Research Paper Entry 11

Factory farms also known as CAFO's (Central Organized Feeding Operations) have extremely negative effects on everyone's living environment that directly affect you, whether you realize it or not. Living close enough to them can also impact your health and the quality of living in the community. The goal that CAFO's have involve making a lot of food on a very small amount of land at an affordable price. The problem with this is CAFO's will do it at any and all costs, the space that the animals are squeezed into leads to the releasing of extreme amounts of harmful gases from their waste products into the atmosphere and water at levels that are extremely unsafe and unmanageable for the environment to keep up with. Former government administrations have made it really easy for the CAFO's to continue their path of environmental destruction, it's going to take a lot work to undo the damage. Damage control needs to start with the population being educated to see the harmful effects these farms are doing because most of us live in a place that is nowhere near one and that enables us to remain uninformed. The population can start with making the choice to purchase products produced on sustainable farms but that will only help so much and the choice to make the right decision unfortunately also comes with a higher price tag that most are not willing to pay. I feel the real change needs to start with tighter EPA regulations. Not only do they need to make these regulations stricter the enforcement is also a major concern.

            CAFO’s destroy communities and harm the people surrounding them in numerous ways. Once a CAFO moves into a community it starts the process of deterioration, right off the bat property values decrease, the economy comes to a standstill, and the disgusting order attacks and infuses itself with everything it possibly can inside your home and no matter what you do it won’t go away. So now the community is in economic plunder at least the inhibitors still have their health, not true this too is now also being attacked. CAFO’s “do so by contaminating ground and surface water, releasing harmful pollutants into the air, promoting the development of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, incubating infectious diseases, and facilitating the continued overuse of chemical pesticides.” (Public Health) Growing up in New York most likely doesn’t exposure you to the horrors of these factory farms. If you travel to the outskirts you will most likely only see small sustainable family run farms these are the ones that should be supported.

            Manure, it smells horrible, it’s the source of everything damaging, and there is a lot of it! Factory farms often store animal waste in lagoons and it’s applied to the land as fertilizer, but unlike human waste it is untreated. In fact “The annual production of manure produced by animal confinement facilities exceeds that produced by humans by at least three times” (Pew p.13) With so much manure being produced at these CAFO’s it often leads to spills and leaks in lagoons that are not properly maintained. Being applied to oversaturated land that cannot possibly absorb it all is the other issue. The surface and ground water get infiltrated by run off and that leads to the contamination of the surrounding community’s drinking water that they so heavily rely on. This contaminated water contains nitrates, pathogens, hormones, antibiotic-resistant bacteria, salts and heavy metals. (Hribar)  “In US counties with factory farms, approximately 1.3 million households rely on water wells in which nitrate levels exceed the Maximum Contaminant Level set by the EPA.” (Consumer) This information was given by the EPA in 2002, 12 years later and its certain nitrate levels have only gotten far worst. These high nitrate levels in drinking water lead to a disease called “baby blue syndrome” this leads to an infant’s blood to no longer be able to hold a normal amount of oxygen and can be fatal if untreated.  Adults can also be affected by having extreme cases of diuresis which is the increase or excess production of urine, increased starchy deposits, and possible hemorrhaging of the spline. Pathogens are a higher threat to young children and the older population and can cause diarrhea, cramps, and headaches along with other medical problems. (Consumer) The growth hormones that are pumped into these animals can also still be apparent in the manure and have serious health effects that may lead to breast and testicular cancer. Salts attack drinking water as well causing high blood pressure and in some cases levels become so high that the water becomes undrinkable. Antibiotic-resistant bacteria can cause infections that typical antibiotics can no longer fight. (Public Health) The animals continue to be pumped with more and more antibiotics to keep them “healthy” instead of the CAFO’s spending money to find ways to remedy disgusting conditions. Profit margin is their only concern. I like to think of them as the McDonald's of animal farming. In fact factory farms were formed to keep up with the high demands of the fast food industry so you can see why profit margin is so important. (Fast)

            So you may think that just because you don’t live directly in these communities you are not affected by water pollution. You would be wrong in fact contaminates from factory farms make their way into lakes, streams, ponds, and rivers. This renders fishing and swimming in these waters unsafe. (Public Health) “Almost 40 percent of the nation’s surveyed waters are so polluted they're unsafe for swimming or fishing.  According to the EPA’s 2000 National Water Quality Inventory, agricultural sources were responsible for polluting 128,859 miles of surveyed rivers and streams, 3,158,393 acres of surveyed lakes, and 2,811 square miles of surveyed estuaries”(Public Health) Again this information was released by the EPA in 2002, why is new data so hard to find? The EPA is still around, but what have they been doing for 12 years? This information will be looked at further later in my paper.

            Water pollution is just the beginning to the damage these large CAFO’s pose to the environment. Air pollution is also a major concern as some of the effects are burden for everyone not just the communities surrounding them. CAFO’s hurt the surrounding communities through the reduction of air quality. This happens in a few ways, the movement of animals result in particle emissions, gas emissions occur through the decomposition of animal waste in lagoons and also when its spread to fertilize land, heavy traffic of trucks constantly going in and out of the farms also contribute to air pollution. (Hribar) Although the transportation industry causes traffic and releases harmful pollutants into communities surrounding factory farms and all over the world, in its entirety the contribution is less to global warming than CAFO’s.

  Along with particle matter the typical air pollutants found around factory farms include the gases ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, and methane. All are extremely dangerous and only one out of the four cannot hurt you directly. Ammonia gas is a respiratory irritant chemical burns cause damage to the respiratory tract along with the skin and eyes this leads to a severe cough and chronic lung disease. These gases are released when the breakdown of the manure happens which is also true for hydrogen sulfide. (Hribar) Health effects from hydrogen sulfide vary and depend on how long and how much you are exposed too. Some mild symptoms include fatigue and headaches, gradually you will loose your smell and severe damage to the eyes occurs, extreme levels lead to a quick death that can happen instantly or take thirty to sixty minutes depending on the level of exposure. (Hydrogen) In this case the workers on the farms are more at risk then the community when it comes to a fatal exposure.

Particle matter is a major issue as it seems to be able to affect the surrounding communities greatest as it is able to travel longer distances. The source of these particles comes from a variety of things that include animals bedding material, dry manure, unpaved soil surfaces, animal dander, and poultry feathers. Fecal matter, bacteria, fungi, skin cells, and silicates attach themselves to the particles and the wind carries them away from the farms into the neighboring areas. Health effects consist of chronic bronchitis, chronic respiratory symptoms, organic dust syndrome, and significant declines in lung function. (Hribar) Unfortunately the demographic most effected by particle matter happen to be children as take in 20-50% more air than adults making them more susceptible to lung disease. Studies done in North Carolina that consisted of 226 schools showed that factory farms increased asthma in the surrounding communities as the children closest to these farms had the highest rates. (Hribar)

Methane and nitrous oxide gases are harmful “greenhouse” gases and directly contribute to climate change and global warming. Think back to ten or fifteen years ago the seasons changed and temperatures did along with them. Everything seemed to have a schedule, now one day its seventy degrees out and the next day it’s thirty-five. Just because its winter doesn’t mean its cold out, the summers are getting hotter and the winters longer and harsher. Global warming is real and as the days go on it’s becoming more and more apparent. “Globally, livestock operations are responsible for approximately 18% of greenhouse gas production and over 7% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions (Massey & Ulmer, 2008). While carbon dioxide is often considered the primary greenhouse gas of concern, manure emits methane and nitrous oxide which are 23 and 300 times more potent as greenhouse gases than carbon dioxide, respectively. The EPA attributes manure management as the fourth leading source of nitrous oxide emissions and the fifth leading source of methane emissions (EPA, 2009).”(Hribar) CAFO’s are amongst the leading contributors to global warming and they need to be regulated and controlled. You can’t ask one to voluntary monitor its gas emissions, doing so cost money. You need to demand it and make it a law to properly see what is really going on.

So what can we do about the harm these CAFO’s are doing, when it comes to the government who is really on our side? “The Environmental Protection Agency is obliged under the Clean Water Act to monitor America’s waterways and shield them from the toxic runoff from factory farms. But the growth of that industry, and its courtroom tenacity, has far outstripped the E.P.A.’s efforts to restrict runoff from manure lagoons and feedlots.” (nytimes) It seems to me that past administrations have taken the wind out of the EPA’s sails. They have had significant cutbacks in their work force and funding and unfortunately continue to experience them thanks to republicans which now control the majority. In 2012 two proposed rules that the E.P.A. had proposed were withdrawn. The first rule would gather basic information from all factory farms and the other would have expanded the amount of farms that are required to have a national pollution discharge permit which enables them to dump waste into the water at certain times. In 2013 fewer than 60% did. (NY times) With all those negative things happening in 2013 I believe one positive has come one has happened. Gina McCarthy was made the EPA administrator after a long delay by republicans, seeing how bad they didn’t want her to be in charge is a good sign that President Obama picked the right person for the job. This is a good start, the problem is getting enough of the public informed and motived by the information they see to elect someone that is going to do something about it. I fell that’s the only way things will change, boycotting McDonald’s, altering you’re eating habits, and only buying from sustainable farms is not going to have an significant impact on CAFO’s.

Unfortunately it seems that factory farms will always be a somewhat of a necessity. Even if informed not everyone can afford to make the right choice of buying organic free range produce and raising animals the “right way” takes longer and occupies more space, if all the factory farms were free range there wouldn’t be enough space to house the amount of animals that CAFO’s do. The sad truth is our society consumes entirely too much meat, it’s always been our first choice ever since the beginning of time and it will always be that way until there is no choice given. If we have gotten to the point where we can’t live without CAFO’s then the next step needs to be informing the public to the damage they are doing so that they can elect officials that will actually work on a solution and enforce it. The problem is CAFO’s are extremely good at keeping the public uneducated and they go through great lengths and massive amounts of money to keep it that way. They have been sculpting the EPA for years to make sure things go their way and that has helped keep the public uninformed and ignorant, their favorite type.

Work Cited

Bunton, Bryan, et al. "Monitoring And Modeling Of Emissions From Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations: Overview Of Methods." Environmental Health Perspectives 115.2 (2007): 303-307. Academic Search Complete. Web. 22 May 2014.

“Consumer Factsheet on: NITRATES/NITRITES” Epa.gov. 20 May. 2014

“How Factory Farms Impact You” factoryfarmmap.org. Food & Water Watch. Web. 21 May 2014.

Hribar, Carrie, MA. “Understanding Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations and Their Impact on Communities” National Association of Local Boards of Health. (2010). Web. 21 May 2014.

“Hydrogen Sulfide” osha.gov. Safety and health hazards. Web. 22 May. 2014

Kaplan, Ariel R. "Cafos: Five Essential Tools For Local Regulation." State & Local Law News 35.4 (2012): 10-11. Academic Search Complete. Web. 21 May 2014.

Lavin, Chad. "Factory Farms In A Consumer Society." American Studies (00263079) 50.1/2 (2009): 71-92. Academic Search Complete. Web. 21 May 2014.

Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production. “Putting meat on the table: industrial farm animal production in America.” April 2008 at 23 Web. 21 May 2014.

Pluhar, Evelyn. "Meat And Morality: Alternatives To Factory Farming." Journal Of Agricultural & Environmental Ethics 23.5 (2010): 455-468. Business Source Complete. Web. 21 May 2014.

“Public Health” Sustainabletable.org. Food Program. Web. 20 May. 2014

“The E.P.A. Backs Off on Factory Farms” Nytimes.com. Web. 14 June. 2013

Weeks, Jennifer. "Factory Farms: The Issues." CQ Researcher 17.2 (2007): 27. MasterFILE Premier. Web. 21 May 2014