http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0106-02.htm
Published in the fall 1990 issue of Earth Island Journal
The Dark Side of Recycling
by Keith Woods
(Note: In February 1990, the San Francisco Chronicle carried a macabre two-part story detailing how stray dogs and cats and pound animals are routinely rounded up by meat renderers and ground up into -- of all things -- pet food. According to Keith Wood, thc researcher who brought the information to the Chronicle, the paper buried the story and deleted many of the charges Wood had documented. A report Wood worked on for ABC television's 20/20 was similarly watered down. In exasperation, Wood brought his story to Earth Island Journal. A warning to readers: this report is not for the squeamish.)
SOME QUOTES FROM THE ARTICLE:
As the American Journal of Veterinary Research explains, the recycled meat and bone meal is used as "a source of protein and other nutrients in the diets of poultry and swine and in pet foods, with lesser amounts used in the feed of cattle and sheep. Animal fat is also used in animal feeds as an energy source." Every day, hundreds of rendering plants across the United States truck millions of tons of this "food enhancer" to poultry ranches, cattle feed lots, dairy and hog farms, fish feed plants and pet food manufacturers where it is mixed with other ingredients to feed the billions of animals that meat-eating humans, in turn, will eat. <SNIP>
The dead animals (the "raw") are accompanied by a whole menu of unwanted ingredients. Pesticides enter the rendering process via poisoned livestock, fish oil laced with bootleg DDT and other organo-phosphates that have accumulated in the bodies of West Coast mackerel and tuna.
Because animals are frequently shoved into the pit with flea collars still attached, organo-phosphate-containing insecticides get into the mix as well. The insecticide Dursban arrives in the form of cattle insecticide patches. Pharmaceuticals leak from antibiotics in livestock and euthanasia drugs given to pets are also included. Heavy metals accumulate from a variety of sources -- pet ID tags, surgical pins and needles.
Even plastic winds up going into the pit. Unsold supermarket meats, chicken and fish arrive in styrofoam trays and shrink wrap. No one has time for the tedious chore of unwrapping thousands of rejected meat packs. More plastic is added to the pits with the arrival of cattle ID lags, plastic insecticide patches and the green plastic bags containing pets from veterinarians.
<SNIP>
In California, eight field inspectors regulate a rendering industry that feeds the animals that the state's 30 million people eat. When it comes to rendering plants, however, state and federal agencies have maintained a hands-off policy, allowing the industry to become largely self-regulating. An article in the February 1990 issue of Render, the industry's national magazine, suggests that the self- regulation of certain contamination problems is not working. <SNIP>
Keith Wood is an independent television producer based in Los Angeles and San Francisco.
READ ENTIRE ARTICLE HERE
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0106-02.htm
