Despite increasing criticism from animal rights and welfare groups, Tim Amlaw doesn't expect to see the gates thrown open in livestock confinement settings in Nebraska and other prominent livestock states.

The typical chicken is not going back to scratching his way across the barnyard and the typical hog is not going back to burying himself up to his snout in his favorite mudhole.

Amid rising worldwide demand for food, "a concentrated system of production is going to be a necessity," Amlaw, based in Colorado as director of the farm animal program for American Humane, said in Lincoln Tuesday.

He expects demand to also dictate production systems "that keep costs reasonably low."

Amlaw's appearance at the 2009 Nebraska Cattlemen Beef Industry Issues Summit comes at a time when new laws in California, Michigan and other states are taking aim at cages for laying hens, gestation crates for pregnant hogs, and other tight spaces used for food animal production.

Meanwhile, McDonald's, Costco and other familiar names are feeling pressure from consumers. Increasingly, they're responding by imposing minimum requirements on their livestock and poultry suppliers.

That makes this an important time in the 132-year history of the nonprofit American Humane.

"Our mission is to help animals, plain and simple," Amlaw told an audience of beef producers and promoters at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Under the slogan "good for animals, good for people, good for business," the organization provides third-party oversight and certification for poultry, pork, beef and dairy farms that meet its standards.

Amlaw said he can't tell those on the front lines of meat, milk and egg production what to do. "I can give them recognition of how humane they are."

Under its current standards, for example, American Humane does not endorse the use of hormone implants as growth promoters in cattle feedlots.

It does make recommendations to poultry producers who now face fines and even prison time -- which Amlaw called "neither just law nor a proper sanction for humane practices" -- for not meeting state-imposed animal welfare standards.

In a given situation, that might mean four or five laying hens can no longer be crowded together in a cage. Instead, 40,000 might have room to roam across a confinement building.

That's not a release into fresh air and wide open spaces. "That's just a bigger cage," Amlaw said.

The Cattlemen's Michael Kelsey said hormone implants are common practice in Nebraska feedlots. "Cattle that are implanted use less feed to gain weight than cattle that are not implanted," Kelsey said.

Also on the speaker list Tuesday was Dan Thompson, a veterinary and nutrition expert at Kansas State.

Thompson pointed to surveys that showed 97.4 percent of Americans eat meat and only 6 percent of the income of the typical U.S. consumer is spent on food. In China, he said, it's 34 percent.

Still, "animal welfare, in my opinion, if done appropriately, will make us money," he added.

Sought out later Tuesday, animal welfare consultant Temple Grandin of Colorado State University spoke highly of American Humane.

"They're a good organization," Grandin said. "They're the same organization that makes sure that movies don't abuse animals."

American Humane is not trying to eliminate the meat industry, she said. "There's a difference between people who want to fix the industry and the people who want to get rid of it."

Reach Art Hovey at 473-7223 or at ahovey@journalstar.com.