Chronology of humane progress in India (Part Three)

Special

•••••••
C h r o n o l o g y

of humane progress in India

by Merritt Clifton, Editor, Animal People News

PREFACE

    Chronology part 3:  1977 to 2010

(continued)

        1977 – Shirley McGreal,  the wife of a U.S. diplomat,  in 1973 founded the International Primate Protection League in Thailand to fight Thai monkey exports.  She enjoyed her first campaign success in India,  however,  after becoming acquainted with then-Indian prime minister Moraji Desai through diplomatic connections.

Recalled 1977 – Diana Ratnagar of Pune founded Beauty Without Cruelty (India),  in emulation of the work of Muriel,  The Lady Dowding,  who died in England on November 21,  1993,  at age 85.  A lifelong vegetarian, Theosophist,  and spiritualist,  after her mother’s example,  the Lady Dowding argued in her 1980 autobiography,  The Psychic LIfe of Muriel,  the Lady Dowding,  that enlightenment cannot be achieved without sensitivity to animals.  Then known as Muriel Whiting,  the future Lady Dowding met Air Chief Marshal Lord Hugh Dowding in 1944,  shortly after her first husband Max Whiting,  a Royal Air Force bomber pilot,  was killed in action.  The Lord Dowding quit eating meat and hunting as part of his marital vows.  Serving in the House of Lords, the upper chamber of the British Parliament, from 1948 until his death in 1970,  Dowding endorsed a humane slaughter bill in his debut speech;  of his 32 speeches to the Lords,  27 concerned animal welfare.

The Lady Dowding emerged as a public crusader in her own right circa 1955,  after denouncing fur-wearers at a spiritualist gathering for insensitivity “to the vibrations of terror and suffering emanating from the skins of those animals.”  Learning from former whaling fleet surgeon Harry Lillie about the cruelties of whaling and the annual slaughter of baby harp seals off Atlantic Canada,  she tried to spark protest on behalf of marine mammals,  with little success until the first graphic film of the harp seal killing became available in 1964.  In 1957 she was elected to the council of the British National Anti-Vivisection Society.  The Lady Dowding founded Beauty Without Cruelty in 1959,  in partnership with Sylvia Barbnel,  author of When Your Animal Dies,  and Elsbeth Douglas Reid,  a well-known actress.  Seeking alternatives to animal-based beauty products,  chemist Kathleen Long developed a product line by testing formulations on the BWC directors.  In 1963 Long and the Lady Dowding formed Beauty Without Cruelty Cosmetics.  Afflicted by serious illness in 1978,

The Lady Dowding rallied in March 1979 to fly to New York as star guest along with actress Gretchen Wyler and Fund for Animals founder Cleveland Amory during a week of antifur protest coordinated by Dr. Ethel Thurston,  head of the U.S. branch of BWC,  to coincide with the American International Fur Fair.  The effort is remembered as the real beginning of the U.S. anti-fur movement.  As the Lady Dowding’s health deteriorated,  the nonprofit organization Beauty Without Cruelty (U.K.) waned,  and was formally disbanded in 2002,  though the for-profit company continues.  Beauty Without Cruelty (India),  however,  may now be reaching more people,  emphasizing a vegan message,  than Beauty Without Cruelty (U.K.) ever did.

1979 – Formation of Friendicoes Society for the Eradication of Cruelty to Animals in Delhi by Geeta Seshamani and Gautam Barat.  Friendicoes has grown into the largest of at least nine Animal Birth Control program service providers and animal shelters in the Delhi area.  Friendicoes also operates a care-for-life animal sanctuary in Gurgaon,  just beyond the greater Delhi outskirts,  and has an outreach program serving working equines in the Delhi/Agra corridor.

1981 – Existing overseas programs of the Royal SPCA of Great Britain,  Massachusetts SPCA,  and Humane Society of the U.S. were merged to form the World Society for the Protection of Animals.

        1983 – The neuter/return method of feral cat population control was introduced by the Cat Welfare Society of Britain,  the Universities Federation for Animal Welfare of Britain,  and the Kenya SPCA,  apparently after some trial use in South Africa.  It caught on in the U.S. in a major way through the efforts of Alley Cat Allies,  founded in 1991,  although several smaller organizations had already been using it since the middle 1980s,  and various individuals were sterilizing feral cats on their own even before that.  Acceptance of neuter/return for feral cats helped later to ease the acceptance of neuter/return for street dogs,  as practiced by Animal Birth Control programs.

1984 – Maneka Gandhi (above) formed People for Animals,  the first national animal advocacy network in India,  with active chapters or affiliates in nearly every major city.  Many operate local Animal Birth Control programs.

1990 – The Blue Cross of India field-tested Talsur,  a zinc-based chemosterilant for dogs developed by the National Institute of Immunology,  marketed by Karnataka Antibiotics Ltd.  Of 400 street dogs who were injected by the primary developer,  reported Blue Cross of India chief executive Chinny Krishna,  “More than 35% had massive scrotal swelling and,  in a few cases,  ruptures of the scrotum.  More than 140 animals were then surgically castrated.”  Though Talsur failed and was withdrawn from use,  the zinc-based approach was revamped and used in producing other chemosterilants that have been extensively deployed in Mexico,  Brazil,  and Thailand,  albeit not yet without relatively high rates of complication.

1992 – Founding of the Blue Cross of Hyderabad (registered in 1993) by film stars Nagarjuna and Amala Akkineni.  Through 2009 the Blue Cross of Hyderabad had treated or rescued more than 300,000 animals,  including 34,921 in 2009 alone.

1992 – Formation of the Central Zoo Authority,  the regulatory body for Indian wildlife exhibition facilities.  Since inception,  says the CZA web site,  “the Authority has evaluated 347 zoos,  out of which 164 have been recognized and 183 refused recognition.   Out of 183 zoos refused recognition,  92 have been closed down and their animals relocated suitably.  Cases of the remaining 91 derecognized zoos are currently under review.”

1992 – In court case Maneka Gandhi vs. Delhi,  as summarized by  Utkarsh Anand of the Indian Express,  “the Delhi High Court held that street dogs are a part of the city,  and just being classified as strays does not mean they should be killed.  The court accepted that sterilization and vaccination of dogs is the only scientific and humane solution to the so-called problem of street dogs.”  The verdict established the legal foundation for the Indian national Animal Birth Control program,  ratified by the Animal Welfare Board of India in December 1997 and empowered by enabling legislation in 2003,  but still just being phased into existence in much of the country.

1992 – Christine Townsend succeeded founder Crystal Rogers as head trustee of the original Help In Suffering hospital and shelter in Jaipur,  India.  Relocated the organization to much larger premises,  and presiding over an enormous expansion of resources and mission,  Townend later expanded the organization to run a second hospital in Darjeeling,  in the Himalayan foothills.  Earlier,  Townend and Animal Liberation author Peter Singer cofounded the Australian animal rights group Animal Liberation,  now Animals Australia,  in 1978.  Under Townend,  Help In Suffering directed one of the first Animal Birth Control programs to eradicate rabies from the vicinity where it works,  and was among the first to document that the dog population and rabies cases fell off precipitously as the 70% sterilization target was reached.  Townend retired in 2007,  succeeded by Help In Suffering senior veterinarian Jack Reece,  who has continued to document the successes and ecological effects of ABC.

        1993 – Formation of Compassionate Crusaders Trust,  in Kolkata,  by Debasis Chakrabarti and Poornima Toolsidas.  The founders also formed People for Animals/Kolkata.  Working in partnership,  the two organizations expanded to an inner city emergency clinic,  the Kolkata pound and Animal Birth Control program,  the Karuna Kunj sanctuary,  and the Ashari animal rescue and education center.  A high point of activity was winning a Calcutta High Court verdict in September 2006 that obliged the Kailghat Temple to move animal sacrifices indoors.  In recent years,  however,  Compassionate Crusaders under Chakrabarti and PfA/Kolkata under Toolsidas have moved in separate directions,  and have downsized under economkc strain.

1994 – The city of Surat poisoned dogs just ahead of the monsoons.  Rat infestation followed monsoon flooding.  Outbreaks of both bubonic plague and leptospirosis resulted from the rat infestation.  Of 234 reported plague deaths,  57 were confirmed b y post mortem testing.  There were 693 reported plague cases in all.

1996 – Formation of the Visakha SPCA,  now among India’s largest.  Commencing an Animal Birth Control Program in the last days of 1998,  the Visakha SPCA achieved a sterilization rate of 80% among the dogs of Visakhapatnam proper in only six years,  and extended ABC service to the villages of the greater Visakhapatnam Circle — many of them now engulfed by the rapid growth of the city of Visakhapatnam.

   1996 – Wildlife SOS began building a dancing bear sanctuary on 20 acres within the Sur Sarovar wildlife refuge,  17 kilometres from the Taj Mahal in nearby Agra.  Initiated as part of a multinational string of dancing bear sanctuaries funded by the World Society for the Protection of Animals,  the first Wildlife SOS sanctuary was completed in 2002 as the first Animal Rescue Center accredited by the Central Zoo Authority of India,  after a split with WSPA.  It opened on Christmas Day 2002,  sponsored by International Animal Rescue,  Save the Bears,  and One Voice.  Begun by Kartick Satyanaryan as a wildlife rescue auxiliary to the Friendicoes Society for the Eradication of Cruelty to Animals in New Delhi,  Wildlife SOS now operates two additional Animal Rescue Centres for rescued bears.  One is within Bannerghatta National Park,  near Bangalore,  in Karnataka state.  The other is at Van Vihar,  near Bhopal,  in Madya Pradesh state.

1997 – The Animal Welfare Board of India in December 1997 hosted the first Indian national animal welfare conference.  Held in Delhi,  the conference attracted representatives of more than 100 organizations.

1998-2002 – Maneka Gandhi served as the first minister of state for animal welfare in India,  and the world.  She was removed from office after conflicting with the biomedical research and pharmaceutical industries,  as well as with practitioners of animal sacrifice,  and the authority of the ministry is significantly reduced.

1998 – The British-based Donkey Sanctuary began work in India,  initially in partnership with People for Animals.  The Donkey Sanctuary/India was formally incorporated in 2002.  It now operates at five locations.

    1998 – Formation of the Wildlife Trust of India.

1999 – The British-based Brooke Hospital for Animals began Indian operations.

2000 – Formed by then recent university graduate Rahul Sehgal in September 2000 to start an  Animal Birth Control program in Ahmedabad,  the Animal Help Foundation had just incorporated in January 2001 when an earthquake killed as many as 30,000 people in the nearby Kutch region of Gujarat.  Animal Help was among the first responders,  and from that experience plus experience with other disasters went on to form the first standing disaster relief team in India.  Meanwhile,  Animal Help introduced western-style high-volume surgical techniques,  striving to achieve western-level surgical asepsis as a pre-condition for doing same-day release surgery (commonly called CNVR). Sterilizing 8,000 dogs in 2005,  Animal Help hired more veterinarians and sterilized 45,000 in 2006, winning contracts to work in other cities,  including Bangalore and Hyderabad. However, Animal Help was severely stressed in 2007 when several cities delayed payments for services, including Ahmedabad, and staff were attacked and equipment destroyed in mob attacks,  some of which appeared to have been incited by losing bidders for contracts awarded in connection with the federally subsidized Animal Birth Control program.  Animal Help has continued to operate in Ahmedabad,  but the greater part of Animal Help activity in recent years has been done in other cities,  and in Bhutan,  where it has operated under contract to Humane Society International.

   2000 – Lama Kunzang Dorjee founded the Jangsa Animal Saving Trust,  the first humane society in Bhutan.  The organization has partered with Humane Society International and Animal Help,  of Ahmedabad,  to operate the first Animal Birth Control program in Bhutan.  According to Jansa Animal Saving Trust literature,  Kunzang Dorjee was motivated by “a personal experience where he encountered five bulls who had come to seek refuge in the Jangsa Dechen Choling monastery,  where he is the resident head lama.  These bulls had escaped from a slaughterhouse and had been miraculously drawn toward the lama’s monastery.  Kunzang cited as his inspiration his teacher Chatral Rinpoche,  a Tibetan Buddhist whose work was praised by Thomas Merton,  the Trappist monk (1915-1968) whose writings helped to introduce Tibetan Buddhism to the U.S.

2000 – Formation of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals/India,  an affiliate of PETA in the U.S.,  founded in 1981 by former animal control officer Ingrid Newkirk,  who spent part of her childhood in Kolkata.

2001 – Nilesh Bhanage formed the Plant & Animal Welfare Society in Thane,  one of the first Indian animal advocacy organizations to make extensive use of the Internet and Worldwide Web to raise funds,  recruit membership,  and advance campaigns.

2001 – The Supreme Court of India on May 1,  2001 ended the last of 17 lawsuits filed by the circus industry in opposition to a 1990 order by then-federal minister of forests Maneka Gandhi that circuses could no longer exhibit dancing bears,  monkeys,  lions,  tigers,  and leopards.  In 2009 the order was extended by animal welfare minister Jairam Ramesh to include elephants — and to exclude elephants from exhibition by zoos.  Housing animals displaced from circuses led to the construction of Central Zoo Authority-accredited Animal Rescue Centres near Agra,  Bangalore,  Bhopal,  Chennai,  Jaipur,  Tirupati,  and Visakhapatnam.

    2004 – Koose Munisamy Veerappan,  52,  the most wanted poacher and wildlife trafficker in the world after sometime elephant ivory and rhino horn trafficker Osama bin Laden, was killed on October 18 in an hour-long shootout with members of the Tamil Nadu Special Task Force between the towns of Padi and Papparapatti in the jungle of Dharmapuri district,  Tamil Nadu,  near the Karnataka border.

Killed with Veerappan (left, shot through the temple) were three close associates.  Introduced to elephant poaching at age 10 by another poacher of note,  Selvan Gounder,  Veerappan killed his first human at age 17,  took over the gang at age 18,  was briefly jailed for murder at age 20,  but was bailed out by a Tamil separatist politician,  and went on to kill as many as 2,000 elephants,  along with uncounted thousands of blackbuck,  monitor lizards,  languors,  and tens of thousands of fish.  His favorite fishing method was reputedly dynamiting ponds.

Cornered in the Mavukal forest on August 27,  1983,  Veerappan shot forest guard K.M. Prithvi,  25,  his first known law enforcement victim,  to effect his escape.  The Veerappan gang went on to kill at least 36 police officers and forest guards,  wounding 47.  Among the dead were a Tamil Nadu forest officer who was ax-murdered in 1987,  three Tamil Nadu forest guards who were kidnapped,  killed,  and mutilated in 1989,  four Karnataka police killed in an April 1990 ambush,  a Karnataka deputy conservator beheaded in November 1990 for allegedly causing the suicide of Veerappan’s sister Mari,  five police who were shot in a 1992 raid on the Ramapura police station,  and 22 police who were killed in 1993 when Veerappan dynamited a bus.  The Special Task Force formed to capture Veerappan,  eventually including as many as 1,500 men,  itself came under investigation for alleged retaliatory use of beatings,  rapes,  and torture against tribal people they believed were withholding information.  Fifty-six gang members were killed in shootouts with the STF and local police.

At least 20 gang members were arrested.  Three,  including Veerappan’s brother Arjunan,  took cyanide in 1996 to avoid capture.  Veerappan  killed a police constable in a revenge attack.  Altogether,  Veerappan was responsible for between 120 and 130 murders, about 80 of them to silence potential witnesses.  In August 1985 Veerappan shot five villagers on each of two consecutive days to avenge his wife’s arrest.  In one 1986 incident he reportedly “butchered 10 tribals” to reinforce his reputation,  including seven members of one family,  and in August 1995 he reprised the killings by murdering four more.  Veerappan also liquidated at least one rival poaching gang.  Veerappan also liquidated at least one rival poaching gang.  His best-known crime was kidnapping soap opera star Rajkumar,  71,  in July 2000.  Rajkumar was eventually ransomed,  but former Karnataka chief minister H. Nagappa was killed after Veerappan kidnapped him in August 2002.

   2004 – An earthquake just west of the northern tip of Sumatra triggered the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 26,  2004.  Establishing communication with animal welfare organizations within the stricken region almost immediately,  the U.S.-based newspaper and electronic information service ANIMAL PEOPLE relayed funds to the Visakha SPCA,  the Blue Cross of India,  Wildlife SOS, and Friendicoes Society for the Eradication of Cruelty to Animals — and other humane societies in Sri Lanka,  Thailand,  and Indonesia — to enable the start of animal relief efforts even before any of the larger international animal welfare organizations were back on the job after taking holidays from December 25 through January 1,  2005.  The ensuing two-month relief effort was by far the largest in the history of the animal welfare movement to that point,  and remains the largest in numbers of animals helped and amount of territory covered.  The rescue effort after Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana and Mississippi in late August 2005 involved more organizations and volunteers for longer,  but was supported by considerably more resources.  The relief effort after the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion and sinking in the Gulf of Mexico in April 2010 was the second largest in terms of territory affected,  but nonetheless involved just a fraction as much as the Indian Ocean tsunami relief effort,  had few human victims,  resulted in very little infrastructure damage,  and the total number of animal victims was unexpectedly low.  While the Visakha SPCA,  Blue Cross of India,  Karuna Society,  and allied organizations covered the Bengal Coast,  Wildlife SOS ventured as far as the Andaman Islands,  arguably the hardest-hit region other than Banda Aceh,  Indonesia,  where the tsunami first struck.

2006 – Time magazine in April 2006 published a photo of chanting Tibetan Buddhists wearing tiger and leopard skins.  The photo prompted the Dalai Lama,  the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism,  to join with Care for the Wild International and the Wildlife Trust of India in speaking out against the killing and trafficking.  “It is in the Pali and Sanskrit tradition to show love and compassion for all living beings,”  the Dalai Lama said at a New Delhi press conference.  “Because of our follies a large number of our animals are killed,  and we must stop this.”   Long criticized for not speaking out more on animal issues,  the LEFT: People in Thankor lined up animal skins for burning in Tibet Autonomous Region of China last year.  Early in 2006, at the height of the protest against animal skins being used in traditional Tibetan dresses – thousands of Tibetans in Rebgong, Amdo and elsewhere burnt truck-loads of animal skins including Chubas, however, officials in Lhasa stopped people from burning them. The burning was considered a new beginning by Tibetans, which started in response to the Dalai Lama’s appeal to give up the use of animal products. In 2007, prior to the Losar festivities, some Tibetans symbolically burnt tiger, leopard and otter skins on a bridge in Lhasa – marking one year of an attempted burning which was stopped by local authorities. 

        2007 – Mob attacks on dogs and municipal dog pogroms began in Chandra Layout, a Bangalore suburb,  after three dogs killed a five-year-old girl named Sridevi on January 5,  2007.  The attack occurred near a lot used for dumping meat wastes in a shantytown suburb beyond reach of local ABC programs.  Often dogs who had been sterilized and vaccinated,  only to be killed,  were replaced by unvaccinated,  unsterilized dogs from outlying districts,  who invaded the city to take advantage of meat wastes that continue to be dumped in vacant lots by illegal butchers.  The Animal Rights Fund,  a major Bangalore and Hubli ABC service provider,  had warned since 2002 that the meat waste dumping in vacant lots was attracting abnormal numbers of dogs,  and was likely to result in dog attacks.

A second dog fatal attack on a child,  four-year-old Manunath,  occurred on March 1,  2007,  also near a site where meat wastes were dumped,  also beyond the limits of the ABC programs as defined by their municipal contracts.  Dog pogroms erupted within a few days not only in Bangalore but also in Mysore,  Chitradurga,  Bidar,  and even outlying suburbs of Chennai.  The Bangalore ABC programs were suspended due to lack of municipal support.  Rabies,  absent for nearly four years,  returned to inner Bangalore within four months.  Soon thereafter the Bangalore authorities recognized the value of the ABC programs,  which resumed making progress — having already reduced the Bangalore street dog population by about 75%,  according to a variety of counts,  before the fatal attacks and mob frenzy occurred.  Hiranmay Karlekar in Savage Humans & Stray Dogs (2008) authored a reasonably definitive history and analysis of the episode.

2007 – Formation of the Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organizations,  following the fifth Animals for Asia conference,  hosted in Chennai by the Blue Cross of India.

  2008 – The Bombay High Court,  in the most legally influential judicial ruling yet on dog population control in India,  on December 19,  2008 upheld the legal validity of the national Animal Birth Control program,  with two amendments to ensure that extremely aggressive or suspected rabid dogs,  whose behavior imminently threatens human life,  will be killed.

2009 – Delhi High Court Justice V.K. Jain on December 18,  2009 recognized on behalf of dog feeder Simmy Malhotra,  who fed dogs as part of an ABC program,  that,  “The purpose of feeding dogs is to keep them confined to a particular place,  so as to subject them to sterilization,  vaccination,  and re-vaccination.”  Justice Jain asked the Animal Welfare Board of India to identify suitable sites for feeding dogs in ABC program areas,  in consultation with residents’ associations and humane societies that provide ABC services.  Jain’s ruling followed up an August 2009 order to police by Delhi High Court Justice Rajiv Shakdher.  Shakdher ordained that the safety of ABC program dog feeders should be ensured,  after petitioner Namrata Chanda and six others alleged that they had been assaulted by dog-haters.

2009 – Madras High Court Justice S. Tamilvanan on December 23,  2009 rejected the contention of Coimbatore dog breeder D. Vikram that the corpus of Indian dog law affirms his claimed right to keep a large number of dogs,  despite the objections of three neighbors,  all of whom had dogs themselves.  A lower court had ordered Vikram to remove the dogs.  Ruled Justice Tamilvanan,  “It has been clearly established that the petitioner is keeping large number of dogs,  without obtaining a license,  for commercial purposes,  and also caused noise pollution and a hazardous atmosphere in the residential area of the respondents.”  These conditions,  Tamilvan found,  were the cause for the dogs being evicted,  not the mere fact that Vikram kept dogs.

2010 – Sansar Chand,  first charged with poaching tigers and leopards in 1974,  at age 16,  was in August 2010 sentenced to serve six years in prison on charges originally filed in 1995.  Wanted for poaching in connecting with 57 cases in nine states,  Chand was sentenced to five years in prison in 2004,  but was released on bail three months later and disappeared.  He reputedly took vengeance by poaching the last tigers at Sariska.  The Supreme Court of Indian suspended the 2004 sentence in September 2009.  In 2008,  meanwhile,  Chand won dismissal of charges of possession of 28 leopard skins and two tiger skins,  originally brought in 1992.  The Chand history is indicative of the gap between the accomplishments of Indian animal advocacy in winning passage of legislation and obtaining effective enforcement.
_________
PART ONE
PART TWO 

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Chronology of humane progress in India (Part One)

Special—
•••••••
C h r o n o l o g y

of humane progress in India

by Merritt Clifton, Editor, Animal People News

PREFACE

       Note:  Upon completion,  at least to the present state,  I sent “Chronology of Humane Progress in India” to several peer reviewers.  Quite a lot was corrected,  amended,  and updated,  but various reviewers continue to believe that I am a great ignoramus about various points of ancient history & scripture,  & perhaps some more recent history,  too.

      There are,  however,  several different versions of the alleged truth of various points that I have purportedly garbled.

       It may be that all of them are complete,  accurate,  and the whole truth,  co-existing in parallel universes or at least parallel interpretations;  but,  being a great ignoramus,  and a journalist besides,  I have elected to go with the information I have.

Readers are at liberty to rewrite as suits them.
—M.C. 

————————————————————

1646-1626 BCE – Approximate date of the Mesopotamian clay tablets telling the earliest known version of the story of Noah,  who saved his family and animals from a great flood by building an ark.  The actual historical events inspiring the story may have happened many centuries before that.  Elements of the story appear in some of the oldest Indian literature.  Though many different cultures and religions have adopted versions of the story,  central to all versions is that Noah made a point of saving animals as well as people.

1200-800 BCE – Range of most plausible dates for the events narrated in the Mahabharata,  the earliest edition of which appears to have been written down circa 400 B.C.  Two episodes of the Mahabharata have particular significance to animal advocates.  One,  found only in the Jain version,  is the compassion of Lord Neminatha (left),  who renounced his kingdom and refused to marry after seeing the many animals who had been penned to await slaughter for his wedding feast.  The example of Lord Neminatha figures prominently in the Jain vegetarian tradition.  Since publication of the first English edition of the Mahabharata in 1897,  the other episode of import to animal advocates has become known and often cited worldwide.  This involves Yudisthira,  who earlier in the story loses his kingdom,  bankrupts his family,  and dishonors his wife by gambling.

Eventually http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0JXcPxkSGE>.)

800-400 BCE – Range of most plausible dates for the events narrated in the Ramayana.  The hero,  Ram,  is credited with building a causeway to Sri Lanka,  called Ram Sethu and also known as Adam’s Bridge.  While Ram Sethu may have begun as a chain of natural limestone shoals,  as science indicates,  it has been above sea level at various times in recorded history,  was historically the main avenue for migration of land animals from India to Sri Lanka,  and there is archaeological evidence that it was reinforced at some point by a walled,  paved causeway.  Ram is said to have marched an elephant army across the causeway,  accompanied by flying monkeys,  to rescue his kidnapped wife from a demonic king of Sri Lanka.  The flying monkeys are believed to have been Hanuman languors,  named after Hanuman, the leader of the monkey armies, who are capable of much longer “flying” leaps from tree to tree than macaques,  the monkey species most familiar in southern India and Sri Lanka.  Although tradition holds that Hanuman and his army were monkeys,  the Mahabharata itself never explicitly refers to Hanuman or his people as monkeys,  but only as “forest dwellers.”

620-560 BCE — Life of Aesop,  the Greek slave and story teller whose fables often focused on animal intelligence and the importance of being kind to animals.  Especially well-remembered is the story of the runaway slave Androcles,  who paused in his flight to pull a thorn from the paw of a lion.  Androcles was later captured and thrown to a lion–who was the same lion,  and refused to eat him.  Aesop’s fables have been known in India since ancient times.

     600-500 BCE – Buddhism and Jainism rose in India in opposition to animal sacrifice,  then practiced by most Hindus,  though vegetarian teachings had already emerged.  Hinduism subsequently evolved to encourage vegetarianism and require members of the highest caste,  the Brahmins,  to be vegetarian. Both Mahavir,  599-527 BCE, the last of the 24 great teachers of Jainism,  who prescribed many of the rules that differentiate Jains from Hindus,  and the Buddha,  563-483 BCE,   taught vegetarianism and compassion for all beings.  Said Mahavir,  “It is not enough to live and let live.  You must help others live.”  This is the idea embodied in the Sanskrit word ahimsa.

Both [Lord] Mahavir (left) and the Buddha also taught that humans have an obligation to shelter and care for their aged and infirm work animals just as they would shelter and care for aged human beings.  Whether this inspired the Hindu tradition of sheltering cattle in gaushalas and pinjarapoles,  or simply revived it,  is unclear and is disputed.  Either way,  however,  it was in this era that sheltering cattle became the first established and enduring form of sheltering animals as an act of charity.  Jainism may have evolved in part from earlier beliefs and practices of some inhabitants of the desert region extending from east of the Indus River into modern Gujarat and Rajasthan,  whose descendants include the Bishnoi,  the Sindhi,  and Thari people.

The renowned Indian conservationist The modern Bishnoi faith was established by   250 BCE — Introducing the first animal protection laws in the Indian civil code,  the Buddhist emperor Asoka practiced a form of Buddhism which like Hinduism and Jainism holds that animals should not be eaten,  and that an aged or disabled cow or work animal should be retired and well-treated.  Asoka sent missionaries to Thailand and Sri Lanka to teach Buddhism,  including his son Arahat Mahinda.  Interrupting a hunt upon arrival in Sri Lanka in 247 B.C.,  “Arahat Mahinda stopped King Devanampiyatissa from killing the deer and told the king that every living creature has an equal right to live,” according to Sri Lankan elephant conservationist Jawantha Jayewardene.  Persuaded,  the king became a Buddhist and “decreed that no one should kill or harm any living being,”  Jayewardene continues.  “He set apart a large area around his palace as a sanctuary that gave protection to all fauna and flora.  This was called Mahamevuna Uyana,  and is believed to be the first sanctuary in the world.”  Arahat Mahinda and the other Asokan emissaries also introduced animal sheltering as a central function of monasteries wherever they went.  Buddhist monasteries in Thailand and Sri Lanka to this day often double as animal shelters,  though at some the custom was long ago distorted into keeping just a lone chained temple elephant.

341 — Sri Lankan King Buddhadstra found a higher calling as a veterinarian.

497 — http://ezine.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/article.php?article=521.

570-622 – In verse 54:28,  there is a reference to Allah insisting that the people of Tamud share the water with their camels.  In the Sunna of www.godsdirectcontact.org/eng/news/178/vg_55.htm>.)  A Sufi version of the life of Jesus asserts that he was vegetarian and indicates that his focal concern was opposition to animal sacrifice.  The early Christian historian Hegesippus,  born 48 years after the death of James,  the brother of Jesus who founded the Jerusalem branch of Christianity,  wrote that James was vegetarian.  Several relocations and several hundred years later,  the remnants of the Jerusalem church last left historical record of themselves in approximately the region where Sufism emerged another several hundred years after that.  A theory that Sufism incorporated lingering teachings of the Jerusalem church is is outlined in detail by Keith Akers in The Lost Religion of Jesus:  Simple Living & Nonviolence In Early Christianity (Lantern Books 2001).

 1143 – www.cathar.info> web site,  “Cathars, or at least Parfaits and trainee Parfaits, refused to eat animal products – not only meat but also milk, cheese and eggs – anything that resulted from coition. Some at least refused to eat honey, apparently on the grounds that it, like the morning dew, was the product of monthly copulation between the sun and the moon!  In many respects Cathar parfaits resembled modern day vegans, except that they did eat fish.   (The justification was that fish, as they believed, did not reproduce sexually and so could not imprison a soul as other animals could.)  That fish reproduced asexually was a genuine and widespread belief in the Middle Ages.   The same error underlay the Catholic practice of eating fish on fast days.   This practice is still alive in the Roman Church, and a vestige of the same error is the common practice of serving fish on Fridays – Fridays having been traditional fast days.”

Though not Catholic,  1150 – Sri Lankan King Nissanka Malla carved into a stone a decree stating that,  “It is ordered,  by beat of the drum,  that no animals should be killed within a radius of seven gau from the city” of Anuradhapura,  his capitol.  The decree combined consideration for animal welfare with concerns about public health and sanitation,  and about the emotional effect on children of witnessing slaughter.

 1334-1354 – Bubonic plague killed up to 75% of the human population of Europe and Asia,  especially China,  but passed relatively lightly through the Islamic world and India.  Brought to Europe from Constantinople by returning crusaders,  and the flea-infested black rats who stowed away on their vessels,  the plague attacked most virulently after terrified cities blamed it on “witchcraft” and purged from their midst both the majority of people who had medicinal skill (mostly older women) and their “familiars,”  mostly the cats who had provided rat control.  Similar persecution of cats arose in southern China,  especially Guangdong,  with similar results.  In the Islamic world,  however,  cats were protected by the favor of Mohammed and his cat-loving disciple Bukhari.  In India,  cats and rat-hunting dogs were protected by Hindu and Jain teachings of tolerance toward all animals.

16th century – “The Mogul emperor Akbar the Great established zoos in various Indian cities which far surpassed in quality and size anything in Europe.  Unlike the cramped European menageries,  Akbar’s zoos provided spacious enclosures and cages,  built in large reserves.  Each had a resident doctor,  and Akbar encouraged careful study of animals.  His zoos were open to the public.  At the entrance to each he posted a message:  ‘Meet your brothers.  Take them to your hearts,  and respect them.'”  [David Hancocks,  A Different Nature.]  This appears to be the first clear differentiation between exhibition of animals for entertainment and exhibition as attempted humane education.

1600 – Approximate date of the formation of the Ahmedabad Dabla Pinjarapole.  This was among the animal care institutions that eventally inspired British soldiers who were stationed in India to form the London SPCA upon returning to England.

 1824 – Formation of the London SPCA,  which began enforcing the 1822 British humane law five years before Sir William Peel formed the first London police force.  About 150 convictions were won in 1824,  the first year for which records exist.  The London SPCA nearly went bankrupt in 1828,  but was saved by         1851-1939 — Life of Henry Salt,  founder of the anti-hunting Humanitarian League in 1891,   author of A Plea for Vegetarianism (1886) and Animals’ Rights: Considered in Relation to Social Progress  (1894),  among many other pro-animal writings.  Salt was an influential friend of the vegetarian and antivivisectionist playwright George Bernard Shaw,  the vegetarian moral philosopher and politician Mohandas Gandhi,  and the authors Leo Tolstoy and Thomas Hardy,  among many others. Although others including Abraham Lincoln apparently used the phrase “animal rights” in various contexts,  Salt is believed to have been the first person to advocate an animal rights movement.

1861 – Formation of the Calcutta SPCA.  According to The National Humane Review of May 1935,  “This society receives a government grant,  but much money must come from other sources.”  In 1934 the Calcutta SPCA treated 3,439 working animals for illness and injury,  and prosecuted 9,323 cases of abuse of working animals,  winning 7,908 convictions.  The society killed 1,057 diseased street dogs,  whose conditions were deemed beyond cure.

 1862 – Formation in Sri Lanka of the Animals Non-Violence Society and passage of the first wildlife protection law adopted under British rule.  The first Sri Lankan anti-cruelty law was not passed until 1907.

1874 – Formation of the Bombay SPCA,  the longest continuously operating western-style humane society in India.

1890 – Formation of SPCA Lahore.  Some sources state 1892.

1890 – Introduction of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act in England.  Versions of this legislation were adopted throughout the British Empire within the next six years,  but effective enforcement proved to be rare and difficult.

1896 – The Maharajah of Pithapuram deeded 98 acres to the use of the newly incorporated Kakinada SPCA.  The Kakinada SPCA was supposed to support itself through judicious use of the land,  but instead sold most of it,  and by December 2008 had just two acres left when investigated by the Animal Welfare Board of India for alleged mismanagement,  at instigation of visitor Lisa Warden.  “The charges framed against SPCA secretary S.S.R. Guru Prasad,  treasurer K.G. Lunani,  and other members of the core committee included negligence in taking care of animals,  misusing funds,  and using almost half” of the remaining land “for purposes other than animal welfare,”  reported The Hindu.  “Guru Prasad had his own house constructed in a corner of the premises where animals were supposed to be sheltered,”  The Hindu added,  “and embarked on building a commercial complex” on the site.

1906 – Formation of SPCA Amritsar.

1907 – The last remaining Asiatic lion habitat,  the Gir Forest in Gujarat state,  was protected by order of the Nawab of Junagadh.  The Gir Forest lion population soared from just 13 when the Nawab acted,  to 219 in 1950 to 285 by 1963,  fell to 177 by 1968,   and climbed back to 359 in 2005.  Human encroachment meanwhile shrank the protected area from more than 4,000 square kilometers to just 1,400.  As many as 90 lions now live outside the protected area.  The Wildlife Institute of India has recommended starting a second protected habitat for Asiatic lions,  but the Gujarat state government has opposed the move,  saying the lions are a symbol of pride for Gujarat.

1907 – Corbett (in WW2 uniform at age 64) knew from his own background what families endure after the loss of a mother or wage-earner,  and though he never had children,  he appreciated the grief of those whose children were killed and eaten.  Yet Corbett did not pretend that the killing done by tigers was evil while his own killing was morally justified.  On the contrary,  Corbett was troubled by his work,  and eventually felt that it was all for nothing.

        Retiring with his sister to Kenya after Indian independence,  Corbett expected the Indian tiger to be extinct within a decade of his own death.  World War II overshadowed publication of Man-Eaters of Kumaon,  but since his death it has come to be recognized as the foundation of tiger conservation,  and a literary classic in its own right.

__________________

 

PART TWO
PART THREE
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Presented by Animal People News
The World’s Leading Independent Publication on Animal Issues
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Elephant Tarra Mourns Bella the dog (VIDEO)

By Megan Drake

YOU MAY HAVE HEARD about the odd couple in Tennessee.  Yes, the YouTube sensation from a few years ago that seemed to keep re-entering your inbox from everyone who knows your email address.  Bella, a stray dog and Tarra, a retired Asian elephant who live at The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee became best buds.  They were considered inseparable.  They played together, ate together and slept together.  Their level of love and trust was something to behold. 

That special bond was tested when Bella suffered a spinal cord injury a couple years ago.  Not able to walk, Bella was living inside the sanctuary office.  Tarra stood vigil outside for three weeks.  Staff finally carried Bella outside for Tarra to see.  It seems the unconditional love and dedicated caring helped Bella get better.

Watch Tarra lovingly rub Bella’s belly in a CBS follow-up video.  Trust like that is a rare sight to behold.  Eventually Bella improved and returned to her residence with Tarra and continued to frolic among the 2,700 acres of wooded land with her BFF.

Sad news was reported on Friday by The Elephant Sanctuary.  Bella is dead; the presumed victim of a coyote attack.  “As soon as we realized Bella was missing on Tuesday morning, the staff launched a Sanctuary-wide search, which continued into the next day. Late Wednesday morning, Bella’s body was discovered close to the barn Tarra shares with Bella and five other elephants,” states Steve Smith, Director of Elephant Husbandry.

Robert Atkinson, CEO of The Elephant Sanctuary, wrote a heartfelt Goodbye to Bella.  In it, he explains where Bella was finally found and why they believe Tarra was the one to initially find Bella and carry her back.

The extent of Bella’s wounds and the relative order at the site where she was found has the sanctuary personnel concluding Bella was moved there.  This assumption was further confirmed when blood was spotted on Tarra’s trunk and her seemingly disinterested behavior.  It is thought Tarra may have come across the animal attack on Bella and saved her from being completely devoured.

Staff are giving extra attention to Tarra in her time of grieving. Elephants are similar to humans in how they develop bonds with family and friends.  Because of this, they mourn in much the same way, as well. A sister elephant, Shirley, seems to be especially compassionate toward Tarra.

To honor Bella, you can participate in her tribute page.  Rest in Peace, little Bella.  You lived your life as an example to all.

Watch a loving video of Bella and Tarra:

Read more: http://www.care2.com/causes/elephant-tarra-mourns-bella-the-dog.html#ixzz1ceR2wvC7 

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AS EXPECTED: Obama green lights new BP Gulf oil drilling

By Tom Eley, Social Equality Party
How many betrayals can the nation and the world absorb from this despicable administration?  Barack Obama and his accomplices are shamelessly breaking records for misleadership in the wake of one of the country’s foulest regimes. They’re again giving away OUR Gulf of Mexico to these confirmed bastards, who wounded it irreparably less than 2 years ago. This is not a government of the people but of the criminal corporations. And it must end. —Eds

The animals and environment, as usual, pay the real cost for corrupt human decisions.

The Obama administration has given BP the go-ahead to begin four new deep-sea oil exploration operations in the Gulf of Mexico only 18 months after a blowout on its Deepwater Horizon exploratory rig killed 11 workers and caused the worst oil spill in US history.

The drilling will take place in the Keathley Canyon 192 miles southwest of New Orleans in 6,000 feet of water—1,000 feet deeper than the Macondo well, site of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. The permits were approved by the US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE), successor to the discredited Minerals Management Service (MMS), the regulatory agency that failed to correct numerous violations aboard the Deepwater Horizon.

The granting of new exploratory drilling rights to BP takes to a new level of shamelessness the subordination of the Obama administration to corporate interests. Not only has there has been no punishment for any executive from BP, Transocean, or Halliburton—the three corporations whose profit-driven negligence caused the April 20, 2010 blowout—but BP has now been given the green light to launch four new wells engaging in the same sort of deep-sea exploration as took place at the Macondo well.

The Obama administration claims that there are “tough new standards” in place for deep sea oil drilling. But aside from such bald assurances— and the changing of the letters MMS to BOEMRE—it is not clear precisely what these changes are.

In a statement regarding the new drilling permits for BP, the BOEMRE explained these purported new regulations in the following terms:

“Before approving this EP, BOEM [sic] confirmed BP’s compliance with the bureau’s rigorous, heightened standards established following the Deepwater Horizon tragedy.

“In July 2011, BP announced additional safety enhancements and performance standards they would voluntarily implement in connection with its deep water drilling operations in the Gulf of Mexico. BOEM has verified that BP has met the relevant voluntary performance standards.”

This “self-compliance” to “voluntary” regulations is the same concept of regulation that led to the Deepwater Horizon disaster and that prevails in every branch of US industry, including food processing (which has made millions sick in recent years) and finance (which set the stage for the global economic crisis begun in 2007).

Commenting on the decision, Obama’s chief of the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, Michael Bromwich, declared that BP has a good offshore drilling record.

“They don’t have a deeply flawed record offshore,” he said “The question is: ‘Do you administer the administrative death penalty based on one incident?’, and we have concluded that’s not appropriate.”

Far from a “death penalty,” BP has suffered no penalty at the hands of the federal government. According to Congressman Ed Markey of Massachusetts of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, BP has yet to pay any fine.

Financial analysts are now confident that the Obama administration will not pursue BP for “gross negligence” in the Gulf oil disaster, in spite of overwhelming evidence, including a lengthy paper trail and survivor testimony documenting the short cuts and reckless decisions taken to speed the Macondo Well into production. If BP is found to have been grossly negligent, under the Clean Water Act it could face billions in additional fines.

BP’s share prices rallied last month after one of the other corporations implicated in the Gulf disaster, Anadarko Petroleum, paid out $4 billion to settle all claims between the two companies. “The settlement [was] also an indication that BP was not guilty of gross negligence for the spill,” according to a financial commentator.

The Anadarko settlement will also allow BP to end payments into the escrow fund set up by the Obama administration as a means of shielding the oil giant from lawsuits. The “claims facility” fund is overseen by Washington lawyer Kenneth Feinberg, who previously has protected the federal government from inquiries into the 9/11 terrorist attacks by victims’ families, and chemical firms from veterans made sick by the defoliant Agent Orange used in the Vietnam War. BP’s payments into Feinberg’s fund “will finish in 2012, a year ahead of schedule,” according to the British Daily Express.

It was also announced last week that BP will expand its operations in North Africa. It is one of several western oil majors which have benefited from the NATO onslaught against Libya and the toppling of the Gaddafi regime, with which it had previously signed exploratory contracts.

“We are absolutely planning to go back in and all the signals are that [the Transitional National Council] wants us to and expect us to come back,” BP’s Chief Executive Bob Dudley told reporters on October 22. “It’s just a matter of time and we’ll begin an exploration program.”

The newly-elected interim prime minister of Libya, Dr. Abdurrahim El-Keib, is a faculty member of the Petroleum Institute, a think-tank funded by BP and the same constellation of British, French, and US oil firms that stand to benefit the most from the regime change in Libya. 

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OpEds: Animal husbandry & the Horn of Africa famine

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  September 2011:
Editorial feature:
Animal husbandry & the Horn of Africa famine

Cattle being led to watering hole in Southwestern Ethiopia.
By the editors of ANIMAL PEOPLE 

“In central and western Kenya,  farmers have had a bumper crop of plump ears of corn and earthy potatoes.  Yet in the north,  skeletal children wait for food aid amid a growing emergency,”  recounted Katharine Houreld of Associated Press on September 1,  2011.

Altogether,  Houreld wrote,   3.75 million Kenyans are at risk of starvation. Another eight million people are at risk in Ethiopia,  Sudan,  and Somalia.

Aid agencies,  governments,  and journalists have warned about the growing drought crisis in the Horn of Africa for more than two years,  but few have better captured the paradox that the most afflicted nations–Kenya and Ethiopia–are still net food exporters,  with thriving crop sectors despite the ecological and economic collapse of the Horn of Africa region.

“Small farmers in western Kenya–which has had steady rains and a good harvest–say they don’t move their crops to the drought-ravaged north because it costs too much to store and transport them and they are not assured of a market,”  Houreld continued.  “Many wouldn’t be able to afford to buy the produce in the north because the drought has killed their cattle.  The pastoralist communities there use their herds like bank accounts,  selling off animals when they need cash.  Oxfam says in some areas between 60-90 percent of livestock have already perished.”

Overwhelming as is the human suffering in the Horn of Africa,  animals brought into the world for human use have already suffered and died there in far greater numbers than the projected worst-case scenarios for people.  Much of this misery was manufactured by aid agencies which should have known better.  The present disaster has had ever more frequent precedents, each time followed by the same mistakes in helping the region recover.  The first and greatest mistake,  time and again,  has been rebuilding animal husbandry.

Summarized The Economist in 2009,  “The drought cycle in east Africa has been contracting sharply.  Rains used to fail every nine or ten years.  Then the cycle seemed to go down to five years.  Now,  it seems,  the region faces drought every two or three years.  The time for recovery–for rebuilding stocks of food and cattle-is ever shorter.”

The Economist mentioned “food and cattle” as separate commodities because this is the reality of the region.  Despite the prominence of livestock in the culture and economy of the Horn of Africa,  the residents eat less meat than the people of almost anywhere except India and Sri Lanka,  where much of the population are vegetarian by choice.

Ethiopia ranks tenth in the world in cattle numbers,  according to the United Nations Food & Agricultural Organization,  with nearly three times as many cows as Kenya,  yet Kenya produces 20% more beef.  Including estimated consumption of poached wildlife,  Ethiopians eat barely more meat and fish per capita than Indians and Sri Lankans.  Kenyans eat about twice as much flesh food as Ethiopians,  but Americans on average eat nearly 16 times as much as Ethiopians and eight times as much as Kenyans.

About 45% of Ethiopians and 30% of Kenyans,  most of them in the Horn of Africa, were malnourished in recent non-drought years. Drought only intensifies the ongoing disaster.

The people of the Horn of Africa raise cattle and other livestock they cannot feed and water,  and mostly cannot afford to slaughter until the animals are already dying,  chiefly because livestock are their currency.  They are as culturally wedded to livestock–including as the requisite price of arranging a marriage–as western cultures were wedded to the gold standard until 40 years ago,  when then-U.S. President Richard Nixon uncoupled the value of the U.S. dollar from the price of gold.

The Horn of Africa may be the region where cattle were first domesticated.  The Horn of Africa was not yet a desert when the pastoralist way of life evolved,  close to 10,000 years ago.  At that time,  when humans were few, cattle and other livestock were an actual measure of wealth,  indicative of the amount of meat and milk accessible to the people who kept them,  and of the grasslands the herders could protect against predators and human invaders.  But that was before millennia of overgrazing and deforestation induced the present aridity, before the numbers of animals the now impoverished herders keep came to mean little more than statistics in a bank book,  and before continued reliance on animal agriculture plunged the region into both ecological and economic debt.

The most ominous aspect of the Horn of Africa crisis is that without a hard turn away from animal agriculture,  climatic change suggests that the intensifying drought cycle will spread to almost the whole of Africa,  hitting most severely the other nations,  north and south,  where the most people engage in animal husbandry.

“Currently,  1.6 billion people live in areas of physical water scarcity.  This could easily grow to two billion soon if we stay on the present course,”  warned the United Nations Environment Programme and the International Water Management Institute in a 2009 joint report entitled An Ecosystem Services Approach to Water and Food Security.
“Almost all of the Middle East,  more than a third of Africa,  and half of India are considered dryland,”  UNEP and the IWMI explained.  “This means that in these regions, on average,  the amount of water evaporated from the Earth’s surface and transpired by plants exceeds rainfall.  Drylands support one third of the global [human] population,  up to 44% of all the world’s cultivated systems,  and about 50% of the world’s livestock.  Hunger,  malnutrition and poverty are high in these areas.”

UNEP and the IWMI noted that historically “grazing animals capture the benefits of sparsely distributed rainfall by grazing on rainfed pastures” over large areas,  but this was before the runaway human population growth that began in the 20th century.

“In recent decades,”  the UNEP/IWMI joint report continued,  “the expansion of cultivation along with the establishment of international boundaries and barriers across traditional migratory routes have diminished herd mobility and forced herders to adopt more sedentary livelihood strategies.  The result has been an increase in severe land and water degradation and aggravated poverty,  poor health and food insecurity.  Unintentional trade-offs associated with livestock production include impacts on water scarcity,  nutrient cycling,  climate change and land degradation.”

UNEP and the IWMI were optimistic that “Opportunities exist for the sustainable management of livestock systems that maintain ecosystem services,”  but only if “herders are able to get the same benefit from a smaller number of animals.”  Hoped UNEP and the IWMI, “Management strategies to improve animal health and survival can reduce herd sizes.”
Some aid agencies have taken note, including Heifer International.  Asks the Heifer International web site,  after quoting the 2009 Economist article cited above,  “Just two years later,  the catastrophe is here.  Will we hand out aid again and not dig deeper to long-term solutions?  Will the images and stories fade until two years from now,  when it all happens again,  we’ll scramble to repeat the inadequate response?”

These are the necessary questions,  but Heifer International offers an unviable solution, promoting more of the same mistakes that put the Horn of Africa into the present crisis.

“Heifer’s camel projects in Kenya and Tanzania have already helped farmers and pastoralists recover from loss of cattle,”  the Heifer International site continues.  “We’re studying ways to expand our model in Kenya to Ethiopia and Somalia.”

Introducing livestock better suited to a desertified climate,  such as camels,  may slow the rate at which animal agriculture becomes unviable.  If fewer animals are kept,  the habitat has more opportunity to recover from overgrazing.  Indeed,  the Heifer International model calls for “zero grazing.”  But what “zero grazing” means is confinement husbandry, requiring that animals who formerly grazed must instead be fed crops.

Agricultural economists Muyeye Chambwera and Simon Anderson warned– abstractly–that this approach is unsustainable in an August 2011 briefing commissioned by the European Initiative for Agricultural Research for Development. “According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change,”  Chambwera and Anderson wrote, “land area suitable for agriculture,  length of crop growing seasons,  and yield potential-particularly along the margins of semi-arid and arid areas-are all expected to decrease.  National agricultural yields are likely to fall over the next 70 years.  Africa’s population is expected to rise,”  during this same time,  “from one billion today to 2.1 billion by 2050.”
That combination of effects will not leave much crop production available for feeding confined livestock,  regardless of species,  or leave much land available for wildlife habitat.

Where are the animal charities?

One might expect international animal welfare organizations to be leading recognition that the epoch of animal husbandry in the Horn of Africa–and the rest of a hotter,  drier world–is drawing toward a parched close.  But so far there is little indication that any of the biggest animal charities have taken much note of either past experience or present realities.

“The poor pastoralist communities depend on animals for their livelihoods–for milk,  for trade,  for transport.  Without animals their future is bleak,”  contends the Society for the Protection of Animals Abroad,  in disregard that keeping animals at enormous ecological cost has already deprived tens of thousands of humans and millions of animals of any future at all.  Their bones are now bleaching in the African sun.

The Brooke Hospital for Animals and The Donkey Sanctuary are focused on providing aid to donkeys–but not in a manner likely to lastingly reduce donkey suffering.

Observed Brooke director of international development Dorcas Pratt in Mandera,  Kenya,  on August 19,  2011,  “Water vendors are driving donkey carts through dusty streets,  carrying water from the river.  Less than 1% of the population of approximately 40,000 has piped water.  A water truck serves institutions with sufficiently large water tanks and those able to afford its services.  The rest of the population rely on donkey carts bringing water for drinking, cooking,  bathing and washing clothes.”  In El Wak,  about 100 miles south of Mandera,  Pratt added,  “The Brooke and Practical Action have been contributing to purchase fuel for five boreholes in the drought stricken region,  where owners and their donkeys drink and fetch water for the wider population.”

Certainly the donkeys who are alive and working today need water,  as do the people.  But expanding access to piped water and cisterns capable of holding a piped or trucked water supply would reduce the need for working donkeys, would provide jobs for displaced donkey drivers, and would have a noteworthy precedent,  as one of the major projects of early humane societies in the U.S. and Europe was establishing pipe-fed water troughs in marketplaces.

Conceived and funded only to give thirsty working equines a drink where bringing water for them in buckets was impractical,  these systems helped to introduce the notion of ever-available tap water,  hastening the obsolescence of water-and-ice wagons.  Several major humane societies still possess significant dedicated funds bequeathed to them for the extension of equine watering systems.

But instead of encouraging the replacement of working donkeys with non-animal powered technology,  the Donkey Sanctuary is “gathering evidence to convince the humanitarian aid agencies that working animals, including donkeys,  are necessary to the survival of agricultural communities.”

Says Donkey Sanctuary director of international operations Stephen Blakeway,  “We want to see the official guidelines issued to these agencies altered to include provision for donkeys and mulesŠas well as providing essential transport for emergency supplies,  donkeys are often used to plough once the rains return,  in place of oxen who have starved to death.”

Tractors don’t starve to death,  can be used in “no-till” cultivation which conserves water and prevents soil erosion,   and just one well-maintained tractor could replace dozens of donkeys,  at no more cost in fuel than the cost of running the pumps to water the donkeys from boreholes.  So why is the Donkey Sanctuary perpetuating methods which keep donkeys enslaved, on the verge of starvation that fells oxen,  and keep people–including children who miss getting an education–engaged in ecologically destructive and only marginally productive agricultural techniques?

“There is an unrealistic mindset amongst policy makers,”  World Society for the Protection of Animals director general Mike Baker recently acknowledged to ANIMAL PEOPLE.  “The question is not ‘How do we feed the increasing world population an increasing amount of animal products?’ but ‘How do we cope and adapt to the fact that we can’t do that?’

A western style consumption pattern at a global level with an increased population is pie in the sky.  Only dramatic technology changes could deliver even anything close to that,  and there are none out there that hold out any promise of that at the moment.  The real message,”  Baker said,  “is that there needs to be a change of mindset.”

However,  Baker contended,  “‘Eat less meat’ is too simplistic a message,  as meat consumption varies across the world.  It would be a bizarre message in many parts of Africa,”  such as the Horn of Africa,  where meat consumption is low,  “and does not deal with all of the issues,” Baker claimed.  “We could have lower consumption and still have all of the animals confined in appalling systems.  There are no models that can enable the world to adopt a western style consumption pattern,”  Baker concluded.  “We need to be there to help focus them on a new way of thinking and solutions that have at the very least the potential for good animal welfare and avoid a futile sacrifice of animals,  environment and people’s livelihoods in a rush to industrialization.”

Applied to the context of the Horn of Africa,  one might conclude that Baker sees the need to leave behind both unsustainable traditional pastoralism and the “zero grazing” confinement animal husbandry pushed by Heifer International –with which WSPA made common cause in at least one 2010 campaign.  But the primary context of Baker’s remarks pertained to a recent WSPA appeal to “keep a wonderful tradition alive–the sight of dairy cows grazing in green fields.”

The declared object of the WSPA appeal is “to keep our dairy cows in fields,  not in factories.”   The appeal politically supports traditional elements of the British dairy industry who fear competition from mega-sized U.S.-style dairy operations,  whose basic method is “zero grazing.”  Yet picturesque and familiar as “the sight of dairy cows grazing in green fields” may seem to many WSPA donors, traditional British dairy farmers within recent decades brought the world mad cow disease by feeding calves “milk replacer” made from the bones of cattle,  badger culls conducted in futile attempts to fight bovine tuberculosis (see page 6),  the live export of calves to veal crating operations in Belgium and the Netherlands,  and resistance to vaccinating cattle against foot and mouth disease, culminating in the mass slaughter of more than three million hooved animals before vaccination was accepted as inevitable.

Traditional British dairy farmers also often lease land to fox hunters,  hare coursers, deer stalkers,  and bird shooters,  and have rallied several times in support of blood sports.

What WSPA is opposing is a trend which since 1995 has seen the numbers of British dairy farms decrease from 35,500 to 16,500,  meaning a decrease by more than half in the numerical clout of dairy farmers,  while the average milk yield per cow has increased by 19%.  Thus 600,000 fewer cows are needed to produce the British milk supply,  meaning a 24% decrease in the number of calves born each year to be exported for veal or be fed “milk replacer” before being slaughtered for beef or being impregnated and put into milk production.

On balance,  despite the objectionable aspect of “zero grazing,”  it is difficult to argue that a 24% reduction in the numbers of animals subjected to the cruelties associated with the dairy industry as practiced on any scale is anything other than a net gain for animal welfare.

Whether in the Horn of Africa,  Britain, the U.S.,  or anywhere else,  animal husbandry is both ecologically and ethically unviable.  Arid regions may be able to support their human population,  but not by feeding and watering livestock.   The U.S.,  Europe,  and parts of Asia which have long sustained animal husbandry with the help of melting glaciers and undergound aquifers are also running critically short of water,  and will also have no choice but to eventually reduce animal consumption–as some livestock industry experts already recognize. Texas AgriLife Extension Service state forage specialist Larry Redmon,  for example,  in mid-August 2011 advised  drought-stricken ranchers to “just get out and come back later,” if and when adequate water is again available.

“It’s unprecedented,”  Redmon acknowledged. “We’ve had the 12 driest months in Texas history,  and there’s just not many ways to combat that.”

The question before us is whether animal advocates will step forward to demonstrate viable alternatives to animal husbandry,  especially where they are most urgently needed,  or will continue to pretend that watering donkeys and keeping dairy cows in fields represents adequate leadership.

 

Merritt Clifton
Editor,  ANIMAL PEOPLE
P.O. Box 960 | Clinton,  WA  98236
Telephone:  360-579-2505
Cell:  360-969-0450
Fax:  360-579-2575
E-mail:  anmlpepl@whidbey.com
Web:  www.animalpeoplenews.org

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