HB 1200 Right to Choose Farming and Livestock Practices

Rep. Lehe’s HB 1200 looks like a whole lot of nothing. Or, at least I can’t tell what it is supposed to accomplish. First it makes a big declaration that the General Assembly wants to conserve, protect, and encourage agriculture and that the Indiaa Code should be construed to protect the rights of farmers, including their right to to choose among agricultural and livestock practices “including the use of continuously changing technology.”

Then it declares that nothing in Title 15-17 concerning animals and animal health or animal products should be construed to prohibit or impair traditional or modern farming and livestock production practices.

My guess is that this bill generally stands for the proposition that other concerns addressed by the Indiana Code and, in particular, addressed by Title 15 should not get in the way of confined feeding operations. And, further, that the authors recognize that if they advance this proposition in any but the most general terms, support for the measure will be much more difficult. It’s one thing to make sweeping generalizations. It’s quite another to offer detailed legislation that specifies who gets to do what to whom and under what circumstances. That’s when the trade-offs of a policy come into sharp focus.