<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<META content="MSHTML 6.00.5450.4" name=GENERATOR>
<STYLE></STYLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY bgColor=#ffffff>
<DIV><FONT face="Arial Narrow">
<DIV><FONT size=2><FONT face=Arial><FONT size=3>Animal Alliance Canada is asking
if there is </FONT><FONT size=3>a group (6 people minimum) that would do a demo
in Ottawa for laying hens. They provide the
costumes.</FONT></FONT><FONT face=Tahoma> </FONT><FONT face=Arial size=3>Are you
guys interested? Email the list or email me directly...... (Thanks P for the
info!)</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Tahoma size=2> </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><FONT face=arial size=2><A
onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href=""
target=_blank>http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1162728965849&call_pageid=970599119419</A>
</FONT><BR> <BR><B>Activists vs. factory farms</B><BR>Groups want
consumers to force changes in egg and pork production </BLOCKQUOTE><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE type="cite">Nov. 6, 2006. 05:26 AM</BLOCKQUOTE><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE type="cite">STUART LAIDLAW, Toronto Star<BR>FAITH AND ETHICS
REPORTER<BR><BR>Smelling blood in the food industry, animal welfare activists
in Canada and the U.S. are preparing to step up their campaigns against
factory farming, with much of their focus on how eggs and pork are produced.
<BR><BR>"Eggs are the new veal," Paul Shapiro, of the Humane Society of the
United States, told a conference on humane food in Toronto. <BR><BR>With farm
group representatives sitting in the audience, Shapiro and his Canadian
counterparts urged the food industry to stop their costly public relations
campaigns and to spend the money instead on making real changes to animal
welfare. "If you are taking part in brutal, cruel practices, your days are
numbered," said John Youngman, director of the Canadian Coalition for Farm
Animals, which sponsored the conference. <BR><BR>Industry spokesperson Jackie
Wepruk, who attended the conference for the National Farm Animal Care Council,
an umbrella group for food companies and farm groups, said the industry is
interested in good animal welfare. "We are looking at renewing the codes of
practice" for animal care, she said, pointing out that they have not been
updated for more than 20 years. <SPAN></SPAN><BR><BR>Youngman's group is an
umbrella organization of 27 humane societies and animal welfare groups across
the country that have already held several protests outside grocery stores
mostly those belonging to the Loblaw chain with more in the works. <BR><BR>The
coalition has also launched postcard campaigns in which consumers are asked to
mail pre-written cards to the heads of food companies such as Loblaw or Maple
Leaf Foods asking them to require more strict animal welfare standards from
their suppliers. <BR><BR>Based in Manitoba, where the hog industry has been
booming in recent years thanks to a Maple Leaf plant in Brandon, Youngman has
put much of his effort into fighting the use of narrow crates to house sows in
giant barns. <BR><BR>One of his tactics is to set up one of the crates outside
a grocery store, with a life-sized sow doll inside. He said most people are
shocked to see the living conditions under which sows live, in crates so small
they cannot turn around. Many challenge him on whether such conditions really
exist, he said. <BR><BR>"Once you convince them, you can get them to sign
anything," he says, referring to the postcards and petitions he always has on
hand at such a demonstration. <BR><BR>Stephanie Brown, another director of the
coalition and the food animal co-ordinator of the Toronto-based Animal
Alliance of Canada, said consumers should expect to see more such
demonstrations and postcard appeals outside their grocery stores. <BR><BR>One
postcard, aimed at Loblaw, calls on the company to ensure that the eggs it
sells are not from hens housed in tiny cages known as battery cages, which
restrict their movement and allow farmers to put more hens in one barn,
increasing efficiency. <BR><BR>Shapiro said battery cages provide each hen
with a space smaller than an 8 1/2 by 11 letter-sized sheet of paper.
<BR><BR>Another postcard, targeting Maple Leaf Foods, Canada's largest hog
slaughtering company, calls for the phasing out of gestation crates to house
sows. The idea of the postcards is to convince the companies that their
customers want these changes, Youngman said. <SPAN></SPAN><BR><BR>The
coalition has made chicken costumes and human-sized battery cages that it will
be shipping to protests across the country over the next few months and into
the spring. Protests have already been held in Toronto, Guelph and Halifax,
with more planned for Winnipeg, Montreal, Vancouver and Courtenay, B.C.
<BR><BR>At the protests, demonstrators wear the costumes and get in the cage
to show how cramped the conditions are. Other protestors then hand out the
postcards and petitions. <BR><BR>Wepruk rejected the idea that the industry
does not know what consumers want, saying they are represented in her group in
several ways: through the Canadian Federation of Humane Societies and
associations that represent grocery and food manufacturing companies such as
Loblaw and Maple Leaf. <BR><BR>Shapiro said consumer-based campaigns can be
effective, citing companies from McDonald's to Ben and Jerry's that have made
public commitments to getting their food ingredients from more ethical
sources. <BR><BR>"Agriculture has not been at the forefront," he said.
"Companies that are retailers have been at the forefront."
<BR></BLOCKQUOTE></DIV></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>