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Anthropologist Steve Striffler begins this book in a poultry processing plant, drawing on his own experiences there as a worker. He also reports on the way chickens are raised today and how they are consumed. What he discovers about America's favorite meat is not just unpleasant but a powerful indictment of our industrial food system. The process of bringing chicken to our dinner tables is unhealthy for all concerned-from farmer to factory worker to consumer. The book traces the development of the poultry industry since the Second World War, analyzing the impact of such changes as the destruction of the family farm, the processing of chicken into nuggets and patties, and the changing makeup of the industrial labor force. The author describes the lives of immigrant workers and their reception in the small towns where they live. The conclusion is clear: there has to be a better way. Striffler proposes radical but practical change, a plan that promises more humane treatment of chickens, better food for the consumer, and fair payment for food workers and farmers.

InThe Chicken Trail, Kathleen C. Schwartzman examines the impact of globalization-and of NAFTA in particular-on the North American poultry industry, focusing on the displacement of African American workers in the southeast United States and workers in Mexico. Schwartzman documents how the transformation of U.S. poultry production in the 1980s increased its export capacity and changed the nature and consequences of labor conflict. She documents how globalization-and NAFTA in particular-forced Mexico to open its commodity and capital markets, and eliminate state support of corporations and rural smallholders. As a consequence, many Mexicans were forced to abandon their no longer sustainable small farms, with some seeking work in industrialized poultry factories north of the border. By following this chicken trail, Schwartzman breaks through the deadlocked immigration debate, highlighting the broader economic and political contexts of immigration flows. The narrative that undocumented worker take jobs that Americans don't want to do is too simplistic. Schwartzman argues instead that illegal immigration is better understood as a labor story in which the hiring of undocumented workers is part of a management response to the crises of profit making and labor-management conflict. By placing the poultry industry at the center of a constellation of competing individual, corporate, and national interests and such factors as national debt, free trade, economic development, industrial restructuring, and African American unemployment,The Chicken Trailmakes a significant contribution to our understanding of the implications of globalization for labor and how the externalities of free trade and neoliberalism become the social problems of nations and the tragedies of individuals.

By the end of the 1960s, The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) had established the basic purity and safety standards for poultry biologics in the United States and had licensed products to address many of the major poultry diseases of concern at that time. The emergence of new diseases, advances in scientific technology, and changes in poultry husbandry practices that occurred in the 1970s to the 1990s required the development of many new and amended regulatory requirements to keep abreast of the changing needs of the poultry industry. Veterinary Services often approved the use of special or conditional licensing procedures to shorten the time to license products needed to address emerging diseases. Infectious bronchitis, bursal disease, fowl cholera, duck virus enteritis, avian influenza, and other vaccines were rapidly licensed to address emerging disease problems using this procedure. Changes in labeling and packaging requirements were made to address changing vaccination practices. Veterinary Services permitted diluents to be shipped separate from product, first for Marek's disease vaccine and later for vaccines recommended for administration by automatic vaccinating machines. The maximum number of doses permitted to be in one container and package were also amended to address the increased size of poultry flocks. Veterinary Services also approved the use of split manufacturing procedures that permitted two or more licensed manufacturers to work together in the production of a product. This innovative use of licensing products for further manufacture allowed the industry to use production facilities more efficiently and provided a wider variety of combination products. In 1985, Congress passed an amendment to the Virus-Serum-Toxin Act that gave USDA the authority to regulate all veterinary biological products shipped in or from the United States. This amendment brought intrastate biologics manufacturers under federal jurisdiction and ensured all biological products shipped in or from the United States met the same standards of purity, safety, potency, and efficacy. The development of new recombinant DNA (r-DNA) techniques for the production of vaccines required USDA to establish new procedures and rules for the review of these products prior to their release into the environment and eventual licensure. Compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act required the preparation of environmental risk assessments and public participation in the field testing and licensing of live r-DNA products. This article addresses some of the history of these and other changes in regulatory requirements for poultry products that took place in the 1970s to the 1990s, but space does not permit us to address all of the changes that have occurred. We have presented some of what we consider the most notable events in this process and leave it up to future historians to address events that may not have been included. Reseña Histórica—Historia de los requerimientos regulatorios para los productos biológicos para la avicultura en los Estados Unidos de 1970 a 1990. A finales de la década de los años 1960s, el Departamento de Agricultura de los Estados Unidos (con las siglas en inglés USDA) había establecido los estándares básicos de pureza y de inocuidad para los productos biológicos usados en la avicultura de los Estados Unidos y había emitido licencias de productos para enfrentar muchas de las enfermedades de las aves importantes en ese tiempo. La aparición de nuevas enfermedades, los avances en la tecnología científica y los cambios en las prácticas avícolas que se produjeron entre los años 1970 y 1990 requirieron el desarrollo de nuevos requerimientos regulatorios o la modificación de los existentes para estar de acuerdo con las necesidades cambiantes de la industria avícola. La oficina de Servicios Veterinarios a menudo aprobó el uso de procedimientos especiales o emitió licencias condicionales para acortar el tiempo de emisión de licencias de los productos necesarios para hacer frente a las enfermedades emergentes. Las vacunas contra la bronquitis infecciosa, la enfermedad infecciosa de la bolsa, cólera aviar, enteritis viral del pato, la influenza aviar y otras vacunas, fueron autorizadas rápidamente para enfrentar a estas nuevas enfermedades mediante este procedimiento. Los cambios en el etiquetado y envasado se hicieron debido a cambios en las prácticas de vacunación. La oficina de Servicios Veterinarios permitió que los diluyentes fueran enviados por separado del producto, primeramente para la vacuna contra la enfermedad de Marek y más adelante para las vacunas recomendadas para su administración mediante máquinas automáticas de vacunación. El número máximo de dosis permitidas en un envase y embalaje también se modificaron para hacer frente al aumento de tamaño de las parvadas avícolas. La oficina de Servicios Veterinarios también aprobó el uso de procedimientos de fabricación que permitieron a dos o más fabricantes con licencia trabajar juntos en la producción de un producto. Esta manera innovadora de establecer licencias para manufacturas posteriores permitió a la industria el uso más eficiente de las instalaciones de producción y proporcionó una variedad más amplia de combinaciones de productos. En 1985, el Congreso aprobó una enmienda a la Ley referente a los Virus, Sueros y Toxinas (Virus-Serum-Toxin Act) que le dio autoridad al Departamento de Agricultura para regular todos los productos veterinarios biológicos enviados dentro y fuera de los Estados Unidos. Esta enmienda introdujo a los fabricantes de productos biológicos intraestatales dentro de la jurisdicción federal y aseguró que todos los productos biológicos enviados para consumo dentro y fuera de los Estados Unidos reunieran los mismos estándares de pureza, inocuidad, potencia y eficacia. El desarrollo de nuevas técnicas de ADN recombinante (r-DNA) para la producción de vacunas, requirió que el Departamento de Agricultura estableciera nuevos procedimientos y normas para la revisión de estos productos antes de su aplicación y emisión en el medio ambiente y para emitir sus licencias definitivas. El cumplimiento de la Ley Nacional de Política Ambiental requiere la preparación de evaluaciones de riesgo ambiental y la participación pública en las pruebas de campo y los métodos de emisión de licencias para vacunas vivas de ADN recombinante. En este artículo se aborda parte de la historia de estos y otros cambios en los requisitos regulatorios para los productos avícolas que tuvieron lugar entre los años 1970 y 1990, pero el espacio no permite hacer frente a todos los cambios que se han producido. Se presentan algunos de los acontecimientos más notables de este proceso y se deja en las manos de futuros historiadores para hacer frente a acontecimientos que no han sido incluidos.

The US poultry industry based on flexible accumulation has been advanced as the model of agro-industrial development for agrifood globalization. Similarly, Mexico has been presented as a noteworthy example of the negative effects of neoliberal restructuring associated with the globalization project. In this paper we use both of these assertions as points of departure to guide an investigation of the case of the restructuring of the Mexican poultry industry. Informed by a commodity systems analysis, archival data and key informant interviews are used to generate an overview of the history of the poultry industry in Mexico. A sociology of agrifood theoretical framework informed by regimes theory is employed to analyze the events of the case. We conclude that neoregulation related to the IMF and NAFTA restructuring in Mexico facilitated the diffusion of the US model of poultry production.

Congress passed the Virus-Serum-Toxin Act in 1913, giving the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) authority to prevent the importation or interstate shipment of worthless, contaminated, dangerous, or harmful veterinary biological products. The passage of this act marked the beginning of regulatory requirements for veterinary biological products in the United States. In 1913, only a few biologics establishments produced products for the poultry industry. The first license issued by the USDA for a poultry product was in 1918 to the University of California, Berkeley, for fowlpox vaccine. The list of biological products for poultry grew slowly in the 1920s. However, this began to change with the licensing of laryngotracheitis vaccine in 1933; pigeonpox vaccine in 1939; several Newcastle disease vaccines (inactivated in 1946, Roakin strain in 1948, B1 strain in 1950, and La Sota strain in 1952); and the first bronchitis vaccine in 1953. With the development of these and other new products, the biologics industry began to move its emphasis on hog cholera serum and virus to one based on the production of numerous new vaccines and bacterial products. The USDA's approach to the regulation of biologics in the early 1950s was still geared to the production of hog cholera products; however, as a result of the intervention of a group of dedicated poultry scientists, who were concerned about the poor performance of Newcastle disease vaccines, this soon changed. This presentation describes the initiation and development of modern standards for poultry biologics that occurred as a result of this intervention. The development and improvement of standards and regulatory requirements to address mycoplasma, leukosis, and other extraneous virus contaminations in chicken embryo origin products are reviewed. The licensing of products to meet new and emerging disease problems in the poultry industry and the close interaction among research scientists, poultry industry, biologics manufacturers, and government regulatory officials that has been needed to ensure the availability of products that meet appropriate standards of purity, safety, potency, and efficacy are also addressed.

Scientists have shown that the practice of factory farming is an increasingly urgent danger to human health, the environment, and nonhuman animal welfare. For all these reasons, moral agents must consider alternatives. Vegetarian food production, humane food animal farming, and in-vitro meat production are all explored from a variety of ethical perspectives, especially utilitarian and rights-based viewpoints, all in the light of current U.S. and European initiatives in the public and private sectors. It is concluded that vegetarianism and potentially in-vitro meat production are the best-justified options.

Discoveries, understanding, and innovations in meat science during the last century have led to revolutionary changes in meat and poultry production, processing, marketing, and consumption. American Society of Animal Science members have made key contributions in most, if not all, categories of advancement. The first US university meat science program was begun in Minnesota in 1905. Use of mechanical refrigeration in the meatpacking industry, improved transportation and packaging, and home refrigeration provided more flexibility, variety, and consistency in meat and meat products in the early 1900s. Cooperative meat research was begun by 27 universities in 1925, with a focus on the observational characterization of carcass traits and composition, meat quality attributes, and causes of the wide variation in these variables. Scientific study of genetic, nutritional, and environmental influences on the growth, physiology, and postmortem biochemistry of muscle often used muscle-comparative investigations. Rigor mortis, cold shortening and thaw rigor, postmortem muscle metabolism, postmortem tenderization and tenderness variation, and postmortem myoglobin and lipid oxidation were studied vigorously in the 1960s and beyond, defining the biochemical bases for associated outcomes in fresh and processed products. Value-added benefits resulted from implementation of electrical stimulation, boxed beef and modified-atmosphere packaging, restructuring technologies, collagen recovery, and muscle profiling work. Isolation, purification, and definition of the primary structure and biophysical properties of the myofribillar and cytoskeletal proteins in muscle aided the understanding of contraction and postmortem changes. The role of Ca-dependent proteases in meat tenderness and muscle growth is being clarified. The chemistry of meat curing, meat emulsion formation, fermentation, and other processing methods led to new technologies, new meat products, and new benchmarks in product shelf life and quality. Meat safety assurance and our ability to manage the microbiological causes of food-borne illness and spoilage are imminently important now and in the future.

Meanwhile, stocks closed mixed yesterday led by gains in tech and industrial companies. The Dow did decline twenty-six points. The NASDAQ closed up eighteen, hitting a new record. The S&P 500 gained three points.

In 1910, H. B. Fantham described the life cycle of a coccidian parasite in birds. Fantham was a parasitologist at Cambridge University in the United Kingdom working for an enquiry into diseases affecting the red grouse. Despite the growing importance of the poultry industry and the realization that coccidiosis was an important disease of the fowl, little further work was carried out in the United Kingdom until coccidiosis research was initiated at the Veterinary Laboratory, Weybridge almost 30 yr later. Further progress depended upon research carried out at academic and agricultural institutions in the United States. E. E. Tyzzer at Harvard University provided the solid foundation upon which our present knowledge of coccidiosis, and the species of Eimeria involved in the disease, is based. Agricultural experiment stations (AESs) throughout the nation played an important role in communicating advances to the agricultural community. W. T. Johnson at Western Washington and, subsequently, Oregon AES made significant contributions to our understanding of the disease, as did C. A. Herrick and coworkers at Wisconsin AES, J. P. Delaplane and coworkers at Rhode Island AES, and P. P. Levine at Cornell University. Abbreviation: AES = agricultural experiment station