How Do Factory Farms Affect The Environment

Have you ever wondered what the eat you are eating came from? The answer: factory farms. Factory farms supply approximately 80% of the poultry, beef, and pork consumed in the United States. These large scale farms slaughter around ten billion animals a year. Small, independent farms have become transitioned into huge enterprises with assembly lines and thousands of workers. Many of the farms are considered concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs. Factory farm’s effect on the environment, effect on human health, and lack of animal welfare proves that they are a destructive industry.
An example of how these farms affect the environment is the way they get rid of the animal’s waste. “Factory farms typically store animal waste in huge, open-air lagoons, often as big as several football fields, which are prone to leaks and spills” (Factory Farming and the Environment). When these lagoons spill into bodies of water, manure is what is being released cause all the
organisms in the water to die. By slaughtering the animals in the farm, they are unintentionally killing other living things. It’s not just a small portion of the waste spilling. “Hog, chicken and cattle waste has polluted 35,000 miles of rivers in 22 states and contaminated groundwater in 17 states” (Disturbing Facts on Factory Farming and Farm Safety). With this huge number of contaminated water, it’s killing living things on a much larger scale than one would think.
For the amount of dairy and other meat products they produce, they release “staggering quantities of waste and greenhouse gases, polluting our land, air, and water and contributing to climate change” (Factory Farming and the Environment). The purpose of factory farming is to make money and make everyone happy (by keeping them fed). But if they want people to stay happy, they should stop with factory farming. The products of mass production of animals is literally calling people by polluting the air they breathe.
According to the CDC, the number one source of saturated fat in an American’s diet is animal products (Misery for Animals). What saturated fat does is increase the level of cholesterol in blood, therefore increasing the chances of having heart disease or a stroke. This is common knowledge and people are still choosing to consume dairy products. If these people cannot stop eating meat on their own, someone, like the government, needs to step in and make the decision for them. Factory farming needs to be shut down because meat and dairy are a huge part in the reason people are becoming sick and dying. There are a multitude of illness one can get from meat products, such as: salmonella, e. Coli., norovirus, and Listeria. “Each year 76 million Americans become ill from food borne illness, and thousands die” (Factory Farming and Humans). Humans can also contract chronic disease, obesity, and drug resistant bacteria because of these farms. Basically, supporting factory farms is supporting your chances of getting sick.
The welfare of animals is not even worried about in factory farms.
“These animals will never raise their families, root around in the soil, build nests, or do anything that is natural and important to them” (Misery for Animals). All animals want to do is live their natural lives, following their instincts. Being stuck in battery cages, or being in an enclosure so tightly packed with other animals that they cannot move. This is obviously terrible for the animal’s welfare because they cannot live the life they were meant to. Animals is factory farms are cramped together with no room to even move around. “About 10 billion land animals in the United States are raised for dairy, meat, and eggs each year” (Facts about Factory Farming). With this extreme number of animals, there is no way they can be given fair treatment or a happy life. The people who run these farms obviously do not understand that these animals are just confused and scared; they are ruining billions of animals lives and could not care
less.
People might feel to oppose factory farming would be pointless because the industry is so large; just one person would not make a difference. But if just one person does it, it could inspire another person to realize how awful the mass production of animal products is. If these people understand the negative effects, the idea will spread and that first person actually made a difference. Someone else might think “it’s not a big deal because everyone all over the world does it”. Imagine if eating animals like cats or dogs was the norm. You would think that’s awful, right? What’s the difference with a cow? Everyone collectively doing something bad does not make that bad thing okay. If someone is the one person in their community to oppose CAFOs the idea will spread.
Factory farming is arguably one of the most destructive industries because of the effects on the environment, the effects on humans, and the welfare of the animals. Reasons like this are why factory farms are considered CAFOs. The means by which factory farming is conducted and what it produces is truly savage. Not only are these farms murdering the animals within them, they are also murdering the people and environment outside of them. If at least a couple people share their negative opinion on factory farms, hopefully, one day everyone will oppose them.