Most Kapolei
residents have no beef
with plans for a new
slaughterhouse

Community and state support
outweigh concerns of animal
rights activists

By Lori Tighe
Star-Bulletin

They watched a video shown by animal rights activists of pigs being skinned alive, hung upside down and looking around the room in pain.

But that was in North Carolina.

After hearing the pros and cons of a new slaughterhouse near Barbers Point, residents favored it.

Assured Hawaii doesn't follow North Carolina practices, Kapolei Neighborhood Board Chairwoman Maeda Timson said, "Our conclusion: We were all meat eaters, and it was good for the economy."

Animal Rights Hawaii has fought the new slaughterhouse, arguing that animals have been slaughtered inhumanely in the past.

The slaughterhouse will have "manure lagoons" that will pollute the ocean, the group says, and the state, hamstrung by money problems, is bailing out an industry that can't survive on its own.

But the community as well as the state and federal governments support the new slaughterhouse and the people behind it, the Hawaii Livestock Cooperative. They say it will help the economy, meet strict national standards and address environmental concerns.

"It's practically done," said Paul Matsuo of the state Department of Agriculture, landlord of the new slaughterhouse. The environmental assessment finding -- no major impact to the area -- is expected to be published June 23.

The only alternative opponents have now is to file a lawsuit.

"We feel this is another example of the Department of Agriculture and the state running over the wishes of taxpayers," said Cathy Goeggel of Animal Rights Hawaii.

The new slaughterhouse will replace the Ewa slaughterhouse, now run by Farmers Livestock Cooperative. It is the largest slaughterhouse in the state among about six, said Halina Zaleski of the University of Hawaii's Animal Sciences Department.

The Ewa co-op includes hog companies only. It will join the Hawaii Livestock Cooperative, formed in 1998.

The Ewa slaughterhouse churns out about 75 percent of the state's pig market and 25 percent of the cattle market, said Zaleski, a consultant to Hawaii Livestock Co-op.

It must move by July 2002 because its landlord, Campbell Estate, wants to develop the property. If it doesn't find a new location, it would be forced to close, paralyzing a good chunk of a $22 million Hawaii meat market, said Aster Ramos, operations manager of Farmers Livestock.

Let it close, argues Animal Rights Hawaii.

After a track record of violations, the U.S. Department of Agriculture shut down the current Ewa slaughterhouse for two weeks last year because of a rodent problem.

Previous violations included insufficient stunning of some animals before slaughtering them.

Pigs and cows blinked and writhed while bleeding to death because they weren't properly knocked unconscious.

But USDA inspector Robert Vickery said the Ewa co-op conquered its problems by revamping staff and processes.

"They've really cleaned up their act. I don't have any problems of inhumane handling of animals here. I'm a stickler for that. This is a pretty good plant," said Vickery, who inspects them nightly.

Hawaii Livestock will continue to meet USDA standards because if it doesn't, it goes out of business, said Calvin Wong, a director of Hawaii Livestock.

The new slaughterhouse is "absolutely unnecessary," Goeggel said. It is being built not out of necessity, but to satisfy Oahu's "hot pork" craving.

Although Hawaii gets most of its meat from the mainland, Chinese and Hawaiian communities demand hot pork killed within 12 hours because of the preferred taste, said Brent Buckley, a University of Hawaii beef specialist and Kapolei Neighborhood Board member. Most hot pork goes to Chinatown.

"The slaughterhouse is a good thing. It'll allow pork and dairy industries to survive in this state," Buckley said.

If they don't have a place to slaughter, they go out of business, he said.

"Our backs are to the wall," said Norman Oshiro, financial adviser to the Ewa slaughterhouse.

The state Legislature agreed to help the Ewa slaughterhouse, suffering from swine viruses and Hawaii's poor economy. It approved a $10 million low-interest loan in 1997 to the Palama Meat Co. to jointly build a meat processing plant with the slaughterhouse.

The industry needed the loan because it proved too difficult for it to obtain a private loan, said Tish Uyehara of the Agriculture Department.

This infuriates retired Kaiser physician William Harris, on the boards of Animal Rights Hawaii and the Vegetarian Society of Hawaii.

"The animal food industry is being kept afloat by the state because they can't hold their own in the free market. My taxes are being spent on these ventures," he said. "Is it necessary to the economy when the meat industry represents only 0.3 percent of the gross state product? I don't think so."

Taxpayers also pay Medicare and Medicaid for the health problems caused by meat: an increased rate of cancer, heart disease and other illnesses.

But because of hot pork's demand in Hawaii, a black market would spring up if the Ewa slaughterhouse went out of business, said Agriculture Department's Uyehara.

"Otherwise," she said, "there will be a lot more backyard slaughtering, which poses a public health risk."

Environmentalists have additional concerns about the new slaughterhouse waste contaminating the ocean. The slaughterhouse will begin operations with 40 cattle and 200 hogs a day which produce about 87,000 gallons of waste water needing treatment.

"Any time there's concentrated organic waste near the ocean, it could threaten the marine environment," said Jeffrey Mikulina, president of the Sierra Club Hawaii Chapter. "It loads it with organic matter, which sucks the oxygen, and fish can't breathe."

Gary Gill of the state Health Department said there is virtually no threat that ocean fish will be killed and said seepage into ground water won't be a problem. Even if treated waste water leaks to the ocean, the organic matter will disperse instantly.

The slaughterhouse's unusable animal parts will be separated from liquid waste and sent across the street to a rendering plant for recycling.

The liquid waste could be treated in two large manure lagoons separated from the ocean by a 7-foot coral and clay berm, said UH's Zaleski. The treated water would be used to irrigate pasture land.

Another option is the "Living Machine," used to treat waste water from Ethel M. Chocolates in Las Vegas and developed by the University of Massachusetts. The natural system uses plants, fish and snails to eat the organic matter in large tanks.

The Health Department already has approved the waste-treatment lagoons, said Bruce Anderson, director.

"It's an isolated area ideal for a slaughterhouse without causing a nuisance to nearby residents," Anderson said. "It would not pose a problem."

Hawaii's beef and pork supply by the numbers HAWAII'S MEAT MARKET: TOTAL VS. LOCALLY PRODUCED Total supply in 1996* (last year tallied) Beef/veal -- 117,372,000 pounds Pork -- 43,735,000 pounds Locally produced: 1996 Beef -- 10,161,000 pounds Pork -- 6,075,000 pounds Locally produced: 1997 (most recent year available) Beef -- 10,024,000 pounds Pork -- 4,579,000 pounds** * Most comes from mainland and Asia. ** Pork decreased from 1996 due to a swine virus that killed off piglets. Source: Hawaii Department of Agriculture, Nils Morita, research statistician.