Brits Bellowing About 8K-Cow 'Factory'

Enterprise promises 'environmental disaster,' say foes
By Mary Papenfuss,  Newser Staff
Posted Mar 1, 2010 3:22 AM CST
Brits Bellowing About 8K-Cow 'Factory'
How it is today.   (AP Photo/Jim Mone, File)

A monstrous 8,000-cow dairy operation in Britain has critics bellowing even before it opens. The "cow factory" enterprise, expected to be the largest in the world, will emit carbon emissions equal to 3,000 homes, say foes. The operation will combine herds from several regions and owners into giant hangars on 22 acres in Lincolnshire. Critics are predicting an "environmental disaster" in an operation that will "condemn animals to dark sheds for most of their lives."

"Can dairy farming in the UK sink any lower?" asked a spokesman for Vegetarians' International Voice for Animals. "This blows out of the water the supposedly bucolic, pastoral image the industry likes to portray." But one organizer said the diary has been "designed to a level beyond the highest environmental and animal welfare standards ever seen in the UK." The operation must get approval from a local government council before it can open, and critics have a few more days to file protests.
(More UK stories.)

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