Factory Farming

by Catherine Kavassalis (from a letter sent to the Planning and Public Works Committee of Halton Region - Monday, April 07, 2003)

... I am convinced that confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs) also called factory farms should not be allowed to operate in this region, or anywhere for that matter. Factory farming harms the environment, negatively affects human health, destroys rural communities, and needlessly causes animal suffering on a massive scale. 

Although some communities, like Walkerton, Ontario, have become painfully aware of the problems with CAFOs, Canadians are only just coming up to speed on the many issues.  If you are unfamiliar with these operations, I recommend you watch CTVs November 2002, W5 news story, Raising a Stink: The controversy over pig farms (http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1037381239499_32790439/?hub=WFive). Transcripts and video are available online. Three broad problems bode against intensive livestock operations: their negative environmental health impact, their negative economic impact on communities, and finally their unethical treatment of animals.

 Intensive animal feeding operations confine a large number of animals into a small space. Concentrating animals produces concentrations of solid waste and chemicals. Nitrogen, ammonia, nitrates, phosphorous, hydrogen sulfide, salt and heavy metals, pathogens, antibiotics, pesticides and hormones are just some of the byproducts of these operations. These take a heavy toll on the land, water, wildlife and people in the vicinity. Look at the impact of just a few of these byproducts:

• Nitrogen transformed into ammonium and nitrate forms can be highly problematic in large quantities. In water, ammonia removes dissolved oxygen and fish essentially cannot breath - resulting in dead fish. CAFOs have been associated with numerous fish kills. Most recently 3,000 fish in about six miles of creek near an Indiana CAFO were found dead. As a result, the state of Indiana has moved, as of April 4^th, to seek to close the operations of Pollman’s Farms (the largest CAFO operator in the state - you may read about this latest calamity in the IndyStar http://www.indystar.com/print/articles/0/033680-8840-009.html). Just as ammonium in water can reduce oxygen, nitrates in well water can harm human infants by reducing oxygen in their blood. This potentially fatal condition is termed blue baby syndrome or methemoglominemia. Nitrates may also combine with amino acids in the human stomach and form carcinogenic nitrosamines. Nitrogen can also be transported through the air. “This occurs when nitrogen in liquid waste is volatilized as ammonia nitrogen (NH3) from anaerobic (oxygen-deprived) lagoons, causing ammonia to evaporate. Volatilization also occurs after land application. Once in the atmosphere, it is converted to forms that are redeposited within 50-100 miles on land or in surface waters. These forms of nitrogen are water-soluble, meaning the nitrogen can adversely affect water quality much like nitrogen fertilizer if it enters a stream as direct surface runoff,” (Congressional Report 98-451, May 12, 1998 Animal Waste Management and the Environment: Background for Current Issues Environment, http://www.ncseonline.org/NLE/CRSreports/Agriculture/ag-48.cfm).
• Phosphorous like nitrogen can lead to oxygen depletion in the water. Along with nitrogen compounds, this fertilizer can lead to eutrophication, or nutrient over-enrichment, of surface waters. Algal blooms, which are already a significant problem in this region, can be exacerbated by the addition of concentrations of phosphorous that would be produced by intensive livestock operations.
• Rotting manure produces, among other nasty gases, hydrogen sulfide. Hydrogen sulfide is the chemical responsible for the smell in rotten eggs. Besides being a nauseating odor, it can be deadly. Low levels cause deterioration of neurobehavioral function and high levels cause death. This compound has been responsible for the deaths of CAFO workers here in Canada and in the United States and can be credited with causing headaches, nausea, confusion, depression and generally a diminished quality of life for those living in the vicinity of CAFOs. Occupational Health and Safety bureaus in the United States and Canada continually warn workers of the dangers of the gases produces by concentrations of manure, (NIOSH Warns: Manure Pits Continue to Claim Lives: http://www.cdc.gov/nasd/docs/d001001-d001100/d001028/d001028.html and Saskatchewan Department of Labour, Occupational Health and Safety Division terms Hydrogen Sulfide: The Deadliest Manure Gas http://www.labour.gov.sk.ca/safety/pamphlets/hydrogen.htm )
• Walkerton introduced Ontarians to the potential dangers of pathogens produced by animal feces. “Residents in a number of rural Ontario municipalities have complained in recent years about the handling of manure at large livestock operations. Several large manure spills and leaks have increased the public's concern. Citizens’ groups have recently formed in the London area, in Bruce County and also near Peterborough, all focused on problems related to intensive farming and manure management,” (Gord Miller, Environmental Commissioner of Ontario, July 27, 2000, Special Report to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario: The Protection of Ontario's Groundwater and Intensive Farming http://www.eco.on.ca/english/publicat/sp03.pdf ). E. coli is but one of the potentially deadly microorganisms associated with large concentrations of animal feces, salmonella, clostridium botulinum, pfiesteria are also problems. Pfiesteria, a lethal microscopic organism that feeds off the phosphorus and nitrogen found in manure, has been a particular problem in the southern United States. Massive fish kills from pfiesteria fed by CAFO runoffs have occurred in Maryland and North Carolina, (Congressional Report 97-872, Pfiesteria: NR and Human Health Concerns http://www.ncseonline.org/NLE/CRSreports/marine/mar-18.cfm). To minimize water quality and public health impacts from intensive livestock producers, the USDA and EPA have developed strict guidelines for the operation of intensive livestock operations http://cfpub.epa.gov/npdes/afo/cafofinalrule.cfm Such regulations “to minimize” the impact would be needless if CAFOs were not allowed to operate in our region.
• In order to manage pathogens, CAFO operators feed quantities of antibiotics to livestock. Pharmaceuticals like tetracycline and sulfamethazine antibiotics are ending up in waterways (as are hormone compounds used to promote growth). Antibiotic resistance is an increasing problem made worse by their heavy usage in intensive feed operations. For this reason, the Union of Concerned Scientists sent a letter to the EPA urging them to limit the use of antibiotics in factory farms, http://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_environment/antibiotic_resistance/page.cfm?pageID=273 .

“The hog industry everywhere in the world has steadfastly denied the environmental and public health consequences of unfettered expansion, until the impacts became to comprehensive to ignore. Only at this point do governments suddenly realize that the costs have started to outweigh the benefits. Unfortunately, by this stage, it is very difficult and costly to repair the damage, particularly to water, as has been demonstrated in The Netherlands, for example. Yet despite these lessons, we continue to adopt the attitude that, if we keep our eyes closed, we can honestly say that we don’t see any problems.” (Dr. E. Pip, December 2000, University of Winnepeg, A Review of the Impact of the Livestock Industry on the Environment and Human Health http://www.factoryfarm.org/docs/a_review_of_the_effects_2000-12-09.pdf). Along with Dr. Pip, the Canadian Medical Association believes industrial farms are a potential threat to human health, and that provinces should halt expansion of the industry before more research is done.

But CAFO’s are economically beneficial. Or are they? The environmental costs and public health costs of intensive feeding operations are beginning to rack up, making these cheap meat operations profitable for only the few and expensive for the rest of us. Do local communities benefit from these operations locating in their region? According to Dr. William Weida, who has examined numerous research studies on the economics of intensive farming, the answer is no, CAFOs, “do not offer economic advantage to the communities in which they locate.” Here are a few highlights from his report, A Summary of the Regional Economic Effects of CAFO s:

• CAFOs decrease employment opportunities.
• Large, concentrated animal-feeding operations decrease land values.
• Large hog farms tend to hinder rural economic growth at the local level.
• Large-scale animal production facilities are more likely to purchase their inputs from a great distance away, bypassing local providers in the process.
• CAFOs create social, health and traffic costs that local governments must finance.
• A CAFO will also leave the costs of its odor, health risks, surface water pollution, and ground water pollution and in the long run, its abandoned lagoons and facilities for the region to deal with.

(Weida, July 21,2001 http://www.factoryfarm.org/docs/RegionalEcon72101.doc) 

Small farms are disappearing. In the United States, there are “300,000 fewer farmers than in 1979, and farmers are receiving 13 percent less for every consumer dollar. Four firms now control over 80% of the beef market. About 94 percent of the Nation’s farms are small farms, but they receive only 41 percent of all farm receipts. An agricultural system characterized by a limited number of large-scale farms does not take into account the loss of market competition when production is concentrated in oligopsonistic markets. Decentralized land ownership produces more equitable economic opportunity for people in rural communities, and offers self-employment and business management opportunities.” (USDA’s National Commission on Small Farms, 1998, “Time to Act,” http://www.reeusda.gov/smallfarm/smlfrm1.pdf). Bylaws are necessary to restrict their development and entrenchment in this community.

In all of this discussion, the animals being raised for food are often ignored and thought of as products and not as living beings. I was struck, watching CNN, by the attention an Afghanis farmer was giving to his goat during a winter storm. He carefully wrapped it in a blanket to protect it from the harsh weather. This farmer valued his animal. This is not the industrial farm model. Profits are made by packing as many animals (euphemistically termed units) into a space as can survive (many don’t) and by minimizing the human care. In his recently released book, entitled Dominion: The Power of Man, the Suffering of Animals, and the Call to Mercy, Matthew Scully, a senior speechwriter to President Bush, urges that all factory farming be banned as cruel and unChristian behavior. He is not alone. According to a recent U.S. poll conducted by Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates regarding factory hog farms, “67 percent of Americans think that pigs should be treated humanely ... In fact, 72 percent say they would pay more for products from pigs raised more humanely," (May 30, 2001, Humane Society Press Release, http://www.hsus2.org/halthogfactories/hf_press.html). The state of Florida recently passed Constitutional Amendment No. 10, limiting cruel and inhumane confinement of pigs. As people become informed about the conditions imposed on animals raised in intensive feeding operations, they are repulsed. The majority of people would not choose to support such unethical practices. Over seven million members and constituents of the United States Humane Society are calling on government to prohibit factory farms via their Halt Factory Farms campaign, http://www.hsus.org/ace/11510. Numerous other organizations are working to do the same like the Grace Factory Farm Project, http://www.factoryfarm.org/, the Animal Welfare Institute http://www.awionline.org/farm/fai.htm and the Sierra Club http://www.sierraclub.org/factoryfarms/.Intensive farming practices, like puppy mills, should be prohibited on moral grounds alone.

CAFOs are morally reprehensible in their treatment of animals. There is a significant body of evidence that indicates such operations would not benefit our community economically and moreover, they would hasten the loss of farmland and the small farm. Finally intensive livestock operations pose threats to our environment and to public health. Please take responsible action and prohibit their operation in the region.

...