EWA President Rebuts Newsweek “Slaughterhouse” Sue Wallis Promo Story

Straight from the Horse's Heart

Newsweek Steps Into Pile of Wild Horse Pooh

John Holland ~ President of the Equine Welfare Alliance

Only days before Wyoming Representative “Slaughterhouse” Sue Wallis makes a bid for a third term in her contested state seat Newsweek ran a two paragraph article that appears to have been penned by the renegade Recluse resident herself. Classic evidence of Wallis’ authorship includes misrepresentation of facts, poor grammar, lack of a grasp for mathematics and self-serving quotations.
Enraged equestrians, from around the world, broadcast their disbelief and outrage on social networks while John Holland, President of the Equine Welfare Alliance, put the global response into perspective.
Inserted, below, is said Newsweek article with Holland’s response immediately following. SFTHH recommends that you click HERE to publicly respond to Newsweek’s poor journalistic standards and protest the bloody and predatory business of horse slaughter that the rogue representative from Wyoming endorses.
Newsweek:
“The wild horse is a symbol of the frontier way of life. But in recent years it’s been recast in a less noble role—as a public nuisance. The Bureau of Land Management has tried culling herds through roundups, auctions, and federal corrals. But the feral ranks have nearly tripled, to 69,000 since 1971, and more than half of those horses are roaming free in 10 Western states. Factor in the thousands of horses turned loose during the recession, and the result, the government contends, is a population that’s overwhelmed its habitat.
Wyoming thinks it has a solution. In 2007 Congress blocked the inspection of horse meat, which effectively ended interstate sales and closed the last U.S. abattoir. But selling horse meat intrastate remains legal, and state Rep. Sue Wallis wants to use that fact to license Wyoming’s first slaughterhouse to help owners who can’t afford to care for their animals. While horse advocates call slaughter inhumane, Wallis anticipates enough local demand—from, among others, pet-food makers—to sustain a factory as soon as next year. Besides, she says, for a horse on overgrazed land, slaughter beats starvation.”
John Holland:
“You have been duped by Slaughter House Sue Wallis. She is a shameless opportunist who plays the horse slaughter issue to get donations.
Sue has been claiming to be starting a slaughter house under the corporate name Unified Equine LLC since last Winter. But when she announced it and opened a web page talking about what a great investment it would be back last spring, we found there was no such corporation. In fact, it still did not exist when we rechecked months later.
Hyping an investment outside of an offering memorandum is a serious securities violation in most states to say nothing of hyping investment in a non-existent corporation.
The plant you describe is impossible. Do the math!
And the idea that such a slaughter house could be a going concern based on selling horse meat inside Wyoming is absurd. First, Americans don’t eat horse meat, and secondly the entire population of Wyoming is 544,270. That is 3% the size of New York City!
The smallest of the now defunct US slaughter plants (Dallas Crown) killed about 20,000 horses a year. An average horse produces about 500 pounds of meat. That means the plant would produce about 10 million pounds of meat a year to be viable. Sue would have to sell 18 pounds of horse meat to every man woman and child in Wyoming every year to keep a plant profitable. That is of course absolutely impossible in a country where the meat is shunned.
So what investor would put money into that sort of a proposition? Next time, do a little tiny bit of research before you repeat propaganda and soil the News Week brand by being duped.
Nobody could make a living killing horses to sell their meat within Wyoming! There is absolutely no market for horse meat in the US.”

Canadian Rules Could Impact Slaughter Exports

Horse.com

by: Pat Raia
February 15 2010, Article # 15830

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New Canadian horse processing regulations could slow the flow of U.S. horses to slaughter plants there, say equine welfare advocates.

Last month the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) advised all Canadian owners of horses that could be sold for processing to keep detailed records of their equines' vaccinations, medications, and illnesses (see their statement). The information will be necessary beginning July 31 when all horses processed in Canadian plants must be free of chemical substances banned by European Union (EU) food inspection regulations. Undocumented horses brought to slaughter in Canada will be quarantined for six months.

Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs phenylbutazone ("Bute") and flunixin (Banamine), and sedative acepromazine are among the banned drugs.

Canada is a major destination for slaughter-bound horses from the United States since state actions eliminated horse processing in 2007. According to CFIA records, 56% of the 93,812 horses processed in Canada in 2009 were imported from the United States.

Horses sent to Canada for processing will be subject to the new inspection requirements. However, the United States has no jurisdiction to require U.S.-based exporters to comply with Canadian health inspection rules.

Equine welfare advocate Jerry Finch said the new regulations will increase horse processing costs in Canada.

"All these measures will make all the operations harder and more costly for all the (Canadian) plants," said Finch, president of Habitat for Horses Inc. "This may eventually mean the final nail in the slaughter plants' coffin as far as Canada and the U.S. is concerned."

However Montana State Senator Ed Butcher said he believes the new rules will give traction to his initiative to establish horse processing facilities in his state. Last year, Montana enacted a law prohibiting state courts from granting injunctions designed to stop or delay construction of horse slaughter or processing facilities in that state (read more).

Since then, Butcher has been negotiating with Asian investors interested in locating horse processing plants in Montana. He believes the new rules will boost investor interest in Montana plant development.

"The more they put the hassle on in Canada, the better position we're in," he said.

Whether the Canadian rules will boost U.S. exports to Mexican processing plants is uncertain, said John Holland of the Equine Welfare Alliance. Two major processing plants in that country also provide horsemeat for European markets, and will eventually have to meet EU standards. Failure to do so could stem the flow of horsemeat from that country into Europe.

Some equine welfare advocates also believe stricter foreign inspection rules will fast track passage of HR 503 and SB 727, which would prohibit the export of U.S. horses for slaughter.