Thanks to Proposition 2, Californians will soon phase out some of the most egregious confining animal conditions. However the rest of the country continues to utilize concentrated animal feeding operations for the production of meat, poultry and dairy products.
CAFOs are industrial facilities that are designed to produce the most amount of meat in the shortest amount of time. In practice this means confining animals tightly together, often in unsanitary conditions, without access to the outdoors. According to the EPA, CAFOs divide into small, medium or large distinctions depending on the number of animals these facilities are confining. What's most interesting is that the "large" CAFOs are not restricted to an upper limit of animals. So, for example, a large CAFO raising cows has "1,000 or more" heads of cattle. For broiler chickens the number is an astounding "125,000 or more." As far as I can tell, there is nothing to stop a large CAFO from having thousands or even hundreds of thousands of animals confined in the same small space.
The animal abuses associated with this type of confinement seem obvious. Cows, pigs, chickens, turkeys and other animals need the same type of space and fresh air that human beings do. Crowding them together and never letting them see the light of day is certainly inhibiting their natural inclinations as sentient beings. But we should care about CAFOs for reasons far greater than animal abuses, for they abuse our own environment and the health of our children.
This week, Stacy Sneeringer, a professor at Wellesley College, published research, which documented the impact of CAFOs on infant mortality, in the respected American Journal of Agricultural Economics. Sneeringer looked at a 15-year period between 1982 and 1997, analyzing data on a county level for the number of CAFOs and animal units. Controlling for a host of variables, she found that changes in animal units directly compared to changes in infant mortality. The results concluded that for a 100,000 animal increase in a county, there were 123 more infant deaths under the age of one per 100,000 births and 100 more infant deaths under the age of 28 days per 100,000 births. As well, the research suggests that a doubling of animal production induces a 7.4 percent increase in infant mortality.
Sneeringer recognized that this phenomenon is a result of air pollution, most likely from ammonia and hydrogen sulfide. These two gases are toxic pollutants that also contribute to greenhouse gas emissions. Hydrogen sulfide is also responsible for deaths annually as farmworkers enter poorly ventilated manure containment systems and die almost instantly. As the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production indicated in their final report earlier this year, "facilities can be harmful to workers, neighbors, and even those living far from the facilities through air and water pollution, and via the spread of disease. Workers in and neighbors of [these] facilities experience high levels of respiratory problems, including asthma." This is significant for policy since most of the regulations on CAFOs to date have been implemented under the Clean Water Act -- not the Clean Air Act.
The research also looked at the percent change in animal units by county between the 15-year period. The results show what might be expected: low income and rural areas have been adversely impacted by CAFOs. The Northeast and upper Midwest had an overall decrease in CAFOs, while Appalachia, the Midwest, and Central California had significant increases. These facilities are one of the newest forms of environmental injustice.
This research is timely and important as we all look toward a new administration, and President-elect Obama decides who will help him run our country. Obama has openly stated that he wants strict rules on CAFOs to better regulate both air and water pollution. Of equal importance, is his stance on limiting Environmental Quality Incentives Program funding for large livestock operations, which currently allows huge CAFOs to receive as much as $450,000 a year. Instead, Obama supports "reinstating a strict cap on the size of the livestock operations that can receive EQIP funding so that the largest polluters have to pay for their own environmental clean up."
It's a big step in the right direction, but we shouldn't stop there. Large CAFOs are disasters for this country. They pollute our air and water, taint our food supply, devastate rural communities and human health, and perpetuate animal abuses that the American people have clearly rejected. But CAFOs don't have to be here. There are farmers throughout the country producing high-quality, grass-fed beef and animal products that are beneficial to our grasslands, kind to the animals, and profitable for rural residents. Let's support them both economically and politically rather than give handouts to a system that so clearly is flawed beyond repair.
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Comments
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KarenLOrr Posted 9:49 pm
21 Nov 2008
Please sign the letter below and pass this message along to friends and colleagues.
Dear President-Elect Obama,
We, the undersigned, are urging you not to appoint former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack as Secretary of Agriculture or any other position in your new administration.
-Vilsack has been an ardent supporter of genetically engineered pharmaceutical crops, especially pharmaceutical corn. These crops pose huge risks to human health and the environment.
Vilsack is a noted proponent of unsustainable and dangerous genetically engineered crops. Even the biggest biotechnology industry group, the Biotechnology Industry Organization, named Vilsack Governor of the Year. He was also the founder and former chair of the Governor's Biotechnology Partnership. Organic farming does not allow for the use of genetically engineered crops. The Organic Consumers Association is opposed to genetic engineering and supports mandatory labeling of genetically engineered foods.
-Vilsack has fought strongly to limit states' rights to regulate seed, GE crops, pharma crops and other proactive measures. We believe that municipalities and states have the right to enact laws that protect their welfare, health and the environment.
-Vilsack has a glowing reputation as being a shill for agribusiness biotech giants like Monsanto. Corporations like Monsanto are inherently undemocratic and threaten human health and sustainable agriculture with their toxic products.
-Vilsack is an ardent supporter of corn and soy based biofuels, which use as much or more fossil energy to produce as they generate, while driving up world food prices and literally starving the poor.
We urge you to appoint a Secretary of Agriculture that will support the expansion of organic food and farming, while remaining accountable to citizens and not to corporations.
Sincerely,
To sign the letter, click here:
http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/642/petition.jsp?pet ...
Further information
Iowa has the worst record for enforcing pollution regulations.
An Iowa Sierra Club document says that rivers all over Iowa are turning
into cesspools from corporate animal factories (3,000 CAFO's). Iowa is
the 2nd largest livestock state with 3,023,800 pigs and 3,950,000 cattle
amongst 2,982,000 people.
The Iowa River is one of the Most Endangered Rivers in America for 2007.
Vilsack could have but did not draw up stricter state pollution regulations
of CAFO's than EPA regs. Vilsack sided with polluters against public health.
A 2002 study by the University of Iowa and Iowa State University
said Iowa Dept of Natural Resources needed to act to approve protections
of public health near confined animal factories (CAFO's).
He lowered the recommended air quality standards allowing twice
as much health-threatening levels of ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, particulates
and odors emitted from animal factory sewage lagoons, confinement houses
and the fields manure is spread on.
As governor, Vilsack set a weaker standard than the surrounding states.
Vilsack is a poor choice for Agriculture Secretary.
December McSherry
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Erik Hoffner Posted 12:27 am
22 Nov 2008
Erik
The Orion Grassroots Network: supporting grassroots groups working for conservation, justice, & more
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amazingdrx Posted 1:31 am
22 Nov 2008
Not really. You can clean up CAFO, even make it organic with more humane conditions, namely take the C ("confined")out. But wouldn't that reduce the bottomline?
No. Distributed green energy smart grid backup power from biogas manure digestion more than gixes the bottomline issues. The organic fertilzer byproduct is also profitable.
Maybe Green Animal Living Operations (GALOs)where animals live in free range style ("Free the chickens"), of course animals are restricted to a given pasture space, using rotational grazing. Animals learn in Pavlovian style that if they deposit manure in an area where food is provided they get maybe a special food.
The manure still goes into a biodigester, with all it's GHG saving, pollution saving, green energy biogas fuel cell grid power producyion, that can backup a distributed renewable grid.
With chickens, for instance, this system would have a grazing area that is changed to a new location periodically, and a portable chicken roosting, feeding and manure collection trailer.
You get high efficiency, low cost food, without the cruelty. And lots of clean energy and organic fertilizer. And better jobs on the farm.
The elimination of anti-biotic flooded food from standard CAFO is worth how much in healthcare savings? The noxious gas, water pollution, and biohazard from viruses like bird flu, make green animal living the clear bottomline winner.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
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