Intensive animal farming
[3] To achieve this, agribusinesses keep livestock such as cattle, poultry, and fish at high stocking densities, at large scale, and using modern machinery, biotechnology, and global trade.
[9] While intensive animal farming can produce large amounts of meat at low cost with reduced human labor,[10] it is controversial as it raises several ethical concerns,[11] including animal welfare issues (confinement, mutilations, stress-induced aggression, breeding complications),[12][13] harm to the environment and wildlife (greenhouse gases, deforestation, eutrophication),[14] public health risks (zoonotic diseases, pandemic risks, antibiotic resistance),[20] and worker exploitation, particularly of undocumented workers.
[25] From its American and West European heartland, intensive animal farming became globalized in the later years of the 20th century and is still expanding and replacing traditional practices of stock rearing in an increasing number of countries.
Research has shown that many immigrant workers in concentrated animal farming operations (CAFOs) in the United States receive little to no job-specific training or safety and health information regarding the hazards associated with these jobs.
Meat-type chickens currently grow to market weight in six to seven weeks, whereas only fifty years ago it took three times as long.
In America, intensive piggeries (or hog lots) are a type of concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO), specialized for the raising of domestic pigs up to slaughter weight.
[citation needed] The use of sow stalls has resulted in lower production costs and concomitant animal welfare concerns.
Many of the world's largest producers of pigs (such as U.S. and Canada) use sow stalls, but some nations (such as the UK) and U.S. states (such as Florida and Arizona) have banned them.
[41] Pigs are naturally omnivorous and are generally fed a combination of grains and protein sources (soybeans, or meat and bone meal).
To prevent disease spreading and encourage growth, drug programs such as antibiotics, vitamins, hormones and other supplements are pre-emptively administered.
Cattle are domesticated ungulates, a member of the family Bovidae, in the subfamily Bovinae, and descended from the aurochs (Bos primigenius).
[46] They are raised as livestock for their flesh (called beef and veal), dairy products (milk), leather and as draught animals.
Many routine husbandry practices involve ear tagging, dehorning, loading, medical operations, vaccinations and hoof care, as well as training and sorting for agricultural shows and sales.
[49] Once cattle obtain an entry-level weight, about 650 pounds (290 kg), they are transferred from the range to a feedlot to be fed a specialized animal feed which consists of corn byproducts (derived from ethanol production), barley, and other grains as well as alfalfa and cottonseed meal.
Because of the availability of these products, farmers using their own grain can formulate their own rations and be assured the animals are getting the recommended levels of minerals and vitamins.
In order for this to happen, several actions need to be taken and these four components include:[63] In 2012 Australia's largest supermarket chain, Coles, announced that as of January 1, 2013, they will stop selling company branded pork and eggs from animals kept in factory farms.
[64] In June 2021, the European Commission announced the plan of a ban on cages for a number of animals, including egg-laying hens, female breeding pigs, calves raised for veal, rabbits, ducks, and geese, by 2027.
[69] For example, in the UK, debeaking of chickens is deprecated, but it is recognized that it is a method of last resort, seen as better than allowing vicious fighting and ultimately cannibalism.
[citation needed] Between 60 and 70 percent[70] of six million breeding sows in the U.S. are confined during pregnancy, and for most of their adult lives, in 2 by 7 ft (0.61 by 2.13 m) gestation crates.
][72] With the evolution of factory farming, there has been a growing awareness of the issues amongst the wider public, not least due to the efforts of animal rights and welfare campaigners.
Workers may develop acute and chronic lung disease, musculoskeletal injuries, and may catch infections that transmit from animals to human beings (such as tuberculosis).
[81] Pesticides are used to control organisms which are considered harmful[82] and they save farmers money by preventing product losses to pests.
[89] The disruption of pristine forests driven by logging, mining, road building through remote places, rapid urbanisation and population growth is bringing people into closer contact with animal species they may never have been near before.
However, small family farms are more likely to introduce bird diseases and more frequent association with people into the mix, as happened in the 2009 flu pandemic.
The UK has stated that in the event of the EU raising the ban at some future date, to comply with a precautionary approach, it would only consider the introduction of specific hormones, proven on a case-by-case basis.
[93][94] The international trade in animal products increases the risk of global transmission of virulent diseases such as swine fever,[95] BSE, foot and mouth and bird flu.
[102] Although Staph should be killed with proper cooking, it may still pose a risk to consumers through improper food handling and cross-contamination in the kitchen.
The senior author of the study said, "The fact that drug-resistant S. aureus was so prevalent, and likely came from the food animals themselves, is troubling, and demands attention to how antibiotics are used in food-animal production today.
"[103] In April 2009, lawmakers in the Mexican state of Veracruz accused large-scale hog and poultry operations of being breeding grounds of a pandemic swine flu, although they did not present scientific evidence to support their claim.
A swine flu which have quickly killed more than 100 infected persons in that area, appears to have begun in the vicinity of a Smithfield subsidiary pig CAFO (concentrated animal feeding operation).
