Righteous Blog
Cooking Up a Story Interview
Monday, May 10th, 2010
Recently, I was the keynote speaker for an incredible event called Farmer Chef Connection near Portland, Oregon. It was the 10th anniversary for the event, which brings together chefs wanting to buy local ingredients and farmers raising vegetables, fruits, honey, dairy products, meat, and eggs in the greater Portland area.
While at Farmer Chef, I had the honor of being interviewed by Cooking Up a Story, an amazing food website that has interviewed many of the luminaries of the good food movement. Check it out:
Leave a Comment | Permalink | Posted in Interview, Video
Avoiding Factory Farm Foods
Friday, November 13th, 2009
In the months since my book was released, I’ve done a lot of speaking and dozens of media interviews about factory farming. Without a doubt, the question I’ve been asked most frequently is this: How can a person AVOID eating foods from factory farms? It’s everywhere and so cheap. Well, the reality is you’ll probably never TOTALLY stop because it is, indeed, everywhere. I mean if you’re invited to your aunt’s house and she makes a pork roast especially for you, what are you going to do? But there’s a lot you CAN do.
Probably the single most important piece of advice I have for people is to stop being a supermarket zombie. As I describe in Righteous Porkchop, when I started looking, REALLY looking for foods that were not from nameless, faceless commodity markets of industrially produced food, I had to get out of the supermarket. Supermarkets buy in huge quantities and are generally unable and unwilling to buy from independent, traditional farmers.
A second important piece of advice is to try to change what you’re eating one step at a time. Start, for example with eggs. (I describe my own egg hunt in Righteous Porkchop). Try to find a local farmer or even a backyard hobby farmer who is raising their hens outdoors. You will pay more for these eggs but they will be well worth it.
Recently, I was invited by Huffington Post to put together a guide of what I’ve learned about finding foods from non-industrial farms. I did so, and called it: Avoiding Factory Farm Foods: An Eater’s Guide. The Guide doesn’t give you all the answers but I think it provides a lot of helpful information to get you well in your way in the journey. I’d love to hear YOUR additional suggestions for the guide once you’ve given it a look.
2 Comments | Permalink | Posted in Uncategorized
Dairy Cows Need their Tails
Friday, October 9th, 2009
Governor Schwarzenegger has a bill on his desk, known as SB-135, which would ban the practice of cutting off dairy cows tails (also known as “tail docking”). Most dairy farmers do not do this to their cows but a few large operations do it to make milking faster and simpler. They also claim it’s more hygenic. Several years ago, I wrote an essay in the New York Times called “The Unkindest Cut” in which I argued against this practice (and also the cutting off of pigs’ tails). The essay points out that there is no scientific support for the justifications for tail docking and it’s well known to cause animals chronic pain.
Today, Bill and I sent Gov. Schwartzenegger a letter urging him to sign this bill into law. Here’s what we said:
Dear Mike Webb,
We understand you are the staff member who is advising Governor Schwartzenegger on SB-135, a ban on dairy cow tail docking. We are livestock ranchers in Marin County who are writing to make it known that we strongly favor the bill and urge him to sign it. This is a modest but important reform.
We adamantly support livestock farming, but we also believe that it’s imperative to make it as environmentally benign, as healthful, and as animal-friendly as possible. In addition to working on our own ranch, (where we raise turkeys, goats and cattle), we have both spent much of the past several several years advocating for what we believe are much needed reforms to the farm animal industries. Bill was a member of the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, which spent more than two years visiting animal operations around the country and reviewing all available data related to current animal agricultural practices, then made reccomendations for numerous reforms in April 2007. Nicolette is the former Senior Attorney for the environmental group Waterkeeper Alliance and has spoken all over the country and written extensively on the many environmental , public health and animal welfare problems associated with current industrial animal methods. She is the author of the book Righteous Porkchop: Finding a Life and Good Foods Beyond Factory Farms (HarperCollins, 2009) and numerous articles about the livestock industry. Both of us strongly support a ban on dairy cow tail docking.
In fact, Nicolette has even written an op-ed in the New York Times (called “The Unkindest Cut”) on the subject. As she explained in the op-ed, tail docking of dairy cows (and pigs) is not justified by scientific research and is well known to have serious down sides for the animals. In case you have not yet seen this article, here is a link to it: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/07/opinion/07niman.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=the%20unkindest%20cut&st=cse .
Really it’s just a matter of common sense. Some practices that cause animals pain or discomfort on a farm may be necessary for human or animal health or safety or for other legitimate reasons. Others practices are just cruel, outdated, and dumb. Docking dairy cows’ tails falls into the latter category. All farmers and ranchers should support getting rid of such practices because they give agriculture a black-eye. We urge Governor Schwartzenegger to sign SB-135.
Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions.
Respectfully,
Bill Niman (Founder, Niman Ranch; Member, Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production; and Rancher, Marin County).
Nicolette Hahn Niman (Lawyer; Author, Righteous Porkchop; Rancher, Marin Country).
Leave a Comment | Permalink | Posted in Uncategorized
Congress Should Restrict Antibiotics in Animal Agriculture
Wednesday, July 15th, 2009
For years Congress has annually considered legislation that would restrict the use of antibiotics in animal agriculture. This year’s House version is called the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act. On Monday, Congresswoman Louise Slaughter (NY) held hearings on the act. We submitted a statement in favor of the bill’s passage. Here’s why.
First, every major public health organization has recognized the critical and urgent need to reduce the use of antibiotics in animal agriculture. It is estimated that 70 percent of the antibiotics and other antimicrobial drugs used in the United States are fed to farm animals for non-therapeutic purposes, mostly for triggering rapid growth and to compensate for crowded, unsanitary, and stressful farming and transportation conditions. In a March 2003 report, the National Academy of Sciences stated that a decrease in antimicrobial use in human medicine alone will have little effect on the current situation and that substantial efforts must be made to decrease inappropriate overuse in animals and agriculture. The World Health Organization, the Centers for Disease Control, the Union of Concerned Scientists, and the American Medical Association, among others, have all urged such action as necessary to protect the effectiveness of antibiotics to treat both human and animal illnesses. The continual feeding of antibiotics to farm animals is already outlawed in the European Union.
Second, from our experience on our own farm and the hundreds of farms we’ve worked with over the years, the feeding of antibiotics is unnecessary. Animals provided healthy environments – fresh air, exercise, normal interactions with their peers, and wholesome feed — rarely fall ill. Antibiotics are an important tool for livestock farmers and ranchers when an animal does get sick. But the wholesale use of them in animal feed is making those drugs less effective, meaning that when an animal gets sick its illness is becoming harder to effectively treat and can be dangerous to humans. So antibiotics overuse is damaging for farmers and ranchers. It’s also hurting the farming community by lowering consumer confidence in animal-based foods.
The Pew Commission on Industrial Animal Production (of which Bill was a member) already recommended banning the feeding of antibiotic to livestock. We think it’s time for Congress to take action on this important issue.
2 Comments | Permalink | Posted in Uncategorized
Chickens on the White House Lawn?
Monday, March 23rd, 2009
Last week, Michelle Obama broke ground on a new White House vegetable garden. I suggest that the next step be adding a colorful flock of egg laying hens. What could be a better way to bring healthy, fresh and delicious food into the White House kitchen while adding beauty and interest to the otherwise boring White House Lawn?
3 Comments | Permalink | Posted in Farming