If organic dairies are managed well, they are unlikely to have such impacts on the environment.” —Antonio Roman, assistant professor of environmental studies, UC Berkeley
Facilities that meet the EPA definition of a CAFO are not necessarily polluters. Basically, the definition of a CAFO includes animals stabled or confined for 45 days or more in any 12-month period. The size of the farms that qualify for the designation varies by type of animal and according to how the farms handle the discharge of manure. The measure’s sponsor, the Coalition to End Factory Farming, a group of animal welfare advocates, environmentalists and small producers, says there are 21 concentrated animal farming operations befouling watersheds and mistreating animals in Sonoma. The Sonoma County Farm Bureau disagrees with these assertions, and has gone on record against the measure. The Sonoma Board of Supervisors in May voted to submit a letter of opposition, calling the initiative a threat to the farming industry in Sonoma County. An academic at California State University East Bay says that, unlike some of the cows at Tresch, the issue is not wholly black or white. “I am critical of industrial agriculture and we need to think
about how we produce food,” says Antonio Roman-Alcalá, a Berkeley-based educator and organizer and assistant professor of geography and environmental studies at the university. “I share the activists’ concern for negative treatment of animals. I sympathize with wanting to challenge [food] producers,” says the assistant professor, who serves on the board of the Ecological Farming Association of California, which advances ecological and just farming and food. The measure is “an effort to shut down a certain kind of production that is known to cause harm,” the assistant professor says, noting that research has shown that certain production practices are harmful to animals and the environment. But at the same time, Roman-Alcalá says, “I would never want to support an initiative that includes people who are really trying” to do things the right way. “I would not want to demonize those farmers along with those who are less ethical.” There are concentrated animal feeding operations that
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22 NorthBaybiz
July 2024
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