Topic: What's the answer?

[Tommy Timebomb]

Just watching a program on CH4 "Jamie and the Giant Supermarket's" about how much food goes to waste.
He's highlighting the plight of male dairy calfs of which 90,000 are killed per year in the UK as they do not have a use.

Apparently dairy Bulls do not make the mark regarding the meat yielded from it, so a majority of these are killed withing 48 hours of birth.
The actual calf is a very good standard but veil but because of the British view of previous inhumane treatment of these animals and the way we view eating cute calfs of 8 months old etc the supermarkets shy away from going anywhere near it.

He tried to convince Tescos to consider making meatballs out of these things as they have a best seller which is 20 meatballs for

[Peripatetic Phil]

Tommy, I know your motivation is good, but I want to be honest with you : the idea of killing a 48-hour-old calf sickens me beyond belief; but the idea that that calf would then be made into meatballs is somehow even more repulsive to me, even though I do appreciate that this is completely illogical (i.e., surely it is better that the animals remains are used /somehow/, rather than just burned or buried in quicklime); nonetheless I find the idea of turning a 48-hour-old calf into meatballs completely and utterly repulsive.

** Phil.

[Tommy Timebomb]

Phil I couldn't agree more.
On reading my post again I haven't really made things clear, as a matter of fact i did not understand a lot of the program as my attention span is VERY short, infact I only manage to watch around three films a year so this internet is a godsend.

I think the point he was making was that if these animals were to have any chance of experiencing a bit of life is if they were farmed in this manner they would get to around 8 months, therefore the mother would experience bringing them up and weening them and they would at least see a few sunsets.

Belive you me I was and am so gutted and astounded at this revelation especially when they actually filmed what can only be described as the execution of three of these poor creatures.
I also questioned the morals of the meatball man but he actually was upset and trying to interview the farmers on the situation etc but obviously they declined.
I wish I could explain myself better, meatballs aren't the point here.

All I was thinking is what's the answer to this problem,.
Because we are so dictated to by the food police etc and come from the land of plenty couldn't we subsidise the farmers to make it in there intrest to rear these animals for an export market or something?
I think you would of had to of watched it to understand what I am trying to say.

Maybe my subject line should have been  "Food for thought".
In an ideal world they would see there natural days out.

Here is a link that there's a little bit more about it
http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showthread.php?p=58506193

It was just something tonight that played on my mind, tomorrows another day.

A quote from ch4 website
 
("Jimmy tries to transform Tesco's best-selling own brand meatballs (they sell 35 million of them a year). In doing so, he spots an opportunity to tackle one of dairy farming's biggest secrets - the killing each years of tens of thousands of male dairy calves because there's no market for them.

Jimmy believes these calves should be reared on to produce British rose veal - a high welfare, high quality meat.

Can he persuade dairy farmers to work with him, come up with a recipe to impress Tesco, and convince the public that the stigma surrounding veal is a thing of the past?)