Tammi Jonas: large-scale hypocrisy on a small-scale farm.
“I could not in good conscience call myself a transparent, ethical farmer if I didn’t believe the slaughtering process was as quick and relatively stress-free as it is.” Tammi Jonas, 25.6.2013*
March 28th this year saw footage captured by the Farm Transparency Project (FTP) aired on the ABC’s 7:30 program, exposing the reality of carbon dioxide stunning of pigs at slaughter in Australia. This prompted commentary not just from the vegan community, but the broader farming community as well. The investigation resulted in widespread media attention, as well as the shutdown of the kill floor at one of the companies, Australian Food Group. Another of the exposed abattoirs at Benalla is currently under investigation for the illegal use of electric goads on pigs. In the recent follow up story, 7:30 chose to place their focus not on the pigs but on a Victorian small-scale pig farmer, Tammi Jonas.
Jonas, born to a cattle ranching family in Oregon (USA), is an owner and operator of Jonai Farms. It operates as a collective, where monthly or annual subscribers pay to receive products from the farm. For $3, 333 per annum, subscribers to the collective can receive 10 kilos of pig and cattle flesh per month. The collective is so exclusive, there is a twenty years long waiting list to become a subscriber.
Collective farming is not new. And I agree with most of what Jonas has to say on the increasing industrialisation of food systems and the role of corporate government in undermining food sovereignty. Collective farming is a powerful tool in reclaiming food production and provision for the community. And no, mass produced plant-based foods are not free from their own ethical complications.
However, there is a significant problem when collectives such as Jonai Farms push the ethical and humane line regarding the slaughter of animals when they themselves are failing to uphold their own business ethos of transparency.
Formerly a vegetarian, Jonas and her husband decided to open a small-scale farm back in 2011. She decided to primarily raise and kill pigs as “[…] they are some of the worst treated in the industrial system.” Having purchased the property, the business turned to crowd funding to raise money for a butchers' shop in 2013, and then again in 2014 for a curing room and commercial kitchen. On the Jonai Farms website it states that: “Since we got here, we liked the idea of slaughtering on farm because of the lower stress for the animals.” Jonas herself referred to this plan for a slaughterhouse as an alternative to using industrial abattoirs in the latest 7:30 story. They have again turned to crowd funding to raise the required almost $400 000, of which they have barely raised a tenth. Plans have been drawn, but the collective abattoir they promote as the “humane” alternative to Co2 stunning is some time away.
Which facility has the “ethical” small-scale Jonai Farms been utilising for the past decade to kill pigs? Victoria’s largest pig slaughterhouse, Diamond Valley Pork (DVP), also one of the three exposed in the recent FTP investigation aired on 7:30.
In 2013 Jonas replied to an open letter regarding a poll on whether the farm should castrate a boar piglet perversely named Wilbur 101 (after Charlotte’s Web). She stated: “What I can say about our abattoir (Diamond Valley) is that we are very happy with their practices as we have observed them. The Animal Liberation quote you provided in no way represents the experience of our animals, and I will be writing a detailed account of our abattoirs practices (eg. they don’t stun, the pigs are lowered into a carbon dioxide chamber and are rendered immediately unconscious.”
Five years later, Jonas discussed the slaughtering process at Diamond Valley again, in an interview with Sprout Magazine in 2018: “The slaughtering is the hardest part because we’re not in control[…] The handling [at DVP] is very good. Pigs have a stress response to strange people or pigs, so by taking away handlers and having automated gates their stress levels are much lower. The abattoir also lets us tour whenever we want -it’s very transparent- and that gives us a lot of assurance that it’s a good operation.” The article then states: “The pigs are euthanised using carbon dioxide stunning, which Tammi says is considered best practice.”
The current Jonai Farms website About section says: “Our pigs are unloaded immediately through to the stunning chamber without being kept in the holding pens with any other pigs. Our abattoir uses Co2 for stunning, which is generally considered best practice in Australia as the pigs are rendered unconscious within 30 seconds, before being slaughtered by a cut to the neck. We have reservations about Co2 stunning as it is an aversive gas, but have no other options to date. We are working towards our ultimate goal, to build an abattoir on farm.”
It took Jonai Farms ten long years to go from “we are happy with DVP’s methods of stunning” to a paltry “we have reservations.” It took less than a month from the FTP investigation for those reservations to become Jonas’ outright condemnation of Co2 gassing: “Co2 gas has been known to be an aversive and to cause pain and distress in pigs for over twenty years, a point made by Dr. Ellen Jongman on 7:30. And yet industry and government maintain a narrow focus on how to improve an inhumane practice designed for an inhumane system that is ecologically destructive, socially unjust, and frankly morally bankrupt.”
For some reason, this condemnation rings hollow.
A brief search for scholarly articles shows results for papers that discuss Co2 as an aversive in stunning dating back to the early 1970s. This has been an ongoing discussion for decades, one largely ignored by industry participants including “ethical” farmers such as Jonas. One would think a former PhD candidate would research Co2 stunning fully before committing to full participation in its usage. Apparently not. More damning, however, is the fact that the FTP investigations from this year are not the first of such to have occurred.
In 2015, less than two years after Jonas declared her support for DVP stunning practices, investigators first broadcast graphic footage from the DVP Co2 chambers. Though the footage may not have been as clear and comprehensive as the 2023 investigation by FTP, the evidence against Co2 as a stunning agent was damning.
Did the “ethical” Jonai Farms stop using DVP upon the release of this footage? Did they cease operations during the past ten years considering Jonas’ own statement that the aversive nature of Co2 to pigs has been known for over twenty years? Did Jonas call a halt to production during the time she’s known about the potential animal welfare implications? Did Jonai Farms cease usage of DVP as an abattoir following the acquisition of majority stakeholder Rivalea by the corrupt corporate giant JBS in 2021? No. Rather, they not only continued to use DVP but also continued to champion the use of Co2 stunning, even after the 2015 investigation. Of course on their website they say they have no other options at this time, except there is one they refuse to explore: stop exploiting animals.
Jonas claimed to be shocked by what she saw in the footage released by FTP this year. But in 2013 she said she had observed DVPs practices herself and was happy with them, implying she had witnessed the use of Co2 stunning in person. And again in 2018 she declared DVP to be transparent in their processes, even allowing her to visit. This calls into question whether she or representatives from Jonai Farms were even allowed access to DVP, whether that access was actually limited rather than fully transparent, or whether she was in fact presenting a mistruth to cover the reality from inside those slaughterhouse walls.
Jonas also described the investigation as “disempowering” as it undermines the entire ethos of Jonai Farms relating to how animals are raised and killed. But with a decade of evidence regarding Jonai Farms active participation and support laid bare, is the public expected to believe a word this business says? Consider how: the farm produces an exclusive product for a premium price but excludes the broader community from access to the product; draws tens of thousands of dollars (potentially hundreds of thousands if their crowd funding is successful) from the community via crowdfunding for its private infrastructure whilst charging over $3300 per annum for an exclusive subscription service; and utilises an industrial facility and stunning method which is part of a corporate system they themselves call “morally bankrupt” and “inhumane,” thus undermining their own anti-corporate, collective, and ethical animal farming ethos.
Let us return to the year 2015 for a moment. I have read many interviews with Jonas, and one or two of her own written pieces, in the process of writing this article. But I also wanted to see the evolution of her ideas and practices through her own gaze, via the “Food Ethics” and “The Farmer and the Butcher” blogs she writes. I specifically wanted to see if any of her blog posts she mentioned the release of footage from DVP in the December of 2015.
In March 2015, Jonas wrote a post alleging that flyers handed out at an event she was speaking at contained “inaccurate descriptions of the [Co2] stunning process.”
In May, she wrote a post decrying the “[…] hypocrisy of free-range eggs and bacon, that is, free-range eggs served with sad bacon […]” being served by cafes and restaurants. Jonas also posted “Grow Your Ethics Part II” on The Farmer and the Butcher blog that month. There she stated “We are accountable for every step but slaughter[…]” as though directly paying DVP $37 per pig stunned in a gas chamber is not something one must take ownership of (a price that has undoubtedly increased in the eight years since). There were sundry other posts during 2015, not high volume content but regular enough. Until October, when the posts ceased for the year.
And nothing was posted in December of that year. Nothing acknowledging the release of the footage, which may have even included her own pigs. No transparency. No accountability.
At the risk of labouring the point, here are some other excerpts from some of Jonas’ blog posts over the years.
June 2014: “If you’re not confining animals on land or on a ship, they’re [activists] not likely to sneak in and film your operation. And if you share your own story, open your doors, and crucially do what you say you’re doing, it’s very hard for someone else to catch you out.”
July 2016: “Community-support agriculture comes from an ethic of connectedness, care, and solidarity. It ensures accountability at both the farmer and the eater end of the equation[…]”
August 2019: “She [the “ethical omnivore”] prefers to eat food grown by humans, not manufactured by corporations, and supports a livelihood for local farmers instead of lining the pockets of the power brokers in today’s industrial food-chain.”
The accountability and transparency Jonas has long espoused is in fact nowhere to be seen. In 2015, there was no public acknowledgment of their own use of DVP’s slaughtering services following the investigation. Two years ago on Facebook, Jonas decried the killing of pigs at piggeries across the USA due to the pandemic disrupting the supply chain: when asked about gassing here in Australia, she replied that yes “some” abattoirs used Co2 and that the process was quick, neither presenting the true expanse of Co2 stunning across the country, nor her own participation in it over the years. Indeed, her comment again downplayed the suffering inflicted upon pigs by this stunning method (see image below).
In a response to the latest footage released by FTP Jonai Farms claim: “We’ve long had concerns about this stunning method, and it’s one of the countless reasons we’re building an abattoir here at Jonai Farms.” -FB March 2023. They “long had concerns,” yet for over a full decade have continued to utilise, champion, and downplay the cruelty of that very method.
For all the photographs of sweeping landscapes and happy piglets, the truth is that Jonas and Jonai Farms are as ever an active part of the very industrial system they so vociferously decry, and are not nearly as transparent in their processes as they may like to claim. Ethics are merely window-dressing, an exercise in humane-washing practices and industries which are inherently unethical. Jonas is quite content sending these piglets to DVP, where in her own words they will “[…] have an aversion to the sensation [Co2] provokes, which is akin to suffocating.” This is the person the ABC’s follow-up 7:30 story offered as the holder of the “ethical” solution to the industrial use of Co2 stunning. Given the documented history of obfuscation, continued usage of methods she herself calls inhumane, and demonstrated failure to uphold the business’ own ethos, why is she to be believed that the Jonas Farms abattoir will be any better in outcomes for animals, on a purely animal welfare basis? Especially considering that industry research has shown stunning via bolt gun or electrocution both have their own significant animal welfare issues.
The opportunity has arisen for Jonas to put her money where her mouth is. Today (3rd May 2023) it was reported that DVP is under investigation for animal welfare breaches after a complaint made in relation to export establishment requirements including compliance with the Australian Meat Standard AS4696:2007. Given the vehemence of Jonas’ new-found opposition to the use of gas chambers, and with DVP currently under investigation for animal welfare breaches, surely now would be a good time for Jonai Farms to cease production of pig flesh? At the very least until such a time as their publicly-funded and long-awaited “humane” abattoir is ready for use.
In 2020 the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance, of which Jonas is President, stated in a submission to the Victorian inquiry into the impact of animal rights activism that: “Where animal welfare is compromised at particular farms, abattoirs or intensive animal production sites, then without whistleblowing from concerned members of the public or news reporting by credible journalists, such offences could go unpunished.”
The whistle has been blown twice during Jonai Farms’ working relationship with DVP. Journalists all across Australia, and indeed globally, have reported on the latest case. Will Jonas ignore it this second time, wringing her hands over her “lack of options” whilst selling “ethical” meat from the gas chamber? Or will she finally embrace real transparency and accountability?
Whether that occurs remains to be seen.
*Opening quote can be found here: https://terrastendo.net/2013/06/25/more-on-our-open-letter-to-tammi-jonas-of-jonai-farms/
