On August 8, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released a report called “Climate Change and Land”. The report, written by 100 authors from developed and developing countries, made news headlines. It addressed the extent of the contribution to greenhouse gas emissions of forest destruction, agricultural food production, and […]
One of the notable animal welfare stories to hit the headlines in March was the temporary closing of the Santa Anita Park horse-racing track. The track in California’s Arcadia witnessed the death of over 20 horses in a ten-week period. Santa Anita Park featured in the popular movie Seabiscuit and […]
On March 12 one of our best friends died, after a good, long life, aged 80. John was a local sheep farmer, and one of the first people we met when we moved to Southland and into his farm cottage over 20 years ago. We arrived in Winton for a […]
Popular culture has started to examine the question of whether it is wrong to harm robots. In the series Westworld, the android inhabitants of a Wild West-style theme park are sometimes treated decently by the human visitors. But they are often mistreated and deliberately damaged, sometimes sadistically and immorally. Or […]
The year 2018 brought turmoil to the US veterinary profession, making it a miniature reflection of the turmoil in the US. Mergers and acquisitions Coming off its multibillion-dollar buy in 2017, of the second-largest veterinary hospital chain in North America (Veterinary Clinics of America or VCA), Mars Inc. (yes, the […]
