Editor, Times-Union: Indiana Kitchen, a Japanese owned company, is luring our family and traditional farmers away by telling them they will help them keep their family farm. When a farmer contracts out to this kind of a company, he owns the buildings that he must borrow money to erect. He does not own the pigs, cattle, turkeys, or chickens that he agrees to finish out for this company. He owns all of the manure. He must furnish all of the labor force.
As this farmer moves into a community with his Confined or concentrated animal feeding operation, he causes a lot of ill will, pollution to land water and air and adds to the wear and tear on county and state roads and bridges. In return for the damage he does to the area, he is rewarded with government subsidies for the feed he puts into the animals he has contracted to finish. He gets more than subsidies in that feed. He gets growth hormones and antibiotics. The animal he is finishing only has to be off of the antibiotics for a very short period, before slaughter.
Purdue has a new report out about pollution from CAFOS. Their answer is to put another additive in the feed to help the animals digest the gain more effectively. Then, the chemical pollution should not be as great. Pfizer has an answer to keeping boar taint out of your meat supply with out castration. They have a shot that must be administered to male hogs in in two shots, each. They are using it in Brazil and Australia and some other countries. If this drug is accidentally self injected, it will cause problems in the physiology of both male and female, human reproductive systems. At present, a veterinarian must administer the drug to the male hogs but Pfizer is working to gradually introduce this drug to the United States meat supply. It is very new and how do they know if this is a safe drug to put in meat that will be consumed by humans? If you want to check this report, type in Betty Freese/World Pork Expo.
When agriculture operations become large and concentrated, as with a CAFO, it moves a higher percentage of money from rural communities than when the the industry is dominated by smaller farm operations that tend to circulate money within the community.
