Title:
Slaughterhouses on Wheels Come to the Aid of Small
Farms
Description: This is
a VOA Special English Agriculture Report.
See text below
Text:
One of the great American success stories after
World War Two was the rise of industrial farming.
But now small is big. People who say they worry
about their food and their environment are looking
for locally grown produce from small farms.Local
meat producers want a piece of the action. But small
farmers often have a difficult time getting their
animals to market. Many cannot pay the cost of a
large slaughterhouse. Also, the number of
slaughterhouses in the United States has decreased
sharply since the nineteen eighties. Some small
farmers have to travel long distances to have their
animals killed and processed. But now if a farmer
cannot get to the slaughterhouse, the slaughterhouse
may come to the farmer. The United States Department
of Agriculture, the USDA, is helping farmers to pay
for and operate mobile slaughter units. These are
trucks and trailers equipped to do the job,
including inspection. A federal inspector travels
with the unit. Last September the USDA announced a
sixty-five million dollar program called "Know Your
Farmer, Know Your Food." The aim is to support local
farmers, rural communities and healthy eating. As
part of that effort, officials are trying to spread
the word about mobile slaughter units. Ten years
ago, in Washington State, fifteen farmers raising
sheep and other livestock formed a cooperative.
Their group, the Island Grown Farmers Cooperative,
wanted to build a traditional slaughterhouse. But
neighbors objected. So the farmers designed a
slaughterhouse on wheels. The Department of
Agriculture approved the first mobile slaughter unit
in two thousand two. There are now forty-four
farmers in that cooperative. And mobile units are
being used around the country not just for sheep and
cattle.A group in Alaska uses a mobile
slaughterhouse for reindeer. And an organization in
South Dakota has a mobile unit for buffalo. The
United States has a limited number of federal meat
inspectors. Some farm co-ops operate with state
inspectors. But red meat and meat that will be sold
in other states must have federal inspection.Right
now, officials say nine groups are operating
federally approved mobile units. They say these
slaughterhouses on wheels are not only a way to
build local food systems, but also to help local
economies. And that's the VOA Special English
Agriculture Report. For more reports, go to
voaspecialenglish.com.
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Hi. I
personally reviewed this video and found it appropriate for
the news section of English Global Group. This
is a Voice of America video which covers an interesting
topic in Special English. I would appreciate some feedback from both
students and teachers about this video. You can comment in
the window below using any of a number of different services
including Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, and Hotmail.
