By: Leslie Ballentine, Farming and Food Commentator
“Pink slime” a pejorative term for boneless lean beef trimmings has been getting a lot of attention from, food advocates and US policy makers in recent weeks. Called “lean finely textured beef within the industry,” the ground beef filler is reportedly not used in fabricating meat in Canada. Never-the-less, the hoopla is spilling over our border and is another example of how a name can affect the industry.
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Posted by FFC on April 2nd, 2012 :: Filed under
animal by-products,
Consumers,
Food,
Food safety,
Meat/slaughter plantsTags ::
Consumers,
food,
food safety,
meat,
Media
By Leslie Ballentine, Farming and food commentator
It’s no wonder there’s a growing perception that farms which feed cattle on grass for their entire lives, are better for the environment than farms that finish their pasture-raised cattle in feedlots with grain. The image is that the grass is always lush and plentiful and the cattle self feed themselves with little dependence on machinery or other energy consuming equipment. Whether or not science has confirmed this perception is another story.
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Posted by FFC on March 13th, 2012 :: Filed under
Beef cattle,
Environment,
Food,
Misconceptions,
Retailers,
SustainabilityTags ::
agriculture,
beef,
cattle,
education,
meat,
sustainability
By Leslie Ballentine, Farm and Food commentator
In December a plan for an outright ban on ritual slaughter methods in the Netherlands failed to pass the Dutch Senate. The bill and the issues surrounding it garnered world-wide attention by Jewish and Islamic communities, the meat processing and retail sectors, and animal activists. Government diplomats also became involved.
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Posted by FFC on February 13th, 2012 :: Filed under
Activism,
animal handling,
Food,
Meat/slaughter plants,
RegulationsTags ::
activists,
animal welfare,
food,
meat,
regulation
By: Leslie Ballentine, Farm and Food Commentator
There is a common saying among vegetarians that “If slaughterhouses had glass walls everyone would be a vegetarian”. Having been to all types of meat plants I disagree. And so did one of North America’s largest processing companies.
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Posted by FFC on November 21st, 2011 :: Filed under
animal handling,
Beef cattle,
Consumers,
Education and public awareness,
Meat/slaughter plants,
Media,
VegetarianTags ::
animal welfare,
animals,
Consumers,
food safety,
meat,
Media,
Vegetarian
By Leslie Ballentine, Farming and food commentator
Recalls happen either because a company finds a problem on its own or is informed of a problem by someone else, after the product has gone out the door. For farmers and food companies, prevention is the ticket to avoiding these events as well as the financial and public relations fallout associated with an outbreak of food-borne illness. To avoid food recalls means starting at the farm.
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Posted by FFC on June 20th, 2011 :: Filed under
Canada,
Consumers,
eggs,
Food safety,
Meat/slaughter plantsTags ::
Consumers,
diet,
food safety,
meat
Steve Buist, Hamilton Spectator, 2021.06.06
The use of battery-powered electric prods to get hogs moving is a controversial animal welfare issue.
The prod is poked into the back or rump of the pig and with a push of a button, a flash of electric current jumps between two contacts. It’s enough to elicit a loud squeal in some pigs.
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Posted by FFC on July 23rd, 2009 :: Filed under
Meat/slaughter plants,
Pork,
TransportationTags ::
animal welfare,
economics,
labeling,
meat,
Ontario,
pigs,
Pork
Steve Buist, Hamilton Spectator,2008.06.06
It’s Friday, May 9. I didn’t need my alarm clock this morning. I was wide awake by 4 a.m.
I admit that I was a little apprehensive. This is Piggy’s last day. This morning, he’s being shipped from the Littlejohns’ farm in the hamlet of Glen Morris to Great Lakes Specialty Meats, a small packing plant in Mitchell, about half an hour north of London.
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Posted by FFC on July 22nd, 2009 :: Filed under
Farm life,
Meat/slaughter plants,
Pork,
TransportationTags ::
Farmers,
meat,
pigs,
Pork,
slaughter,
Transportation
Steve Buist, Hamilton Spectator, 2021.06.04
I’m playing a word game with Temple Grandin. It’s fascinating to hear her describe how her brain works.
Temple Grandin is a professor of livestock behaviour at Colorado State University. She also happens to be autistic.
You could make the case that she’s the world’s most highly functioning autistic person and I wouldn’t argue with that.
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Posted by FFC on July 22nd, 2009 :: Filed under
Education and public awareness,
Family vs factory farming,
Farm life,
Housing,
PorkTags ::
animal welfare,
beef,
livestock,
meat,
pigs,
Pork,
slaughter
Steve Buist, Hamilton Spectator, 2021.05.28
Six months, 250 pounds. That’s Piggy’s destiny in life.01 At first, he’ll double his weight in a few days, then it will double in a week, then every couple of weeks, then every month. It’s incredible, isn’t it, to think that a barnyard animal is capable of growing so large, so quickly.
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Posted by FFC on July 22nd, 2009 :: Filed under
Canada,
Education and public awareness,
Farm life,
PorkTags ::
animal welfare,
artificial insemination,
Farmers,
meat,
Ontario,
pigs,
Pork,
Research
Feedstuffs, (12/25/2008) ,
Rod Smith
The National Meat Assn. (NMA) has filed a lawsuit in a federal court in California seeking to overturn part of a California law passed this summer that bans the slaughter of non-ambulatory livestock for meat for human consumption, and the American Meat Institute (AMI) has moved to intervene in and broaden the action, according to an announcement yesterday.
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Posted by FFC on July 21st, 2009 :: Filed under
Meat/slaughter plants,
RegulationsTags ::
agriculture,
animal welfare,
animals,
meat,
regulation
