The stories you want. The opinions that matter.
No, thanks
Tag: livestock
California Poultry Giant To Shift Away From Using Antibiotics In Its Poultry

California Poultry Giant To Shift Away From Using Antibiotics In Its Poultry

By Geoffrey Mohan, Los Angeles Times (TNS)

California poultry giant Foster Farms has joined the flock of meat companies eschewing the use of antibiotics, pledging to eliminate all those used to combat infection in humans.

The company’s promise comes ahead of Tuesday’s White House forum on the use of antibiotics, and amid rising concern that use of the drugs to raise livestock has aided the proliferation of resistant strains of bacteria among humans.

More than 2 million people in the U.S. are infected with such strains annually, and at least 23,000 die as a result, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“Our company is committed to responsible growing practices that help preserve the effectiveness of antibiotics for human health and medicine,” Foster Farms Chief Executive and President Ron Foster said.

Although over-prescription of antibiotics to humans has been a long-term driver of drug-resistant strains, antibiotic use for animals also has been linked to resistant strains of salmonella and campylobacter.

Foster Farms introduced two new antibiotic-free product lines in April: Certified Organic and Simply Raised.

The company has eliminated all antibiotics that the U.S. Agriculture Department and the Food and Drug Administration deem critical to human medicine, said company spokesman Ira Brill.

“We have a long-term goal of fully eliminating all antibiotics that are used in the practice of human medicine,” he said.

Brill said he could not offer a timeline for a complete elimination of antibiotics that also are prescribed to humans. “I don’t think we can put a date on that except to say that we are aggressively working towards that goal,” he said.

The company is researching alternative practices to improve overall flock health, Brill said. “As you continue to improve bird health, then your need for antibiotics declines,” he said.

ConAgra to pay $11.2 million to settle salmonella criminal case

Foster’s change of heart about antibiotics follows shifts away from use of human antibiotics by fellow poultry giant Perdue, as well as retail food chains McDonald’s, Chick-fil-A, Chipotle and Panera, among others.

The CEO of Sanderson Farms, however, told the Wall Street Journal recently that he has no plans to move away from antibiotics.

Consumer pressure for antibiotics-free meat has intensified over the last several years. Sales of organic beef, pork, poultry and fish increased 11 percent from 2012 to 2013, to $675 million, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group pushing to limit use of the drugs.

Jonathan Kaplan, director of the group’s food and agriculture program, credited Foster Farms for being “on track and heading in the right direction.”

But the company’s announcement “is not quite as robust as what Perdue has already accomplished or what Tyson has pledged to do,” Kaplan said. “They still have committed to moving away from the medically important antibiotics, and that’s the main concern.”

About a third of the broiler chickens produced now are raised with tight restrictions on antibiotic use, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.

“We definitely feel like we are hitting a tipping point for antibiotic stewardship in the poultry industry,” Kaplan said. “This is more than a microtrend. This is a tsunami.”

Foster Farms, which employs about 12,000 people nationally and has sales of $2.7 billion, is based in Livingston, Calif., about 65 miles east of San Jose, and operates five production facilities in the state as well as numerous ranches.

The company has battled back from a 2013 outbreak of salmonella that sickened hundreds of people in 2013, as well as a more recent cockroach infestation and rash of food safety citations at its Livingston plant.

Since then, it has revamped its food safety procedures. Measured salmonella prevalence on poultry at Foster facilities is now well below USDA and industrywide standards, Brill said.

“If you look back on the food safety issues, that was an area where we probably satisfied ourselves with being average — and we realized you cannot lead in a lot of areas if you don’t lead in all areas,” Brill said. “Right now, consumers can look at Foster Farms as about the safest chickens you can buy.”

Photo: No more drugs in your food? Major win. Creativity103 via Flickr

Breeding Antibiotic Resistance Through Our Food

Breeding Antibiotic Resistance Through Our Food

According to a new report released by the Federal Drug Administration (FDA) the meat industry is using more medical-grade antibiotics than ever in its livestock feed and water. And it’s not due to increased production since beef, chicken, and pork production did not rise during the period under review (2009-2012).

What this means for consumers and the healthcare industry is that because we’re consuming medical antibiotics with our food, the antibiotics we need when we get sick will become resistant and lose their efficacy in treating disease. Just 6% of the drugs used by the meat industry are actually used to treat disease in their livestock.

For decades the FDA has been dragging on addressing the subject of antibiotic use in our meat supply. Even with the dire picture indicated by this report, their actions show they are still in thrall to the very industry they are supposed to regulate – the guidelines issued to the meat industry are, wait for it, purely voluntary.

According to Mother Jones “sales of cephalosporins, a drug used to treat respiratory-tract infections, skin infections, and urinary-tract infections in people, rose about 4 percent between 2011 and 2012, even though the FDA had moved to scale back their use on January 4, 2012. That doesn’t exactly boost confidence.”

“The heavy use of antibiotics that are really not used in human medicine can cause harm through cross-resistance—that is, bacteria strains that develop resistance to one antibiotic can quickly become resistant to others.”

“Cross-resistance is a well-established phenomenon. Antibiotic resistance occurs when bacteria evolve to survive contact with a chemical intended to kill them. Factory farms are now incubating resistant bacteria strains that threaten people.”

Photo: Wikipedia

Obama To Announce Millions Of Dollars For Drought Assistance

Obama To Announce Millions Of Dollars For Drought Assistance

By Christi Parsons, Tribune Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama will announce millions of dollars in federal drought assistance Friday when he flies to California and tours fields and orchards ravaged by the deepening water crisis, aides said.

The president wants farmers to know he is paying close attention to the drought and has instructed federal agencies to expedite help, Tom Vilsack, the secretary of Agriculture, said Thursday.

“The federal government will do all it can to alleviate the stress associated with this drought,” Vilsack said in a call with reporters.

Obama will visit a farm in Fresno, aides said, to talk with farmers about the impact of one of the state’s worst droughts and the response of the federal government. He will unveil several initiatives intended to help California producers.

Among other directives, aides said, Obama is asking the Agriculture Department to open sign-ups for 2014 livestock disaster assistance within 60 days and to allow producers to request aid not only for this year but for losses over the last two years.

The livestock disaster programs took more than a year to get assistance to producers under the last farm bill, according to an administration official. The government seeks to cut that time and begin sign-ups in April.

California producers could be eligible for as much as $100 million for 2014 losses, the White House said Thursday night.

The Obama administration also will target conservation money to drought-affected areas, including $5 million in additional assistance to California.

To help people who lost jobs or steady work due to the drought, the Agriculture Department will make $60 million available to help food banks, the White House said.

Photo via Wikimedia Commons