Industrial Meat

Report Blames Factory Farms for Bird Flu
by Stephen Leahy
Published on Wednesday, February 21, 2007 by the Inter Press Service

Factory farms are responsible for both the bird flu and emissions of greenhouse gases that now top those of cars and sport utility vehicles (SUVs), according to a report released Monday.
Sixty percent of global livestock production, including chicken and pig "confined animal feedlot operations" (CAFOs), now occur in the developing world. Unregulated zoning and subsidies that encourage these CAFOs or factory farms are moving closer to major urban areas in China, Bangladesh, India, and many countries in Africa, said the report, "Vital Signs 2007-2008" by the Worldwatch Institute.

Although there is no definitive scientific proof, those farms are very likely where avian or bird flu started and will continue to be responsible for new outbreaks, said the author of the report, Danielle Nierenberg, a Worldwatch research associate.

[snip]

Concentrating huge numbers of animals in small spaces, feeding them the cheapest food possible, centralising and speeding up processing, and distributing the product widely around the world is the perfect recipe for spreading disease ...

The growing numbers of livestock around the world are responsible for 18 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions (as measured in carbon dioxide equivalent), according to the FAO. It's not just methane and manure -- the FAO shows that land-use changes, especially deforestation to expand pastures and to create arable land for feed crops, is a big part. So is the use of energy to produce fertilisers, to run the slaughterhouses and meat-processing plants, and to pump water.

[snip]

And it would be better and healthier to get meat from small-scale, localised production systems. Factory farms provide cheap meat only because the real costs in terms of air and water pollution, terrible conditions for workers and animals and so on are not factored in, she said.

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