PROPONENTS OF INDUSTRIAL AGRICULTURE often argue that the intensification of food production helps to protect the world’s imperiled biodiversity. But the facts show a sad and disconcerting story. The CAFO system has devastating impacts on native habitats and wildlife, including the blanketing of feed crop monocultures across global landscapes, the dewatering of aquatic systems, and the loss of species along with valuable ecosystem processes such as pollination, predation, water filtration, and carbon sequestration.
Biodiversity, simply put, is a contraction of two words—biological diversity. Though most people tend to think of biodiversity as simply the sheer number of plants or animals in a given area, the concern of scientists goes well beyond just the presence or absence of species. Biological diversity refers to both the variety and the number of organisms, with the emphasis on native species. A field full of exotic species from another continent, for example, might increase the number of organisms but would also likely come at the expense of native habitat and wildlife, thereby resulting in a decrease in biodiversity.
The definition of biodiversity also includes the interactions between living organisms at four levels of organization—genetic, population, species, and landscape. To preserve biodiversity, the major ecological influences and processes that maintain species and their habitat must be protected and maintained. For instance, wolves are top-down predators that shape the behavior and number of other animals, thus exerting a defining influence that goes beyond their presence as a species. If you have only a few wolves occupying a given landscape, but not enough to exert a significant ecological influence on prey species, such a situation would represent a loss of biodiversity.
Generally speaking, agriculture of any kind typically diminishes biodiversity. Agriculture’s main goal is to funnel the vast majority of solar energy and local resources into a few selected species—whether plant or animal. Such ecological simplification can occur only at the expense of native species. And when we exchange cattle for the diverse native fauna of the Great Plains that once included bison, elk, pronghorn, deer, prairie dog, sage grouse, and a lengthy list of other species, the result is a simplification of the ecosystem. The reduction of native biodiversity is measured not only in terms of species loss, but in the loss of genetic diversity, landscape diversity, and ecological processes as well. You cannot channel the vast majority of a region’s plant biomass into an exotic species like cattle or sheep without significantly compromising the existence of many native species. Something has to give.
Furthermore, native species and healthy ecosystems provide a broad range of what are termed “environmental services,” such as pollination, natural pest control, water filtration, carbon sequestration, and the cycling of nutrients in soils. If a landscape’s biodiversity is simplified and its natural processes are interrupted or eliminated, many of these ecological services are either lost or severely restricted in scope.
Factory farming and CAFO production greatly contribute to these losses because of their unhealthy and unwieldy reliance on land for grazing and feed production. Estimates from satellite imagery suggest that 28 percent of the Earth’s surface is now used for crop and livestock production. Some 41 percent of this area is intensively farmed with heavy machinery and chemicals, at a huge expense to native biodiversity.1 To produce grain, hay, or other forage crops, the naturally diverse native plant and animal communities are typically replaced with a single monocrop that is often drenched in chemical pesticides and harvest-boosting fertilizers. Since monocropping occurs across hundreds of millions of acres, the ecological effects are substantial. Once-diversified landscapes are radically simplified.
While it’s difficult to determine how much of any crop is pumped into concentrated animal feeding operations as opposed to small-and medium-size diversified farms and ranches, the total impact of animal agriculture of any kind is significant. Consider these statistics. Globally, production of livestock feed occupies one-third of the Earth’s arable land.2 Over the past ten years, vast areas of the Amazon Basin have been burned for conversion to industrial soybean plantations to produce feed for Brazilian feedlots and CAFOs, as well as for export to feeding operations in Europe and Asia. U.S. farmland production is even more skewed toward livestock feed.
In 2008, U.S. farmers, primarily in the Midwest, planted 87 million acres to feeder corn.3 Part of that acreage figure was due to the increasing demand for corn created by ethanol, but the bulk of the acreage is used for animal feed. By comparison, farmers planted only an average of 370,000 acres across the entire country for fresh market sweet corn, the plant we consume directly for corn on the cob, canning, and other uses.4 To give some comparison, Montana, the fourth-largest state in the nation, occupies 93 million acres. Imagine nothing but corn stretching east and west across Montana’s 550 miles and north and south by 300 miles. This is a huge area to be plowed up and planted to an exotic grass crop that requires vast inputs of water, pesticides, and fertilizer to sustain.
Similarly the acreage devoted to soybeans is enormous. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), 74.5 million acres were planted to soybeans in 2008.5 And despite the popularity of tofu and other soy-based food products, less than 2 percent of the soybean crop is used for production of food for direct human consumption. Most of the annual soybean crop goes to animal feed.
Alfalfa hay is yet another significant crop for concentrated livestock production, primarily dairy cows and beef cattle. In the United States, approximately 59 million acres are planted to alfalfa hay annually.6 The state of Oregon comprises roughly 60 million acres. Though serving slightly better as wildlife habitat than a row crop like corn or soybeans, alfalfa hayfields still result in a net loss in native biodiversity. Alfalfa hay replaces native vegetation, often requires excessive amounts of fertilizers, and is cut or mowed frequently, destroying even its temporal value as hiding and nesting cover for many wildlife species.
Taken together, these three animal feed crops cover a minimum area of over 200 million acres in the United States alone. To put the landscape use of animal feed versus food production into perspective, the amount of land used to grow the top ten fresh vegetables in the United States (asparagus, broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, celery, head lettuce, honeydew melons, onions, sweet corn, and tomatoes) totals about 1 million acres.7 Consider also that as much as 22 percent of all wheat grown in the United States ultimately ends up as animal feed, rather than in food products like bread or cereal consumed directly by humans.8
Where formerly an acre of grassland or forest may have supported thousands of native plants and animals, including insects, the typical livestock feed operation is dominated by one or two exotic species. The loss of native plant species has major consequences for other dependent forms of life. Aspen and balsam poplar, for instance, are common tree species across the Northern Tier states from Maine to Minnesota. In many parts of this region, these native trees have been cut down and replaced with corn, hay, and other field crops for livestock production. Yet there are 7 species of giant silk moths, 77 species of nocturnal moths, 7 species of sphinx moths, and 10 species of butterflies known to use aspen and poplar for larval development alone. That’s more than 100 species of butterflies and moths! A list of all insects, microorganisms, birds, mammals, and other life associated with just aspen and poplar would likely number in the thousands.
If you fly or drive across Iowa, Illinois, Ohio, Missouri, and other midwestern states, you’ll pass mile after mile of corn and/or soybean fields. Growing these crops has led to the near-extirpation of native plant communities like the tallgrass prairie.9 Less than 4 percent of the native tallgrass prairie remains, and in some states like Iowa, tallgrass prairie is functionally extinct, with less than 0.1 percent of its original habitat remaining. “Clean” farming has eliminated the surrounding natural vegetation such as woodlots, fenceline strips, wetlands, and other natural areas that in the past supported native species with the agricultural matrix.
Agriculture, including livestock production and crop production combined, is the number one source for species endangerment in the United States,10 and this tally would be higher if we add in the species that are negatively impacted by exotic species, many of which increase because of habitat modification by agricultural production.
Agricultural production also negatively impacts aquatic ecosystems and biodiversity. Agriculture is the largest user of U.S. water resources, with concentrated animal feeding operations the largest per capita consumer of water. The primary mission of most western reservoirs is to store water for irrigated agriculture. Even in California, which grows the bulk of the nation’s vegetables and fruits, the state’s largest use of irrigation water by acreage is for irrigated alfalfa hay production. Although production requirements vary between regions and individual operations and times of year, it is clear that meat and other animal food products are extremely water-intensive compared with grains and other foods, not just to irrigate feed crops, but also to hydrate livestock, move waste in CAFO facilities, and service slaughterhouse disassembly lines.
The environmental impacts associated with dams and reservoirs, such as barriers to salmon migration and changes in water flows and flooding, are just one indirect impact on biodiversity from factory farming operations. Add to this the direct dewatering of rivers for hay and other forage crop production, along with the loss of groundwater supplies by excessive pumping—particularly of the Ogallala Aquifer—for irrigated feed crops, dairies, hog CAFOs, feed-lots, and processing facilities throughout arid regions from Texas and the southwest to South Dakota. It’s easy to see why some argue that livestock production is the leading cause of water degradation.11 The disappearance of native fish, amphibians, mollusks, and aquatic insects as a result of livestock production is significant.
More than four-fifths of the western United States’ native fish populations are either listed or candidates for listing under the Endangered Species Act. For many of these species, habitat change due to water loss or degradation resulting from livestock production operations is a dominant cause of population decline. The dewatering of Montana’s Big Hole River to irrigate forage crops for cattle is, for instance, one of the prime factors in the near extinction of the Montana grayling.
The negative effect on fish of such a river’s being drawn down to a trickle is easy enough to comprehend, but other times the cause-and-effect relationships are subtle and indirect. For example, Colorado River dams created for irrigation storage subsequently used for livestock forage crops have significantly changed natural flood regimes and flows. These changes are responsible for the decline of native fish species, including the humpback chub, the bonytail chub, the round-tail chub, the razorback sucker, and the Colorado squawfish.
Unbeknownst to many people, a sizable portion of the United States public domain is leased to private ranching livestock operations. The typical public lands livestock grazing permittee runs what is known as a “cow-calf” operation. That is, a cow and calf are grazed for all or a portion of the year on public lands, then shipped to a feedlot for fattening before slaughter and processing. Thus public lands grazing operations are a major contributor to CAFO-type feeding ventures, since nearly all the animals that are grazed on public lands ultimately wind up in feedlots.
More than 260 million acres of western public lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service, as well as smaller amounts of land operated by the Fish and Wildlife Service and even some national park units, are leased in “allotments” for livestock grazing. (For comparison, the entire state of Vermont occupies 6 million acres.) Ranchers pay $1.35 per animal unit month (AUM)—virtually pennies a day—to feed and house a 1,000-pound cow and her calf. You couldn’t feed a hamster for what ranchers pay U.S. taxpayers for the privilege of grazing their animals on public lands.
The acreage available to U.S. ranchers is larger than the combined area of all the eastern seaboard states from Maine to Florida, with Missouri thrown in for good measure. Though the low cost paid by ranchers for grazing privileges is a direct subsidy to these government welfare ranchers, the ultimate price is lost biodiversity—something difficult, if not impossible, to ever recover.
Since the majority of these lands are arid and rugged, their productivity is low and vegetation is sparse. Livestock grazing has led to even greater productivity losses, major soil erosion, and detrimental changes in native plant communities. In the arid western United States, it can take up to 250 acres of land to support a single cow for a year compared with an animal that can subsist on a couple of acres of pasture in the moist, humid East. As a consequence of this low productivity, the negative impacts of any grazing operation are magnified.
For instance, up to 90 percent of the annual forage on many grazing allotments may be allotted to domestic livestock. You can’t put that much grass into the belly of a cow without impacting native animals, from elk to ground squirrels. The mere presence of livestock negatively impacts native wildlife. Many species, including elk and pronghorn, are socially displaced by the presence of livestock. They are pushed into habitats that are often less productive and suffer accordingly.
Beyond forage competition, cattle evolved in moist woodlands in Eurasia, and they tend to congregate in habitats that are similar to their evolutionary past—namely the narrow strip of green riparian woodlands along rivers and streams. In the process, they consume many of the plants and trample and compress the moist soils, damaging these fragile green corridors. Since at least 80 percent of all species in the West depend on these riparian habitats for water, food, and shelter, the loss and damage to these areas by livestock take a direct toll on many wildlife species. Everything from red bats to the Southwest willow flycatcher depends on riparian areas, and has suffered steep declines because of the loss of riparian habitat.
Excessive and poorly timed hoof compaction of riparian soils, which are natural water-holding sponges, increases downstream flooding in spring, often with serious damage to human habitation, while it also simultaneously reduces late-season flows. Hooves can also tear apart stream banks, creating wider, but shallower streams that are less suitable for fish.
Another cost of public lands livestock grazing is predator and “pest” control. Taxpayers fund the killing of coyotes, wolves, bears, mountain lions, and other wildlife that may prey on livestock. Hundreds of thousands of animals are killed annually. Endangered species like wolves are killed to protect private livestock that are grazing on public lands. So-called pests are poisoned by government animal control agents. Wildlife like prairie dogs (which are candidates for listing under the Endangered Species Act) are regularly poisoned on public lands because ranchers consider them forage competitors with their livestock.
Trampling of soil crusts, plus the alteration of native plant communities by selective grazing pressure has led to major invasion of exotic weeds. The changes in plants have hurt many native species. For instance, many native butterflies and bees, which depend on specific native flowers that have been replaced by exotic species, are in steep decline. Exotic plant invasions have had other effects as well.
Cheatgrass, an exotic favored by livestock grazing, is an annual that burns very well. The widespread invasion of cheatgrass facilitated by domestic livestock grazing has led to increased fire frequency in many grasslands. These fires are burning out the native vegetation, creating even better conditions for the growth of more cheatgrass.
Many, though not all, of these environmental impacts and the subsequent loss of biodiversity would be reduced or avoided altogether with a shift to smaller, diversified farms, along with a reduction, if not outright elimination, of meat consumption. Rather than grow hundreds of millions of acres of feed for livestock, we should shift the focus toward producing food for people. Such changes in consumption and production would contribute to a huge decrease in the environmental impacts of animal agriculture. By preserving wildlands and biodiversity in and around farmlands, we will protect not only ecosystems that are invaluable to the survival of myriad species of flora and fauna, but ecosystems that are also crucial to the very success and ultimate survival of future generations.
The industrialization of food production has imparted and continues to impart devastating harm to the world’s agricultural and biological diversity. These losses are not limited to the decline of traditional livestock breeds but also include the vanishing of family farmers and dismantling of local and regional production capabilities. The following short essays outline some of these tragic consequences.
There are predominantly two types of food-producing chickens—egg layers and meat birds, or “broilers.” Until the twentieth century, dozens of breeds were prized for both meat and egg production. Today’s industrial chickens, in contrast, have been engineered for very specific characteristics. Laying hens, predominantly the White Leghorn and to a lesser extent the Rhode Island Red, are bred for egg output and the ability to endure the confinement of battery cages. Broiler chickens, mainly the Cornish Cross, reach slaughter weight in just seven weeks and have been bred for optimal breast size, the ability to be plucked in industrial-grade machines, appetite, and astoundingly rapid weight gain.
In the 1920s, more than sixty breeds of chickens were raised on farms across the United States. Today the industry is reliant on just two or three industrial composite hybrids. This domination of commercial egg and meat production by just two breeds is a testament to advances in modern technologies and industrial farming. But it is also a grave concern to scientists, farmers, animal conservationists, and others around the globe. The vast genetic heritage of traditional poultry breeds is being lost in a short amount of time.
U.S. animal scientists report that commercial chickens have been so narrowly bred that they are missing more than half of the genetic diversity native to the species. Researchers such as Purdue University professor Bill Muir warn that these genetic deficits leave them vulnerable to new diseases.1 Commercially bred hens suffer from calcium deficiency and weak bones, reports doctor of animal science Temple Grandin. And the broiler chicken has been so overselected for rapid growth that its bone physiology is totally abnormal, often resulting in lameness.2
Poultry, by far, have become the world’s favored animal food, with nearly 10 billion produced each year in the United States alone. Noncommercial breeds and wild birds should be safeguarded for their own sake. Interbreeding traditional species with commercial lines might also help to protect the industry in the long run.
At least 800 breeds of cattle are recognized worldwide. Traditionally, cattle were raised for a triple purpose: meat, milk, and labor (and, of course, leather). Animal husbandry developed around a foundation of highly diverse cattle breeds adapting to a vast range of grazing and climatic conditions, with different temperaments, varying resistance to diseases, and distinct qualities of meat, milk, fat, and muscle.
Modern dairy breeds are changing rapidly. In the United States, over 80 percent of the registered pure-bred dairy cattle are a single breed—the black-and-white Holstein. Together with more active grazers like Jerseys, Ayrshires, Guernseys, and Brown Swiss, just five breeds make up almost all of the country’s milking herds. While the Holstein is known for its prolific lactation in modern confinement systems, that success rests largely on the availability of large amounts of feed, veterinary support, and replacement stock.
Increasingly the Holstein is being crossed with traditional dairy breeds throughout the world, including the massive Ankole cattle of Uganda. And as the Holstein begins to take over the global dairy industry, some scientists worry about a loss of genetic diversity. According to University of Minnesota professor Les Hansen, 30 percent of all existing Holstein genes today are traceable to just two bulls, one born in 1962 and one born in 1965. Although both bulls are dead, their genes live on in modern dairy cattle.1
Dairy cows must become pregnant during the year to continue milking. Only half their calves will be female; millions of males are destined for slaughter, either as veal or feedlot beef. To be used for meat, the male calves must be a suitable crossbreed for grain fattening, so there is increasing consolidation between milk and beef producers.
In the past, the large number of beef cattle breeds—and the genetic diversity they possess—has been a cornerstone of success for the beef industry, allowing producers to respond to changing market demands. Today, however, 60 percent of the beef cattle in the United States are Angus, Hereford, or Simmental. Although so far diversity has been conserved because of the broad range of habitats in which beef cattle are raised, the accessibility of markets, and decentralized approaches to selection, this genetic resilience could change if we are not diligent.
The majority of the pig breeds we know today are believed to be descended from the Eurasian wild boar (Sus scrofa scrofa). Archaeological evidence from the Middle East indicates domestication of the pig occurred as early as 9,000 years ago, though it may have begun even earlier in China. Fast growth, large litter sizes, early maturity, and efficient feed-to-meat conversion were among the many traits that early farmers took advantage of when domesticating pigs.
As pigs spread across Asia, Europe, and Africa, they became indicative of settled rather than nomadic or migratory farming communities. The reason was simply that pigs are difficult to herd and move for long distances. When the Spanish conquistadors brought pigs to North America, the escapees quickly inhabited the oak-savanna grasslands throughout the country. Many of these pigs descended from the ancient European and Mediterranean breeds that evolved in the unique ecological conditions of France and Spain. As the pigs adapted to the conditions of new lands, farmers developed numerous breeds, including the Arkansas Razorback, Mississippi Mulefoot, Piney Woods Rooter, Choctaw, and the saltwater-tolerant Ossabaw.
In the 1930s, fifteen breeds of pigs were raised for the U.S. market. Today, at least six of these are extinct. The Hampshire, Yorkshire, and Duroc breeds provide 75 percent of the genetics for modern commercial production.
With the rise of animal factory hog production after the 1980s, the number of small family hog farms has plummeted. The animals themselves have also undergone a dramatic restructuring. The modern industrial hog is a feat of efficiency engineering. The narrow gene pool now preferred produces “lean hogs” with significantly less body fat and what many would argue is far less flavor. Leaner hogs have less resilience for the cold winter temperatures, so they are now kept indoors in temperature-controlled environments and no longer graze. Artificial insemination ensures relative genetic consistency, and (with the exception of a number of European Union countries) antibiotics are heavily used to promote growth and prevent disease in industrial breeds.
For centuries, the family farm served as the backbone of agriculture in rural areas throughout the world. Healthy rural communities depended on farm families, who labored full-time on land they cared for and managed, and who practiced sound animal husbandry. Today, the average U.S. farmer is fifty-five years old. People under thirty-five are increasingly reluctant to enter the profession. CAFOs are now producing much of the animal foods sold in the United States and increasingly in other traditional farming societies, such as Poland, Romania, Brazil, and Mexico.
In particular, markets for pork, poultry, and eggs are controlled by a small number of very large corporations, primarily through the practice of “vertical integration.” These corporations own the animals from birth through processing, and also have substantial holdings in marketing, distribution, or grain supplies. While farmers go heavily into debt erecting factory buildings, the large integrators dictate the rest—from breeds to feed rations to slaughter weights, all in the name of output and uniformity. Though they don’t own the animals, the farmers are usually responsible for disposing of the vast amounts of animal waste and are on the hook for fatalities.
This practice of ownership of the animals by the processors, also referred to as “captive supply,” skews the ability to set prices toward the vertically integrated corporations rather than independent producers. Farmers who join the CAFO industry often become nothing more than subcontractors on the animal factory production line. Today, for example, poultry farmers raising birds under contract with corporations are no longer referred to as farmers, but as “contract growers.”1
There are many Americans eager to begin farming, given the right opportunities and circumstances. One of the fastest-growing segments is in organic and grass-fed livestock production. The infrastructure investment for these operations is often affordable, and direct-marketing opportunities can make such farming more profitable, productive, and better in many other ways. What is lacking is a coordinated effort to ensure that we’ll have plenty of productive and secure farming families for subsequent generations.
In the United States, and increasingly in other parts of the world, livestock production has changed dramatically from family-based, small-scale, relatively independent farms to larger industrial operations more tightly aligned across the production and distribution chains.
The problem with applying the industrial economic model to agriculture is the nature of farming itself. Farms are not factories. Farms are embedded within biological systems. A healthy farm has natural diversity rather than factory-like precision and specialization. A healthy farm exhibits complex communities of plant and animal species instead of oversimplified monocultures. And finally, a healthy farm is scaled according to what the land can resiliently sustain, not drawing too excessively from local water supplies, or overwhelming the surrounding area with wastes that can’t be safely applied as fertilizers or tolerated by neighbors.
According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, several factors have contributed to the rapid expansion of the CAFO industry: (1) subsidy programs that have allowed large producers to lower operating costs by buying discounted grains; (2) innovations in breeding that produce animals tailored to harsh confinement conditions; (3) increasing use of antibiotics to thwart disease; (4) the ability of CAFOs to avoid costs of safe manure treatment and handling; (5) lack of enforcement of existing antitrust and environmental regulations; (6) the domination of markets through contracts and ownership; and (7) the disregard of the negative effects of concentrated production on people living near the facilities.1
Between 1980 and 2000, the percentage of U.S. livestock produced from large operations rather than smaller farms increased dramatically across all sectors.2 The trend toward consolidation in poultry, dairy, and beef feedlot operations actually started much earlier than that, but the concentration of industrial pork production accelerated during that time. Between 1982 and 2006, the number of U.S. hog operations fell by a factor of almost 10, from just under 500,000 to about 60,000.3 However, the number of swine has remained about the same over that time period, demonstrating that the increased size of an operation was not required to meet the rising demand for pork products. The big are getting bigger and the small are simply disappearing. It’s happening all over the world.