist reform, but also for food sovereignty and particularly agroecology.

On the third and final day of our meeting we trundled three hours southwards on a bus to visit Sisters Garden – a women farmers’ producer cooperative that’s been operating for nearly a decade. As we feasted on the regional specialty of dried persimmons, we listened to the story of how they came together to grow food that is clean, safe and good to sell directly to people in the cities. They coordinate their growing as best they can to maximize diversity in their boxes (a seasonal box for a family of four is USD$100/month), and make a range of ready-to-eat dishes for inclusion in the boxes, such as tofu, kimchi, dried persimmon and sticky rice cakes. A commission is taken from each farmer based on their profits to pay one staff member, and for maintenance and upgrades.

Once a week they gather at the processing and packing facility built with government support, and enjoy a communal lunch while planning next week’s boxes for 140 households. They also provide donation boxes for organisations such as those providing support for victims of sexual violence. The deep camaraderie and sheer joyfulness of the 13 female farmer members was palpable, strongly affirming the benefits of working as a community towards a common and noble goal.

On our field trip we also visited a community that is both devastated and galvanized by the US military’s presence established through the Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) anti-missile system. The elders of Seongju have been leading the fight against the military installation for these past two years, rising early to form a human blockade by 6am every day – even in temperatures as low as the -20C we experienced during our visit. The military police have intervened on multiple occasions, leading to injuries that included smashing one woman in her eighties’ teeth to the extent that she chose to keep her face mask on during our visit.

Most of the women we met are in their eighties – tiny, hunched, but fierce and committed women – who told us that ‘it doesn’t matter much for us, but what about our sons and daughters?’ These women have lived through the horrors of war, deaths of loved ones and abuse as ‘comfort women’, and they are certain that THAAD can only bring more war to their peaceful village. THAAD is ostensibly being built to protect South Korea and US interests from North Korea, but the villagers say it’s really to give the US another facility close to China and Russia as they gain power in the new world order.

There wasn’t a dry eye in the room as these brave women told us their stories and thanked us for bearing witness to their struggle, asking that we return home and share it with our countries.

While we are doing that, we are also thinking about how better to engage the elders of our own communities in our struggles – these powerhouses of experience and demonstrated will – something to work on in 2018.

Our Action Plan included a few very concrete items, such as a media release to promote and support the villagers fighting against THAAD, and a social media campaign to highlight and promote the work of women farmers on International Women’s Day on 8 March. We also spoke of the need for our organisations to do more to train women in food processing and better control of value chains – something we’ve taken seriously here at Jonai Farms for some years now with my regular training of female butchers and #meatgrrlsmonday. Another focus is to keep stepping up our work around agroecology, and acknowledge and support women’s efforts to save seeds, while promoting this work as essential for a food sovereign and delicious future.

For me personally, the week in South Korea with these remarkable women was a powerful motivator to do more to support the work of women farmers – explicitly and joyfully. And to speak out more against the ills of patriarchy’s contributions to capitalism and the subjugation of women in all walks of life.

United we stand, divided we fall. Or as Zainal reminded us, ‘unorganised good people will be marginalized by organized bad people.’

We farm, we cook, and we feed the world. We are peasant women farmers and we build the movement to change the world!

* Fair Food Farmers United is attached to this region until LVC sorts out our region now that we’ve joined the global movement of peasant farmers.

** The term ‘peasants’ has very different meanings around the world, but is the preferred label of smallholder farmers in the food sovereignty movement. I use the term respectfully here in a politics of solidarity – not appropriation – as advised by my comrades across the global south. I’ll write more on this in future.

La Via Campesina Regional Women’s Workshop in Seoul – 24-26 January 2018

Tammi Jonas, AFSA President

Poultry Welfare Reforms Fact Sheet

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The Codes for animal welfare for poultry are being reviewed for the first time in over 15 years.

The result will be one Australia-wide Code on animal welfare for poultry. Two main documents, along with an independent Farmed Bird Science Welfare Review and many supporting papers, have been released for public comment:

  1. The Draft Standards and Guidelines; and
  2. A Regulatory Impact Statement.

In total these documents stack up to over 700 pages. So we have condensed some of the basic information you need to know in a fact sheet.

We were deeply disappointed to see that, despite early expectations for the process, there was no mention of battery cages being banned.

If they go ahead, the proposed Draft Standard will make things worse for consumers, genuine free-range producers and birds raised on poultry farms.

AFSA’s vision is to enable regenerative farming businesses to thrive. We recognise that Australians want food that is grown locally and without damage to animal health and the environment. Food produced on small regenerative farms is in demand. We believe that it is critical that government heeds changing community expectations by supporting the growth and viability of regenerative agriculture while protecting the environment and human and animal health.

The reforms have been in progress since mid 2015. They were intended to reflect the latest science on animal welfare, recommended industry practices and community expectations. Instead, the integrity of the drafting process is being questioned after egg industry representatives were recently accused of engaging in ‘systemic collusion’ with the NSW Government to thwart moves to outlaw battery hens.

The outcome was that the banning of battery cages was kept out of the Draft Standards. With NSW having the highest production rates of caged eggs in the country, this collusion ought to have been expected.

For many reasons, such as there being over 10 million hens kept in conventional cages, false and misleading claims about egg-labelling and many others, AFSA is concerned for the future of genuine free-range systems for raising poultry on farms.

Australia should ban battery hens as in countries like Canada, New Zealand, Switzerland and Austria. We should follow the example of the ACT where the use of battery cages is prohibited.

Whether you’re a poultry farmer, egg or chicken consumer, chef or animal rights advocate, your views on the Draft Standards are crucial to the consultation process and to the future of poultry welfare in Australia.

We know that you care about animal welfare as much as we do. In 2016, nearly 10,000 consumers, farmers, retailers and advocacy groups provided input to the new national standards to define ‘free-range’.

The welfare reforms are just as important to secure the future of genuine free-range poultry farming in Australia and gives us a chance to reduce regulatory uncertainty faced by producers.

Make your own submission by 5pm Monday 26 February 2018. Alternatively, email us at admin@afsa.org.au with your concerns and we will include them in our submission.

AFSA calls out biased reporting on Victorian planning reforms

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Peter Hunt, a Weekly Times reporter, has treated the concerns of Victoria’s pastured livestock farmers over proposed planning reforms with total contempt, calling them ‘delusional.’

This seems unsurprising given Hunt spent many years in a policy role with the Victorian Farmers Federation (VFF), a body whose reputation for attacking small-scale farmers is increasing.

Pastured pig and poultry farmers have rejected factory farming and are instead growing animals outside in the fresh air. They devote their farms to growing healthy animals in ethical and ecologically-sound ways.

In an op ed in last week’s Weekly Times, Mr Hunt trotted out the drivel the Victorian Government is seeking to rectify when he called pastured livestock farms ‘intensive’.

Hunt went on to make spurious claims about the biosecurity risks of free-range poultry and pigs. However, it is sheds full of thousands of animals living with their own excrement that are the real source of a massive public health threat – those sheds are ‘food for flu’ as evolutionary biologist Rob Wallace states.

The Government’s attempt to reform the planning provisions has fallen short of the 2016 recommendations of the Animal Industries Advisory Committee (AIAC). The AIAC called for the scheme to recognise the lower risk small-scale pastured pig and poultry farms pose, and for planning controls to be commensurate with that risk.

The AIAC called for small-scale pastured pig and poultry farms to be treated like other grazing production systems.

The AIAC went through an independent public consultation. However, once handed to Agriculture Victoria, the ongoing consultation was limited to peak bodies for intensive agriculture – Australian Pork Limited (APL), Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA), and the VFF, and a handful of cattle farmers. There was no representation for pastured pig and poultry farmers, and Ag Vic came back with a draft that sees all pig and poultry farms with more than 200 birds or three sows needing a permit.

The Government, the VFF, and the likes of Hunt keep repeating that all pig and poultry farms have always needed to get a permit, however, they fail to acknowledge that requirement was only recently established by a VCAT case in 2015. This was a trigger for the need to reform the planning scheme. Calling a farm with 100 pigs on 40 acres ‘intensive’ was deemed inappropriate, and the controls applied incommensurate with the risk.

Hunt’s track record of sloppy and inaccurate journalism does the public interest no favours, and his disdain for pastured pig and poultry farmers tells where his allegiances lie.

Tammi Jonas, President

Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance

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