Foster County Planning & Zoning Board

~Citizens against the Mega-Dairy LOCATION ~

Join Us, and Prevent the STINK!

NOTICE:  Our concerned citizens meeting took place at the Armory in Carrington on February 12, 2008,  with approximately 40 people attending.  The main concerns addressed were: the location of the Mega-dairy and its closeness to Carrington and the Carrington aquifer... the possibility of it contaminating our ground water; the fact that we need stricter county regulations regarding large CAFO's (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations such as this Mega-dairy) that want to come to our area; that much of the planning for this proposed Mega-dairy in Carrington was done by some community leaders without notifying the general public. 

Question:  Has anyone (particularly the guardians of our community's safety) looked into the background of the dairy cows which are going to be brought to Foster County?  Notice that they are coming from Calmar, Alberta, Canada.  See the links below their application, and find out more about that region and its connection to "mad cow disease."

COMMENT:  Coincidentally, it just so happens that the proposed MEGA-dairy which wants to locate near Carrington would be owned by Corne and Conny Van Bedaf from Calmar, Alberta, Canada, who "...are presently feeding about 180 head of our heifers which we intend to bring to the states this year to use as we start our dairy operation at Carrington."  (This is quoted from their letter addressed to the Foster County Livestock Planning and Zoning Commission, dated January 24, 2008.)  How do we know that the Van Bedaf cows aren't related to the BSE-positive dairy cows from their home region of Calmar?  Another mad cow from that area was discovered on the 12th of February... having for a time slipped through their careful monitoring systems.   Our national and local beef raisers have suffered enough from the taint of mad cow disease... reportedly brought to us unintentionally from the UK and Canada.  How many Foster County residents will feel comfortable eating a hamburger if they think it might possibly be from a processed dairy cow from the Van Bedaf herd?  One can feel empathy for the Van Bedafs and the stigma that they must face with the recent reoccurrence of mad cow disease from their area.  But, is it not a community's first duty to protect our local families, our children, our local herds, and the health of our community rather than take a chance on an unknown source from another country that could potentially - even if unintentionally - cause harm?

12th case of mad cow in Canada
Feb 27, 2008 6:56 AM    TVNZ News
Canada confirmed a new case of mad cow disease on Tuesday, the 12th since 2003, and said the animal in question was a six year old dairy cow from Alberta which had not entered the human or animal food supply.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency, which vows to eradicate bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) within a decade, has consistently said it expects to find a few cases of the disease.

The cow was born after Canada and the United States introduced a ban in 1997 on cattle feed that contained ingredients made from rendered cattle and other ruminants. At least four other cases involved animals born after 1997.

Canada has generally blamed contaminated feed for its cases of mad cow disease.

Many trading partners shut their borders to Canadian cattle and beef products after the first home-grown case in 2003, dealing a massive blow to the industry, and Ottawa has fought hard to restore market confidence. More...

Centre to tackle mad cow cases
By BROOKES MERRITT, SUN MEDIA
The Edmonton Sun  February 28, 2008
On Tuesday, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency confirmed another case in a six-year-old dairy cow from the Edmonton area. The animal was born after a 1997 feed ban to prevent cows from eating food contaminated with cow tissue, but scientists have long expected a few cases will pop up from time to time. The prion centre's Dr. David Westaway said the new case could have resulted from contamination of an old feed container. "The other theory is that sometimes these cases can have a genetic origin, where the animals' DNA has mutated," he said. More...

Infected Alberta dairy cow latest case of mad cow disease in Canada
The Canadian Press - Feb 27, 2008
"We haven't planned any action because of this case," Karen Eggert said in an interview from Washington. "We expected more cases from Canada. We took that into account in our risk assessment and still found that the risk of establishing BSE here in this country is negligible."

That didn't stop the U.S. rancher group R-CALF, which is currently in court trying to stop the importation of older cattle from Canada, from calling on the USDA to do something about the latest positive test.

"It is a near certainty that the U.S. will import BSE-infected cattle from Canada ... and that these cattle will continue to incubate the disease right here in the U.S.A.," R-CALF president Max Thornsberry said in a news release.

"Our government is not even testing these high-risk Canadian animals before they enter the U.S. food supply. I don't know how much more irresponsible you can get than what USDA is now doing."  More...

Canadian food inspection agency confirms new case of mad cow disease
The Associated PressPublished: February 26, 2008
OTTAWA: Canada confirmed a new case of mad cow disease on Tuesday, marking the country's 12th such case since the disease was first discovered there in 2003. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency said no part of the cow's carcass entered the human food or animal feed chains. The animal is a six-year-old cow from Alberta, born after the implementation of Canada's feed ban in 1997. The national monitoring program targets cattle most at risk for the disease, which is also known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy. The food inspections agency said it expects to detect a small number of cases over the next 10 years as Canada moves toward its goal of eliminating the disease from its herds.  More...

Massive Beef Recall Follows Mad Cow Scare
USDA orders recall of 143 million pounds of frozen beef
By Mark Huffman - ConsumerAffairs.Com
February 17, 2008

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is recalling 143 million pounds of frozen beef in the wake of a video showing so-called downer cattle being prepared for slaughter at a California plant. The recall includes beef products produced after February 1, 2006 at the Westland/Hallmark Meat Co. in Chino.

A consumer group said the recall was the result of a "terrible failure" by the USDA and said consumers are losing confidence in the safety of the American food supply.
...
Mad cow disease
The slaughter of downer cattle set off alarm bells among investigators because not being able to walk is one of the symptoms of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, otherwise known as Mad Cow Disease.

There are strict rules that are supposed to keep meat from infected cows out of cattle feed – much less the human food supply. In addition, Schafer says the fact the cows weren't inspected raises all sorts of other alarming possibilities, including foodborne pathogens such as E. coli O157:H7 and Salmonella. More...


Supplements used in factory farming can spread disease

Seattle Times, December, 2003

"So calves, male and female, are shunted away from many large dairy farms — usually within two weeks of birth — to specialized feedlots, where they are quickly weaned from milk and fed protein supplement pellets, along with hay. These calves depend on supplements for most of their protein intake until they are about 3 months old, when they are mature enough to digest cellulose and absorb protein on their own. Bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE, the brain malady known as mad-cow disease, can infect cattle that eat protein supplements made from the remains of cattle and other ruminant livestock. The disease is not transmitted by milk, which calves would normally be getting from their mothers.

"Because of the supplement regime, dairy cattle are especially susceptible to this problem," said Arthur Linton, a cattle geneticist and director of Washington State University's Irrigated Agriculture Research and Extension Center.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced yesterday that the Washington state dairy cow that tested positive this month for mad-cow disease probably came to the United States from the Canadian province of Alberta in August 2001."

Summary Report: Epidemiological Investigation of Washington State BSE Case: March 2004
"On December 23, 2003, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced a presumptive positive case of BSE in a Holstein cow slaughtered in the State of Washington. The infected cow entered the United States on September 4, 2001, as part of a shipment of 81 animals from the source herd in Canada. On January 6, 2003, Dr. Ron DeHaven, USDA’s Chief Veterinary Officer, and Dr. Brian Evans, Canada’s Chief Veterinary Officer, held a joint press conference to announce that DNA evidence indicated—with a high degree of certainty—that the BSE-positive cow found in Washington State originated from a dairy farm in Calmar, Alberta, Canada. The DNA evidence is based on comparative testing of DNA from the brain of the positive cow with DNA from semen of her sire and with blood from the heifer calf born from the BSE-positive cow on the index farm. The test results were independently confirmed by both U.S. and Canadian animal health laboratories."

FINAL BSE UPDATE – Monday, February 9, 2004

"Investigation: The epidemiological tracing and DNA evidence proves that the BSE positive cow slaughtered in the State of Washington on December 9, 2003, was born on a dairy farm in Calmar, Alberta, Canada, on April 9, 1997. She was moved to the United States in September 2001 along with 80 other cattle from that dairy. A brain sample collected from the cow at slaughter tested positive for BSE on December 23rd.

The Subcommittee recognized that the North American BSE situation vividly demonstrates the unwarranted and very significant social and financial impact when importing countries fail to comply with science-based international rules regarding trade. The subcommittee hopes that the United States will continue to demonstrate leadership in trade matters by adopting import/export policy in accordance with the science and international standards."

Comprehensive BSE Investigation
"As part of a cooperative investigation by Canadian and U.S. officials, DNA testing determined that the
animal originated from a herd in Alberta, Canada. This second case of BSE native to North America, is
confirmed to have occurred in a cow before the ban on feeding cattle meat and bone meal (MBM) from
ruminants, which was implemented by Canada and the United States in 1997. On May 20th, 2003
Canada reported the first native case of BSE, which had also been born before the ban. A comprehensive
investigation concluded that the original source of the BSE prion in MBM is likely to have come from a
limited number of cattle imported directly into either Canada or the U.S. from the U.K. in the 1980s, before BSE was detected in that country. It is likely that some of these animals were slaughtered or died and entered the animal feed system prior to a ban on further importations from the U.K. in 1990.2
 

A Harmonized BSE Prevention and Control System
The events which ultimately led to the introduction of BSE in North America most probably occurred more than a decade ago with the importation of a small number of animals from the U.K. Since that time, extensive safeguards to control and eliminate BSE have been implemented in both countries and continue to be enhanced in accordance with the best available science. The finding of a small number of cases in North America has been predicted by international experts and the Harvard BSE Risk Assessment."

Pathogens and Contaminants [from the USDA National Agricultural Library Web Site]
A Focus on Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy

"Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE), commonly known as "mad cow disease", is a fatal neurodegenerative disease in cattle that causes a spongy degeneration in the brain and spinal cord. BSE has a long incubation period, about 4 years, usually affecting adult cattle at a peak age onset of four to five years, all breeds being equally susceptible. Post-mortem pathological tests of the brain tissue are the only existing methods to confirm BSE.

Mad cow disease is believed to be linked to the variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), a fatal transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE) disease found in humans. The relationship of the infective BSE agent and vCJD in humans is not completely understood and no direct correlation has been confirmed; however, a strong association exists between humans infected with vCJD and exposure to BSE-infected products. Understanding the TSE agent’s ability to cross species barriers and developing more sensitive antemortem diagnostic tests are two current areas of research."

Ranchers Shouldn`t Worry About Canadian Mad Cow
2/27/2008  KQCD News Story - Dickinson, ND

Agriculture leaders say North Dakota ranchers don`t have to worry about the newly confirmed case of mad cow disease in Canada.

It`s the second case there in the past two months.

Agriculture commissioner Roger Johnson says he doesn`t think the newest case is a health issue for animals here, but says it will probably cause some marketing problems.

He says because the US accepts imports of cattle from Canada that meet certain requirements, other countries say the US has a lower standard.

Johnson says it`s a problem that he and others warned against when the agreement was made between the US and Canada, and it isn`t likely to change.

He says he`s concerned that new cases are being discovered in animals that were born after a ban on contaminated feed was supposed to have eliminated the source.

"This latest one, again, six-year-old Holstein cow, that`s three years, born three years after the ban was supposed to have been effective and the contaminated feed was supposed to be out of the system," Johnson says. "Well clearly it was not, there`s still quite clearly some contaminated feed that`s re-circulating up there."

Johnson says the risk of a contaminated cow entering North Dakota is very small.

INDEPTH: MAD COW
Mad Cow in Canada: The science and the story
CBC News Online | August 24, 2006

In August 2006, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, the federal regulator responsible for monitoring the safety of Canadian cattle, confirmed a case of mad cow disease in an older cow in Alberta. It was the fifth case in 2006 and the eighth since 2003.

The agency said locating the cow shows the success of its monitoring program.

Brad Wildeman, vice-president of the Canadian Cattlemen's Association, took the same line.

More infected animals have been found because of the extent of the testing, he said.

"We probably have the most aggressive, safest beef supply of any country in the world."

For years, Canada had been virtually free of mad cow disease. But in May 2003, veterinary officials in Alberta confirmed that a sick cow sent to a slaughterhouse in January of that year had been inspected, found to be substandard, and removed so that it would not end up as food for humans or other animals.

The carcass was, however, sent to a processing plant for rendering into oils. Its head was kept for testing. Samples were sent to the world testing laboratories in the U.K., which confirmed the case of mad cow. More...

Agriculture Department resists banning all 'downer' cattle
WASHINGTON - Slaughterhouse Abuse
Feb 28, 2008 5:46 PM By ERICA WERNER, AP
WASHINGTON (Map, News) - The agriculture secretary on Thursday resisted calls from Democratic senators for a complete ban on so-called downer cattle - those unable to walk - from entering the food supply.

In the wake of the largest beef recall in U.S. history, Agriculture Secretary Edward T. Schafer announced new steps to ensure the safety of the country's meat supply, including more random inspections of slaughterhouses and immediate audits of the 23 plants that supply meat for federal programs, primarily school lunches.

But Schafer contended downer cattle could occasionally enter the food supply safely, in accordance with USDA rules, after an additional inspection by a veterinarian.  More...

 

Click here to print out a copy of the petition.

AS-1155
Scott Birchall, Livestock Waste Management Specialist

"One of the most important decisions when planning any livestock facility is site selection. The site for the feedlot operation must not only be suitable for housing, handling and feeding cattle, but also must ensure that surface and ground waters are protected and that the impact from odors is minimized. Whether you are planning a new facility or modifying an existing one, the following checklist may help avoid costly mistakes....

Odor
Minimizing the impact of odor on neighboring residents is a combination of:

~Recognizing the prevailing wind direction. In North Dakota, this is usually from the north west or south east (or north/south in the Red River Valley).
~Using topography to your advantage. Odor tends to "drain" down slope in the evening in summer.
~Reduce visual impact. Visual confirmation of dust is more likely to result in odor complaints. Windbreaks will also help break up odor plumes and provide stock protection.
~Providing a buffer distance to the neighbors. It is difficult to specify a particular buffer distance without taking into account the previous factors. Be aware that odors from some larger facilities have been detected 4 to 5 miles distant. Anyone planning a facility within 1 to 2 miles of neighboring dwellings will have to provide more detailed information on how they plan to minimize odor."

Read More...

(The above web site

-produced by the North Dakota State University
NDSU Extension Service-

is extremely informative about the precautions that should be taken regarding livestock waste management.  How does the proposed MEGA-dairy intend  to address these

concerns?)