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Farmers, our best spokesmenI would have never guessed that at 3 o'clock on a fall afternoon I would spend a full hour watching Oprah, but I did. In her highly promoted one hour television show, Oprah dove into the issue of modern food production. Lisa Ling, her roving reporter, actually took the viewers to several different farms including a free-range egg laying operation in Pennsylvania, followed by a caged hen egg laying farm in the same state. John and Matt Kellogg of Yorkville, Ill., opened their doors and gave her a full-blown tour of their pork production operation. The viewers truly got to see the pros and cons of each as well as the purpose for the different production methods. Guests in the studio included Wayne Pacelle, president of the Humane Society of the United States. Without coming clean and telling Oprah or the audience that he does not eat eggs, milk or meat, he began his regular diatribe about restricting animal movement. As if he had been reincarnated from some laying hen, he professed to know what the hen thinks about living in these high rise condos, which to me seems no different than the people stacked on top of people in our biggest cities. However, hens in these operations have increased egg production every year for the past 50 years; so, if it is a stressful environment for the hen, somebody forgot to tell her about it. Still, Wayne Pacelle does not consume the very products that he works every day to eliminate from the diets of American consumers. So, he needs to stop imposing his elitist values on the rest of the nation. There were three people in the studio to oppose Pacelle and convey the benefits of modern livestock farms. Two of them, egg farmer Ryan Armstrong from California and pig farmer Matt Kellogg of Illinois, did a tremendous job and collectively represented more than 200 years in the food production business between their two operations. It was obvious they are conscientious people who care not only about the animals they tend but are determined to provide high-quality, safe food products for the people of the world. The third person was a hired agency spokesperson who quite honestly sounded much like Pacelle in her attempt to generate rhetoric; but, I don't believe she had a good grasp of the essence of farming. Farmers, the people who get their hands dirty every day, are the true experts in these cases and they need to be the spokesmen. The one message that needs to be driven home even harder is the cost of food production. Pacelle continually referenced what the European Union has done in lawfully eliminating modern livestock farms and implied that we should follow suit. In the United States of America, when farmers began implementing confinement barns in about 1945, American citizens spent 19.2 percent of their annual disposable income on food. As recent as 1980, Americans still spent more than 13 percent of their income on food. Today, even with higher food prices due to the economic instability, Americans spend less than 10 percent of their income on food because of our production practices. This ranks as the lowest of any nation in the world and yet we have the safest, highest quality food on the planet. So why are people like Pacelle trying to screw this up? Perhaps his vegan agenda has something to do with it. So what about this wonderful EU model that Pacelle is so proud of? Since 1996, about the time lawmakers started unnecessarily meddling in farming, total spending on food has increased by 31.1 percent. Let's take a closer look. This report about Britain, home of the EU's lowest food prices, appeared in the Wall Street Journal last week: "The cost of food in the U.K. is rising at a faster rate than elsewhere, putting more pressure on an economy already squeezed by the credit crisis. Because it has a small farming sector, Britain imports more of its food than other major economies, making it vulnerable to movements in commodity prices and its currency. The country now produces 60 percent of its food, down from 80 percent in 1984, according to government data. Few other major economies rely so heavily on food imports. Chatham House, a London think tank, said in a recent report that Britain may have maxed out its ability to produce more food, a phenomenon it calls "peak food" after the "peak oil" theory that the world is running out of oil." I am surprised to admit that I thought Oprah did a relatively fair and unbiased job hosting the program. I would have liked Oprah to know, according to the USDA, we have more food insecure people in the U.S. now than we have ever had--34 million. Someone should have pointed out Pacelle is nothing more than a food socialist trying to increase food prices and remove our personal choice, while bankrolling a big salary for himself. Producers should have further emphasized that we can judge the success of our modern systems by looking at the overall performance of these animals since we started providing them basic animal welfare, protection from predators and the environment and adequate feed and water on a daily basis. If those points had been made, I think Oprah would have looked into that camera and told Americans that these farmers know what they are doing. So let them do their jobs and continue feeding the world. Editor's note: Trent Loos is a sixth generation United States farmer, host of the daily radio show, Loos Tales, and founder of Faces of Agriculture, a non-profit organization putting the human element back into the production of food. Get more information at www.FacesOfAg.com, or e-mail Trent at trent@loostales.com. 10/27/08 Date: 10/23/08 Advertisement
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