Organic vs Factory Farming: Sick Meat

Do you know the difference between organic farming and factory farming? Organic goes far beyond just “not using chemicals.” It also has to do with the treatment of the animals. Conventional, also known as “factory”, farming uses an overdose of pesticides, chemicals, and antibiotics- as well as the harsh treatment of the animals. Organic farming uses none of these methods. There are many reasons we should abolish the conventional methods and entirely switch to organic farming. Factory farming is among the most harmful things for both our health and the animals’. One of the most shocking situations is the beef industry’s raising of cattle. Factory farming has been used so widely to try mass produce meat quicker and cheaper- but it’s not right. Organic farming is by far superior and can be sustainable and affordable.

The first reason that factory farming is bad is because it is inhumane. These animals are being treated like trash. It is not only “mean”, but it is actually bad for the health of the animals. In a popular documentary “Food, Inc.” we get a gruesome glimpse of these animals are actually treated. The film features Joel Salatin, who at his Polyface Farms in Virginia, is shown raising many of his animals in what most would consider the “old fashioned” way: outside, in small herds, grazing on grass (species appropriate feed.) This is how most people think all animals are raised. They are mistaken. The majority of animals are now, unfortunately, raised by the conventional methods: crammed into tight dark cages, beaten, taken away from their mothers, and fed food they would never eat in their natural habitat.

When animals are fed food they were not made to digest, they become sick. For example: When cows are fed corn, usually genetically modified corn, it makes them sick to their stomach--literally. Cows are actually one of the only creatures that can digest grass and turn into fuel. But, By the time a modern American beef cow is six months old, it has seen its last blade of grass for the rest of its life. As soon as they wean, they spend the first six months out on the pasture with their moms, nursing, nibbling grass. The mom is converting the grass's protein that's turning into milk for the animal, doing the way they've done it for millions of years. They are then taken off grass. They are put in pens, called backgrounding pens, and taught how to eat something that they are not evolved to eat, which is grain, and mostly corn.

Why do they do this? Well, it's a very good question, because it makes absolutely no sense from an ecological standpoint. From a financial standpoint, it does. First of all, corn is much cheaper than grass. And second, this feeding method makes them grow much more quickly. It makes them get fat, and Americans like their meat extra fat and marbled. It allows the farmers to speed up the lifespan. In capitalism, time is money. They are taking cows that they used to let grow to be four or five years old before they are slaughtered, and now they’ve got it down to fourteen months, and heading toward eleven months. Again- one of the problems with this system, is that cows are not evolved to digest corn. It creates all sorts of problems for them. The rumen is designed for grass. And corn is just too rich and starchy. Therefore, as soon as a cow is introduced to corn it creates a number of changes to the animal. Essentially the cow has have to be taught how to eat corn. They teach their bodies to adjust. This is done in something called the backgrounding pen at the ranch, which is kind of the prep school for the feedlot. The cow starts being given antibiotics, because as soon as they are given corn, they’re digestion is disturbed, and of course get sick. Then they have to be given even more drugs because of the sickness.

That's how America has ended up in this whole cycle of drugs and meat. By feeding them what they're not equipped to eat, they head down this path of technological fixes, the first of them antibiotics. Once they start eating the corn, they're more vulnerable. They're stressed, so they're more vulnerable to all the different diseases cows get. But specifically they get bloat. Bloat is just horrible, because they stop ruminating. Rumination is the process of a cow chewing its cud, or “turning it over”, and burping to be able to break it down to digest. They bring down saliva in this process, and it keeps their stomach very base rather than acid. When fed corn, a layer of slime forms over the rumen. The rumen is like a forty five gallon fermentation tank. It's essentially fermenting the grass. Suddenly this slime form, the gas can't escape, and the rumen just expands like a balloon. It's pressing against the lungs and the heart of the cow, and if nothing is done, the animal suffocates. Some cows also get acidosis, which is an acidifying of the rumen, causing bacteria to escape from the rumen into the blood stream, and end up in the liver, creating liver abscesses. Most cows on feedlots eating this rich diet of corn are prone to having their livers damaged. What is done about this? Another antibiotic is administered.

Sadly, some people may not care about the animals’ health, but they probably do care about they’re own. What most consumers are not aware of is that when they consume meat that has been shot full of antiobiotics, they are also consuming those antiobiotics. They don’t magically disappear. Every year in the United States, there are 75 million cases of food poisoning (one in six people) and 5,000 of these cases are fatal. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reports that 70 percent of food poisoning is caused by contaminated animal flesh. The biggest controversy centers around taking antibiotics that are used to treat human illnesses and administering them to food animals. There is an increasing amount of evidence suggesting that the sub-therapeutic use of antibiotics in food animals can pose a health risk to humans. If a group of animals is treated with a certain antibiotic over time, the bacteria living in those animals will become resistant to that drug. According to microbiologist Dr. Glenn Morris, the problem for humans is that if a person ingests the resistant bacteria from improperly cooked meat and becomes ill, he or she may not respond to antibiotic treatment. When someone is resilient to an antibiotic specific to that bacteria, there is no treatment. In one study published in the New England Journal of Medicine on February 6, 2002, researchers found links that strongly suggested that the people who developed Cipro-resistant bacteria had acquired the microorganisms by eating pork that were contaminated with salmonella. The report concluded that salmonella resistant to the antibiotic flouroquine can be spread from swine to humans, and, therefore, the use of flouroquinolones in animals used for food should be prohibited. Another New England Journal of Medicine study from Oct. 18, 2001, found that 20 percent of ground meat obtained in supermarkets contained salmonella. Of that 20 percent that was contaminated with salmonella, 84 percent was resistant to at least one form of antibiotic. In the end, sick meat equals sick people. When buying organic meat, you are eliminating the risk of contamination. Paying a little more now, could save you a lot in a doctor’s bill later. Thirdly, factory farming is ecologically harmful; that is, it is bad for the environment. Factory farming accounts for 37 percent of methane (CH4) emissions. Methane has more than 20 times the global warming potential of CO2. The use of fossil fuels on farms to grow feed and to intensively raise land animals for food emits 90 million tons of CO2 worldwide every year. While corn may be cheap, it requires more nitrogen fertilizer than any other crop, and more than half the corn in the world is fed to animals. Factory farms contribute to air pollution by releasing compounds such as hydrogen sulfide, ammonia, and methane. According to a study done by the Environmental Integrity Project, some factory farm test sites in the U.S. registered pollution emission levels well above Clean Air Act health-based limits. In 2004, the EPA estimated that 20 percent of all man-made methane production resulted from livestock digestion, primarily cows. Low quality corn feed, which again the cows’ bodies are not designed to digest, leads to chronic indigestion which produces excess flatulism, contributing to high methane emissions. Another cause of pollution is excess manure. To put the problem into perspective, take the pork industry, for example. A typical 200 pound pig produces approximately 13 pounds of manure a day. With 100 million pigs in factory farms in the U.S., that amounts to 650,000 tons of manure produced PER DAY in the pork industry alone! The EPA has estimated that all confined animals generate 3 times more raw waste than is generated by humans in the U.S.The waste lagoons on Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) not only pollute our groundwater, but deplete it as well. Many of the farms use the groundwater for cleaning, cooling, and drinking. Organic farmers have a much smaller impact on the environment, because they use much less energy. Switching to organic farming can help alleviate this damage. There are a few reasons why some may say that organic farming is not superior. Some people argue that organic farming is simply just not sustainable. Their argument is that because a mass number of animals cannot be raised fast enough, we can’t produce enough food to support the population. That is wrong. Organic farming is sustainable over the long term. Organic agriculture considers the medium- and long-term effect of agricultural interventions on the eco system. It aims to produce food while establishing an ecological balance to prevent soil fertility or pest problems. Organic agriculture takes a proactive approach as opposed to treating problems after they emerge. In many conventional agriculture areas, pollution of groundwater courses with synthetic fertilizers and pesticides is a major problem. As the use of these is prohibited in organic agriculture, they are replaced by organic fertilizers (e.g. compost, animal manure, green manure) and through the use of greater biodiversity, enhancing soil structure and water infiltration. Well-managed organic systems with better nutrient retentive abilities, greatly reduce the risk of groundwater pollution. These methods require more skill than the conventional ways. While, yes, organic farming is more time and labor intensive, it saves a lot of future damage. Another argument is that Organics are not treated with preservatives, waxes or other chemicals. This may reduce their shelf life and allow for faster spoilage. Skeptics say this can be a problem for both consumers and stores, especially if the foods have to be transported a significant distance. This is true. Less preservatives mean less shelf time. How is this a bad thing? Don’t most people want fresh meat? The meat should not be able sit on a shelf for weeks. That’s just unnatural.As far as the transportation argument goes-- if there are more organic farms (where the meat can’t be shipped too far) people will have to buy more locally raised meat. This is better for the consumers as well as supports the local farmers. Overall, the pros outweigh the cons when it comes to local farming. There needs to be more awareness in how our meat industry works. As in many aspects of life, sometimes investing more time and money now pays off in the long run.

Work Cited:

Interview with Micheal Pollan of Food, Inc.- Modern Meat

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/meat/interviews/pollan.html

Definitions:

http://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/ruminate

Is your Meat Safe? Antiobiotic Debate Overview- Modern Meat

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/meat/safe/overview.html

Meat Contamination

http://www.peta.org/living/food/meat-contamination/

11 Facts About How Factory Farms Affect The Enviroment

https://www.dosomething.org/tipsandtools/11-facts-about-factory-farms-and-environment

Enviromental Effects of Factory Farming

http://www.stopfactoryfarms.org/environmental-effects-of-factory-farming/

What are the environmental benefits of organic agriculture?

http://www.fao.org/organicag/oa-faq/oa-faq6/en/