[11] The acquisition of Smithfield's 146,000 acres of land made WH Group, headquartered in Luohe, Henan province, one of the largest overseas owners of American farmland.

[b] Smithfield Foods began its growth in 1981 with the purchase of Gwaltney of Smithfield,[13] followed by the acquisition of nearly 40 companies between then and 2008, including: The company was able to grow as a result of its highly industrialized pig production, confining thousands of pigs in large barns known as concentrated animal feeding operations, and controlling the animals' development from conception to packing.

[15] Killing 114,300 pigs a day, it was the top pig-slaughter operation in the United States in 2007; along with three other companies, it also slaughtered 56 percent of the cattle processed there until it sold its beef group in 2008.

[20] This was followed by the acquisition of almost 40 companies in the pork, beef, and livestock industries between 1981 and around 2008,[26] including Esskay Meats/Schluderberg-Kurdle in Baltimore, Valley Dale in Roanoke,[20] and Patrick Cudahy in Milwaukee in 1984.

[30] In 2009 Smithfield was assessed a $900,000 penalty by the U.S. Justice Department to settle charges that the company had engaged in illegal merger activity during its takeover of Premium Standard Farms.

[34] At the time of the deal, China was one of the US's largest pork importers,[clarify] although it had 475 million pigs of its own, roughly 60 percent of the global total.

[40] In 2016, Smithfield purchased the Californian pork processor Clougherty Packing PLC for $145 million, along with its Farmer John and Saag's Specialty Meats brands.

[46] As of July 2017, the company's brands included Armour, Berlinki, Carando, Cook's, Curly's, Eckrich, Farmland, Gwaltney, Healthy Ones, John Morrell, Krakus, Kretschmar, Margherita, Morliny, Nathan's Famous, and Smithfield.

The company created advisory boards composed of chefs, established partnerships with culinary schools, and engaged in substantial research and development to improve its products.

[8] The company contracted farmers who had moved out of tobacco farming, and sent them piglets between eight and ten weeks old to be brought to market weights on diets controlled by Smithfield.

[53] According to Jeff Tietz in Rolling Stone, the waste—a mixture of excrement, urine, blood, afterbirths, stillborn pigs, drugs and other chemicals—overflows when it rains, and the liners can be punctured by rocks.

"[56] In 2018 it announced an "animal waste-to-energy" plan; the company said it would spend $125 million over ten years, along with Dominion Energy, to cover the lagoons in North Carolina, Utah and Virginia with "high-density plastic and digesters" to capture the methane gas and direct it into a local pipeline.

[69][64] As of January 2018, on company-owned farms in the United States, Smithfield confines pregnant sows in gestation crates for six weeks during the impregnation process.

According to The Washington Post, over 600 other residents of La Gloria became ill from a respiratory disease in March that year (later thought to be seasonal flu).

[53] Smithfield said that it had found no clinical signs of swine flu in its pigs or employees in Mexico, and had no reason to believe that the outbreak was connected to its Mexican facilities.

This effort has been at least partially driven by the epidemic of swine fever in China that has resulted in massive reductions in that country's pig population and pork production.

[15] Killing 114,300 pigs a day, it was the top pig-slaughter operation in the United States in 2007; along with three other companies, it also slaughtered 56 percent of the cattle processed there until it sold its beef group in 2008.

[86] In 2017, in Wake County, North Carolina, nearly 500 residents sued a Smithfield subsidiary, Murphy-Brown, in 26 lawsuits, alleging nuisance and ill health caused by smells, open-air lagoons, and pig carcasses.

The plaintiffs had filed suit for "stench odor, truck noise and flies generated near their homes on Kinlaw Farm in Bladen County.

Steve Troxler, North Carolina's agricultural commissioner, said the litigation could harm farm production across the country; he argued that legal abuse of the word nuisance is a mounting concern.

[88] As a result of the cases, legislators in Georgia, Nebraska, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Utah, and West Virginia passed or proposed changes to right-to-farm laws that reduce either the right to sue or potential damages.

[93] Its facilities in North Carolina came under scrutiny in 1999 when Hurricane Floyd flooded lagoons holding fecal matter; many of Smithfield's contract farms were accused of polluting the rivers.

[102] In 2018, Smithfield Foods faced criticism for widely publicized failures of its hog waste lagoons, this time in the wake of Hurricane Florence.

[104] In 2009 Armour-Eckrich introduced smaller crescent-style packaging for its smoked sausages, which reduced the plastic film and corrugated cardboard the company used by over 840,000 pounds per year.

[112] In Poland, Smithfield Foods purchased former state farms for what its CEO said were "small dollars" and turned them into CAFOs using grants from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

"[114] In December 2010 the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) released an undercover video taken by one of its investigators inside a Smithfield Foods facility.

According to the AP, the material shows a pig being pulled by the snout, shot in the head with a stun gun, and thrown into a bin while trying to wriggle free.

In 2000, according to Human Rights Watch, Smithfield set up its own security force, with "special police" status under North Carolina law, and in 2003 arrested workers who supported the union.

[129] A Smithfield manager testified in 1998, during an unfair labor practices trial, that at the Tar Heel plant in North Carolina it takes 5–10 minutes to slaughter and complete the process of "disassembly" of an animal, including draining, cleaning, and cleaving.

[143] On December 23, 2020, animal rights activist Matt Johnson of Direct Action Everywhere was interviewed on Fox Business posing as the CEO Smithfield Foods Dennis Organ and made claims that the factories were petri dishes for the coronavirus.