Sen. Cory Booker Just Went All-In Against Factory Farming and the Meat Industry
Sen. Booker’s bill would place an immediate moratorium on new large-scale CAFOs and offer transition assistance to farm operators who want to take up growing specialty crops.
DAVID CORN: ‘Sen. Cory Booker (D.-N.J.) is out with a bold new bill, introduced Dec. 16, that proposes a serious crackdown on two powerful industries: meat and dairy. It might seem like a strange thing move for a candidate seeking to increase his broad appeal in a meat-loving nation—especially one who already flouts carnivory by embracing a vegan identity… Americans rank among the globe’s most voracious consumers of chicken, beef, pork, and dairy; and in 2020, US per capita meat production is expected to reach an all-time high…
But there’s a creeping unease about the way these foods are produced. Most of them come from factory-scale facilities known as CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations) that generate the potent greenhouse gases methane and nitrous oxide, and have been known to pollute water and foul air for surrounding communities. The public’s growing discomfort with this system shows up in the booming popularity of alternatives to the animal-factory model—from pasture-based meats to high-tech soy-burger patties…
Sen. Booker’s bill would place an immediate moratorium on new large-scale CAFOs. The bill would also halt the expansion of existing CAFOs over a certain size. And it would devote $100 billion over 10 years to a voluntary buyout program for CAFO owners who want to exit the business. The fund would also offer transition assistance to operators who want to take up “agriculture activities such as raising pasture-based livestock, growing specialty crops, or organic commodity production”…
The bill would also… make the [meat] packers responsible for the pollution produced by the CAFOs they rely on for animals. Currently, that manure pollution is the responsibility of the growers, though it is lightly regulated in general… In a survey commissioned by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for a Livable Future and released Dec. 10, 63 percent of Iowans supported the idea of banning construction of new CAFOs and expansion of existing ones, and 80 percent expressed concern about the threat of water and air fouled by huge concentrations of manure’. SOURCE…
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