Don't Eat Aussie Horses
Rational Analysis from a Rational Aussie.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Anti-Horse Meat Protest in Perth, 10th Oct 2010
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Talking Horses asks the National Party about Horse Meat in WA
Diane Bennit - Moving along to an emotive issue, the horse meat debate, how does the National Party... where do they stand?
Lynne Craigie - The National Party again, doesn't have a stance on it, I guess if you look overseas horse meat has been a delicacy in some countries, I think France for example, they see it as a delicacy. Personally I'm not in favour of it, I think we have enough choices already and I don't see the need to bring it on board, but as I said at this point the Nationals don't have a policy on it, it's all fairly new, but certainly again it's something we need to lobby our electors enough and about. For myself personally, I don't think I could manage to eat horse, no.
Diane Bennit - The final question is on aerial culling. I realise that a lot of this is a financially practical way, up north, but it is actually hard to kill an animal, even if an animal is standing in front of you, and to hang out of a helicopter at 60km an hr and leave an animal lying on the ground, ANY animal, with maybe four bullet holes in it, and it does take them a long time to die. I know I did see a documentary in New Zealand, they were killing goats in the high country, and they were doing that with aerial culling, and there were goats running around screaming, with broken legs, with blood pouring out of holes. Absolutely it was on of the most distressing thing I've ever seen. Is there any plans, and this would be of course to do with country, are there any plans by the National Party to maybe try and find a more humane way.
Lynne Craigie - Not that I'm aware of, everything I can find about aerial culling, and I have been looking at it since getting your questions the other day, it appears that it is done for financial reasons, because it's mainly out in very remote areas that they do it. Of course according to cost and everything else it's the most efficient way to do it, however I agree with you, I can't see that it is humane in the way that it's done, because how do they know that the animal is dead or not. Again I'm probably a bit naive on this, I'm not sure of what other methods are available. But certainly we should be looking into it.
Diane Bennit - I think you can pretty much guarantee that a very large percentage of them are not actually going to be dead, and I know that they're going to start now, apparently there's a million camels too many in Australia, and they're going to start culling those, so it's not just the horses. It's any type of animal.
Lynne Craigie - Maybe there is room there to look at some forms of employment or industry out in those remote regions, I know with camels it's been talked about before. Perhaps there is room out there for some indigenous enterprise in looking at the ways of what we can do with camel, and culling of camel. Surely the same could be extended to horses, and look for more humane ways to do what we do and to also utilise the animals to their best, perhaps I'm not saying that in the best way, rather than having them lying around and rotting what more can we do?
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Vince Garreffa, Animal Rights Activist?
Vince Garreffa - "...this meat is produced, not to West Australian standards, but it's produced to Australian standards, ok? In a proper abattoir that does my beef, my lamb, my pork. So for the first time ever we've got horse meat that is produced to the highest standards in this country made available to its citizens."
VG - "We would rather have all these wild horses that have been distributed throughout this country, shot from a helicopter, drop dead on the ground and rot, than kill them humanely. The moment a meat becomes worthy of human consumption everybody wants to protect it."
VG - "So I'm thinking what I've created, is a conscience, of making sure we discuss this issue, that we start humanely treating... It costs about $500 to bury a horse. In England they won't allow you to bury a horse without a license, because when you bury a 500 kilo horse you can contaminate the water table. And so all of a sudden people are hiding horses, by shooting them illegally, and burying them in lots of places. Ok? And I'm saying here we are that we could say, "hey stop mistreating 'em, start looking after them, treat them well, they're a valuable commodity.""
VG - "...everyone will talk to you about the fact that to save old breeds of anything, pork is a classic case, all the old breeds of pork, all the old breeds of beef, all the old breeds of anything, have been saved only when they're eaten, because when they're eaten it keeps them safe... from, from extinction!"
VG - "So I think it's been quite an unbelievable little "ride" that's happened the last few weeks, and the protesters have hurt quite a few restaurants, but there's no way in the world I can change... the business that I'm in, and I'm only doing what is legal."
VG - "I feel for people that find it hard to seperate the pet, and the meat, because there's no way in the world that there isn't probably ten thousand young kids out there have got pet lambs on farms, and they know that lambs go and get slaughtered, but they don't want their pet going to get slaughtered, and that's fine! I'm not out looking for people's pets. All I'm out there looking for is clean horses, without drugs, that are destined for the knackeries, that I can agist for a few months, get the all clear from the health department, fatten them up, and turn them into a commodity that deserves respect. Instead of them rotting on the ground somewhere, or being used by dog and cat food."
VG - "...all the best trainers in this country will tell you that they need to close a blind eye to what's going on, because they need for their excess horses to be gotten rid of somehow. It has been known, it has been known, that great champions that nobody wants anymore, when they no longer race, have finished up at knackeries. Because no-one wants to feed them anymore. That's an industry that will on one hand tell me that I'm inhumane in killing a lovely animal, and on the other hand is allowing ten to twenty thousand horses a year... be unwanted... and let's just get rid of them behind closed doors, and let's pick on Vince Gareffa, but not wake up to the fact that we need some good rules and regulations for horses going to the, the pet factory, they should be treated with respect, and if they're valuable as a food commodity, you see how many more horses end up with a better life."
Vince Garreffa - "RSPCA's happy with us!"
Linda Monique - "RSPCA? Have approved? Yes?"
Vince Garreffa - "They are happy, because of the fact that they only worry about when the horse is alive, and when they know my story, they realise that I'm making the life of the horses destined for the table a much happier one for the last few months."
Monday, August 2, 2010
New Horse Meat Regulations in the European Union
"Taking into consideration that in most cases horses are not specifically reared as food producing animals and usually end up in the food chain at the end of their productive lives, special attention needs to be given to the requirements of Council Directives 96/23/EC and 96/22/EC which should guarantee that the horses slaughtered are safe for human consumption. Notwithstanding third countries' existing obligations to implement a residue monitoring plan and submit this on an annual basis to the Commission services for approval, third countries are expected to implement the following measures for those equidae, meat from which is intended to be exported to the EU:
- Equine animals intended for food production should be identified and a system of identity verification should be established.
- In third countries where anabolic steroids are marketed for fattening purposes, there should either be a prohibition on the administration of anabolic steroids for growth promotion purposes to all equidae or there should be a separate system for equidae which may be slaughtered for export of equine meat to the EU. This would require that equidae intended for meat production for the EU would be identified and segregated from those equidae treated with anabolic steroids.
- Treatment records. The purpose of recording treatments of animals with veterinary medicinal products is to ensure that animals are not slaughtered within the withdrawal period of the medicine in question, thus providing guarantees that the EU Maximum Residue Limit (MRL) for the particular pharmacologically active substance is respected. In the EU stock farmers are required to keep medicines records. On that basis it is expected that treatments with veterinary medicinal products should be recorded on a document linked to and accompanying the identified animal when moving from one premise to another or to the slaughterhouse (food chain information).
- At the time of moving the animal to the slaughterhouse, the competent authority of the third country should be able to guarantee that the required withdrawal periods for veterinary medicinal products administered to the animal and recorded in the food chain information have been respected.
- The third-country exporting equine meat should set up a risk based programme for controls on the use of veterinary medicinal products and substances prohibited for use in the EU. The control programme should include regular inspections on holdings, collection centres and at slaughterhouses."
"Any horse in the EU treated with phenylbutazone must be excluded from the food chain and be signed out of the food chain in the equine passport."
"For equidae caught in the wild, the provisions as laid down for wild land mammals apply. These provisions foresee the submission of an annual residue monitoring plan which is restricted to the analysis of environmental contaminants (e.g. heavy metals). Countries so approved will be listed in the Annex to Commission Decision 2004/432/EC under the column entitled "Equine"."
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Your Questions Answered #3
Them - Interviewing Vince from Mondo Butchers to clarify why he sells horse meat. What are some things you want me to ask?
Me @them - would love to know his thoughts on the rational argument against consuming Oz horse meat:http://tinyurl.com/292npx5 :)Me @them - Oh, and I'm very interested in what screening/food safety procedures the govt made him follow, re: drugs in horses :)Them - Interview with Vince from Mondo butchers will be posted on Youtube tonight. Was a real eye opener! some of the facts...Them - Horse meat he sells has been approved by the RSPCA, yet Vince is banned from sellling horse burgers at the Truffle Fest on SaturdayThem - @DontEatAusHorse He has an extensive list of screening procedures at the same abattoir he gets his lamb, beef. Screened for steroidsThem - @DontEatAusHorse 60-70,000 horses are being shipped out of Oz to JAP, HOLL, GER, FRA, BEL for consumption...so why can't a butcher sell?
"Equine animals intended for food production should be identified and a system of identity verification should be established.
Treatment records. The purpose of recording treatments of animals with veterinary medicinal products is to ensure that animals are not slaughtered within the withdrawal period of the medicine in question, thus providing guarantees that the EU Maximum Residue Limit (MRL) for the particular pharmacologically active substance is respected. In the EU stock farmers are required to keep medicines records. On that basis it is expected that treatments with veterinary medicinal products should be recorded on a document linked to and accompanying the identified animal when moving from one premise to another or to the slaughterhouse (food chain information)."
"Any horse in the EU treated with phenylbutazone must be excluded from the food chain and be signed out of the food chain in the equine passport."
"The number of horses slaughtered has been estimated from data collected from Ramsay (1994) and has dropped from over 30,000 in the late 1990’s to the current levels of approximately 11,000 – 13,000 horses per annum."
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Interesting Comments from the Interwebs
"International roaming charges worth it to hear update on horse saga straight from the proverbial Vince Garreffa's mouth.""Perth: looks like no horse meat at truffle festival and there are plans for another slaughter in August (that Vince hopes is more low-key)"
"A few more things the media isn't saying:
- Mondos is the only butcher in Australia allowed to supply horse to the public.
- Horse fillet is currently $95/kg. Rump, Sirloin $60/kg. More per kilo than the best quality beef.
- He's been working on this project for *years* to bring it to market. The word I heard was the supplier is breeding the animals specifically for the purpose. "
- Mr Gareffa has put so much work into lobbying for this, that he wants to see a serious return on his investment and has put a huge mark-up on the meat.
- He's got a monopoly on this, and can charge what he likes.
- A less likely option being that he may be concerned about how long he can continue given the public outcry, and wishes to make as much money as possible before the rule is changed again.