Temple Grandin

摘要

In the 1990s, animal scientist and autism advocate Temple Grandin revamped the livestock industry to improve animal welfare and food safety-which meant lower costs too. Today, almost half of the cattle in North America is processed through a system she designed. Now, she's focused on a new challenge: how to reverse the damage done by decades of overly selective breeding. When it comes to breeding animals today, many factors contribute to what I call "biological system overload." People are over-selecting animals until they get health problems. Hens, for example, are chosen for greater egg production and end up with osteoperosis. They put all their calcium in the eggs and there's nothing left for their bones. Recent studies on pigs and other animals indicate that high-producing animals may have less resistance to disease. We're seeing the consequences of that now.