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New Zealand is on the brink of introducing factory farming of dairy cows, the Green Party said today.
Consent applications were recently lodged with Environment Canterbury for factory-style dairy farms in the Mackenzie Basin.
Three companies plan to establish 16 new farms with nearly 18,000 cows in the area. According to the applications, all 18,000 cows will be housed in 'cubicle stables' 24 hours a day for eight months of the year, and 12 hours a day for the remaining four months.
"This is factory farming, pure and simple," Green Party Co-leader Russel Norman said.
"Proposals to keep cows in cubicles that they don't leave for eight months of the year are a radical departure from our tradition of farming stock outside and on pasture, and could do immense harm to our clean, green international brand.
"Once word gets out to overseas consumers that New Zealand butter comes from factory farms, there goes our competitive advantage.
"Fonterra counters 'food-miles' arguments from our European competitors by saying that our milk products are more environmentally friendly than factory-farmed milk. This proposal flies in the face of that strategy.
"It's also a chilling prospect from an animal welfare perspective."
Green Party Agriculture Spokesperson Jeanette Fitzsimons said most of the farmers she had visited this year and featured on her 'Good Farm Stories' website would be appalled at this move.
"Those innovative farmers have shown that it's possible to be profitable and sustainable, and to treat animals well, without repeating the mistakes of the rest of the world," Ms Fitzsimons said.
Dr Norman also expressed concern at the environmental impact of the proposals.
"These proposals could put the majestic Upper Waitaki River and pristine high country lakes such as Lakes Tekapo, Pukaki, and Ohau at risk from effluent run off and algal blooms. It will produce the effluent equivalent to a city of 270,000 people in the Mackenzie basin."
The consent applications include effluent ponds with 414 million litres of storage capacity and plans to put as much as1.7 million litres of diluted effluent onto the land every day. "These factory farms in the Mackenzie Basin will produce the same amount of effluent as a city of 270,000 people and it is especially worrying that the director of one of these companies has a history of effluent discharge breaches," Dr Norman said.
Cornelius Zeestraten, the director of Five Rivers Ltd, is also the sole director and shareholder of Union Station Dairies, which was fined in 2009 and 2005 for effluent discharge consent breaches.
"The Mackenzie Basin is an iconic dry tussockland ecosystem and the gateway to the jewel of our tourism industry, Aoraki / Mt Cook National Park. Putting it at risk like this is madness," Dr Norman said.
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Comments
I can't believe that New
I can't believe that New Zealanders would even give Factory farming of cows a thought, what is happening to our beautiful NZ ?? just because other countries act like Lemings, surely; when we know the result; we will not follow
This is the first I have
This is the first I have herd of it.. I am appalled, its sounds almost like the E.T.S sneaking in with out us getting a say..I am a son of a farmer (beef,sheep & deer), & I am a tanker as well . If this sort of farming gets the go ahead, & the company I work for has anything to do with it, I will hand in my notice on principle.. !!SAY NO NEW ZEALAND!!THIS IS JUST WRONG!! WHERE ARE YOU MIKE KING????
My earlier post says I'm a
My earlier post says I'm a tanker, Hmmm I meant a tanker driver
The cumulative impacts of
The cumulative impacts of dams, irrigation, intensive dairying; hieracium, rabbits/hares; wilding pines will devastate these significant landscapes and waterways of the area. These are deserving of heritage protection for recreational/scenic purposes and the economic contribution the vistas make by satisfying expectations of domestic and international visitors travelling to and through the area. Surely locals are outraged but at the same tiem sympathetic to the farming families (ir are these nonlocal corporates?). Perhaps it is time for government to consider subsidising the high country farming families to instead continue to produce merino wool on these marginal lands - they have to make a living and merino farming is more compatible with the nature of the landscape than dairying.
I cannot believe that
I cannot believe that beautiful New Zealand with a good record of animal welfare is going down the route of factory farming of dairy catt.e. It simply does not make sense. The wretched cows incarcerated in these plants suffer hugely from metabolic disturbances due to such a concentrated diet, and lameness. They look like hatracks. The breed is not mentioned, but if it is holstein..............Stockmanship goes out of the window, who can possible differentiate between so many creatures.
The debate about animals as sentient beings is over. They can feel pain and suffer. The virtues of grass fed animals is gaining momentum here and in the USA - why on earth is New Zealand going in the reverse direction which has already proved unsustainable?
Certainly the competetive advantage your country has at the moment will be lost.Think again before it is too late.
I entirely agree with the
I entirely agree with the New Zealand Green Party and the comment from "Anonymous UK" 8.12.09. To go down the blind alley of unsustainable factory farming is sheer madness. One recalls the saying: "Those whom the gods wish to destroy they first drive mad". Where is the commonsense in going for a system that is known to shorten the productive life of the cow, to increase veterinary bills (and the use of antibiotics, which encourages antibiotic resistance to the detriment of human health)? Commonsense marches hand in hand with compassion and demands healthy, well-bred cows that will produce a reasonable (lifetime,not lactation} amount of milk and useful male offspring. Milk from pastured cows has a higher content of the essential fatty acid, omega 3, lack of which is thought to be involved in the global epidemic of human depression.
Ah at it again! Finally we
Ah at it again! Finally we find a Green solution to farming and surprise surprise the Greens are against it!
As always tearing down undermining and destroying.
Indoor farming provides the only means of Methane Capture the worst Green house Gas New Zealand produces and the barrier to our reducing greenhouse gasses seriously.
Of course the real agenda is to make us all Vegan vegtated vegetarians but that must not be mentioned.
And to top it all off it is a far more energy efficient method of farming per pound of meat produced. less CO2 less land area required to feed the animals meaning less deforested denuded natural land in New Zealand.
But we must not link this to their real motive...That's a Holy Cow.
Go you idiot Greenies..out to battle....
Better fight this new Green technology as it doesn't drive us back to the stone age and into caves as you'd love to have us mere animals.
Hahahahaha Its the Greens doing their usual counter logical thing.
They should be hand shaking and having photo shoots with these guys but...that would make them look rationale and progressive rather than the D-Generation they are and come from.
To all you watermelons and green pea brains out there not every good idea need be fought against without a thought.
Hahahahah as usual Grens tearing down sucess and good.
This is by far the best means of controlling pollution that you guys have been shutting down NZ's farms for.
China was buyinmg up one of our biggest farming family enterprises last I heard because your ignorant type were out ranting about effluent.
This must be much to impressive a solution to be tolerable to you imbiciles that wouldn't know a good idea when you saw it nor could choose between a spoon to eat your food or a cave mans stick.
Idiots Full Stop.
Joyce H. Smith Ummm do you
Joyce H. Smith Ummm do you have a dictionary and the competence to understand the words in it?
Unsustainable is about using greter and greater resources to produce goods etc. This is about using less land for farming and less land for cropping to produce more food for less! That is a flamin good idea! Grow a pebble between your ears!
America got this right a few decades ago when they started subsidising Corn production...now they have no food shortage and food to spare which is literally the foundation of food aid to the world. Dispite their in ability to stop eating themselves...this has been one of the most Beius green success stories of the century.
It has preserved far more land than it has destroyed!
I was watching a documentary about teh american Corn production policy. and these two guys planted a spot of corn and watched it grow and the process to the Grain mountains of america.
They griped that it didn't taste good but showed clearly what a genius idea it was to do factory farming based on the extremely green and efficient corn cropping.
If only you guys could do maths and logic... too bad.
AThompson has some excellent points. but they relate to the extensive land use required for wild out doors farming not quality indoor farming where vast land resources are spared and become best used again as natural wild lands instead of supporting a handful of cows which in turn pollute it and the environment with effluent and Gases.
Aah..Oop-s Pardon me!
For all our sakes 'Ah at it
For all our sakes 'Ah at it again' if you wish to comment put together a cogent, non defamatory case. Too difficult without personal invective - I thought so.
In the same way your points do not stand up either - I agree with Joyce H Smith and others who have put salient points into a comprehensive animal welfare and environmental persuasive discussion. More power to their collective elbow.
My what a lovely little sulk
My what a lovely little sulk that was.
Can't you believe that someone out there is not just a sheep wearing blinkers that gets in a fluster on cue or whenever a thing is called Un-Green/PC/sexist racist or whatever.
Hahahaa
"For all our sakes" (you perhaps mean for your offended ego's sake..and anyway speak for yourself.)...
"'Ah at it again' if you wish to comment put together a cogent," (Cogent! You use such a a word but don't have a point to make to address the range of points I made that make perfectly compelling logical sense... at least on the surface! If I am so in error it should be quite simple for a wise fella/felless like you to point it out. Go on...make a cogent point about my folly yourself.)
"non defamatory case." E-hem...Defamation relates to rather false representations of things... Do point our my errors...same as my last point.)
"Too difficult without personal invective(BTW insert '?'... Not at all...could you point it out and demonstrate why things were perhaps a little Ad Hominem as opposed to valid comments.)
"I thought so." (Ooh you answer your own questions...or perhaps you can read minds or Crystal balls as to my answers.
You are a funny character... well now what cogent points did you have in the rest of your vacuous yet verbally pedantic attempt to dismiss my real points related to the topic rather than writing style.)
"In the same way" (same as what?)
"your points do not stand up either" (Oh really great wise one...did you happen to have an argument to back that grand judgement up? or is that what follows next?)
"- I agree with Joyce H Smith and others who have put salient points into a comprehensive animal welfare and environmental persuasive discussion. More power to their collective elbow." (Well that was a solid argument if I have ever seen one. "I agree". Wow I better change my world view if YOU agree! I tremble! ...Um what "salient points did your buddies make? The majority of Joyce's and other folks points are merely 'emotioning' the topic...anyway, why don't you start to raise a few "salient" points there yourself?.(Oooh I like using that word it saves me focusing on injecting all that "personal invective") and then we could actually have a rationale conversation that gets to the bottom of one anothers rationale or exposes the lack thereof and poke holes where relevant in one anothers position.
Well, you have backed up my multifaceted argument (invective included) wonderfully with your Vacuous rebuttal or what ever it was meant to be.
Back yourself up a bit....and 'I agree with others or myself' is not what I mean.
Maths and Logic, you know??? Well I thought I would try to stimulate some from you anyway.
Oh Brigette made the only
Oh Brigette made the only real "Salient" point the greens and even you have made so emotionally and hence so unconvincingly...over here, http://www.voxy.co.nz/national/we-will-all-be-losers-factory-dairy-farming/1273/32484#comment-7936
Really on the topic. Take a read.
To 'ah at it again' This
To 'ah at it again'
This correspondence is now closed.
Oh Fancy that! His
Oh Fancy that!
His in-Dignified Anonymous Deity declared the correspondence closed!
I must say to one who has not added to nor rebutted a single "salient" point to this "correspondence" from start to finish, when I have raised a whole lot of points as to why my view is rational...you do have a lack of argument behind your position.
Neither do you have content to back your view.
Nor do you have vocabulary that you understand to argue with.
To one so lacking in credibility...and now running when he realises he has nothing useful true or valid to say..
...quiting like this is quite advisable.
You really should stop mimicing clever sounding speech you have heard until you understand it.
If you sounded like a goof but had a point and had spelling errors all the way through it would be much better and credible than your pretension.
You are living in an illusion of personal wisdom and prowess I suspect that you should really snap out of.
BTW my grand mother cherished boiling her washing because she didn't trust those terrible modern washing machines...probably a bit like your fondness of "Stockmanship".
Bye there.
Have a nice dei...lusion!
GODDAMN AMERICANS!...its
GODDAMN AMERICANS!...its their fault! when i came over here from canada, i saw your cows in farms and sheep at mt.eden...JUST WALKING AROUND!...that is truely amazing for me because most meat in north america is factory farmed...which means it tastes like shit! no wonder everybody is turning vegetarian.
i really think new zealand should not introduce factory farming, because its really just a concentration camp for animals. its cruel and the meat will serouisly taste like crap.