KRU GENG·18 มิถุนายน 2016
Concentrated animal feeding operations or CAFOs are factory farms that mass-produce livestock—harming animals, the environment, and humans in the process. It is true that these farming methods provide an abundant source of food and employ thousands of workers across the country. However, there are many drawbacks of this way of farming.
One of the key controversies surrounding factory farms is animal rights. Factory farms raise livestock indoors, as opposed to allowing the animals to graze in fields and pastures. The farmers favor this overcrowded environment because it maximizes profits. Providing less space for the animals costs less money; filling pens to their maximum capacity ensures that no space is wasted. Consequently, animal pens are often so small that larger animals cannot lie down or turn around.
Livestock in CAFOs are often found living in their own urine and feces, stimulating the spread of diseases. For example, avian flu, foot and mouth disease, and mad cow disease spread very quickly among other animals on the farm if one develop the disease. Therefore, farmers must give the animals antibiotics to prevent the diseases. However, the overuse increases the risk of livestock and after the antibiotics are digested, they are released back into the environment in the form of milk, meat, and waste, which can affect the people who eat these products or the environment that absorbs them.
CAFOs also negatively impact the environment in the form of air and water pollution. Factory farms contribute to air pollution issues in the United States through the release of toxic gases and vapors and by burning fossil fuels to run farm machinery. These farms have notable consequences for the environment in terms of water pollution as well.
Another negative environmental impact of factory farms is resource depletion. The production of livestock in CAFOs is a wasteful use of energy. While both chicken meat and soybeans are good sources of protein, producing equivalent amounts of protein from chicken meat and soybeans does not require equivalent amounts of energy: chicken meat production consumes 14 times more energy than soybean production. Grain and energy supplies should be used more efficiently to produce food sources other than livestock.