Sen. Ernst Says Prop 12 Will Ban Bacon Sales, Punish U.S. Pork Producers
U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) told AgriTalk host Chip Flory she thought she’d seen it all. But banning bacon is ridiculous.
“Radicals in liberal states like California are punishing our hardworking farmers and producers in Iowa by enforcing Proposition 12, which would require meat products raised outside the state of California to still conform to these radical animal rights standards that California adopted,” Ernst said.
Approved by California voters in November 2018, Proposition 12 will ban the sale of pork from hogs born to sows housed in pens raised anywhere in the country that do not meet California’s prescribed sow housing standards. This includes not just banning the sale of pork from California, but pork produced in any state that does not meet California's new standards.
Prop 12 will also prohibit the use of breeding stalls, which let sows recover after delivering and nursing piglets, the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) said in a release on Friday.
“We know that there is less than 4% of Iowa pork producers that can right now conform to those standards, and yet California consumes 15% of the bacon that we produce,” Ernst said. “It's forcing our pork producers to basically take on a new way of agriculture and farming, and that's wrong.”
Ernst said Iowa pig farmers should not be told how to raise pigs from people who do not know what is in the best interest of the pig.
“If it was somebody at UC Davis, a great agricultural school coming out and saying, ‘We've got some recommendations,’ that would be one thing,” Flory agreed. “But this was decided by California voters. How we care for animals was decided by California voters, that just doesn't make any sense at all. In the grand scheme, how do they know how to take care of hogs?”
That’s why Ernst and others are speaking out on the injustice of Proposition 12. On Friday, voices from the restaurant, grocery, packing and pork industries urged the California Department of Food and Agriculture to reconsider the implementation timeline of Proposition 12 during a public hearing held by CDFA and the California Department of Public Health.
“We’ve let the court of public opinion, not science or fact-based education, determine how to care for animals,” Ernst added. “California voters, maybe in the heart of San Francisco or Los Angeles, are deciding that this is what's best for swine operators or swine production, and that's not that's not the way we should do this.”
Learn more about Proposition 12 on Farm Journal’s PORK:
Delay Implementation of Proposition 12, Food Industry Leaders Urge
Judge Denies Proposition 12 Challenge From Iowa Pork Producers
Supreme Court Rejects Meat Institute’s Petition to Review Proposition 12
Federal Court Rejects NPPC's Petition to Strike Down Proposition 12
Pork Industry Braces for Catastrophic Costs to Implement Proposition 12
Proposition 12 Pressures Aren’t Going Away
On-Demand Webinar: Proposition 12: Where Do We Go From Here?
20 States Back Challenge to the Constitutionality of California’s Prop 12
California’s Proposition 12 Would Cost U.S. Pork Industry Billions
