Pew Commission, 2008
"claims of increased efficiency are often unproven"
"The impacts of industrialized agriculture on rural communities have been monitored since the 1940s with no favorable message for rural communities."
"From this review of more than 40 years of research studies and reports, it is clear that industrialized animal production has adverse impacts on rural communities."
"The findings of the more than 100 studies and reports referred to herein make it clear that whatever benefits might accrue from increases in market power resulting from industrialization are not realized by affected rural communities. "
Some CAFOs increase jobs, but they are usually poor quality jobs
- Not all cafos affect job markets in the same manner. Expansion of dairy cafos seems to contribute to population retention and modest employment generation. Growth of concentrated beef feedlots and poultry cafos seem to be largely unrelated to population retention or employment growth.
- Larger beef feedlots and poultry cafos directly or indirectly generate new low-wage jobs.
- Job growth tends to be concentrated in lower paying jobs
CAFOs divert resources from local communities
- Typically, cafos associated with processors and dominant corporations tend to bypass local communities when purchasing supplies and services (young livestock, feed, veterinary services and medicine, construction materials and services, etc.) and, therefore, do not add economic activity
- They provide their own vets with their own antibiotics, they don't purchase feed from local vendors
- They review literature to show that #pigs CAFO proliferation has been associated with economic decline in Illinois, Michigan, Iowa, and Wisconsin.
- Greater concentration of CAFOs is even associated with greater food stamp use.
- By diverting resources from local communities, any job increases from CAFOs are offset by the decline in jobs and wages that the local area suffers as a result of decreased business from animal agriculture.
CAFOs do not live up to promises because of monopoly capitalism
Production contracts shift economic power from farmers to livestock processors. Success or failure often does not depend upon supply, demand, price, or efficiency, but rather upon whether a livestock processor agrees to continue doing business with the producer.
They make people sick
It is clear that at least 25% of confinement workers suffer from respiratory diseases, including: bronchitis, mucous membrane irritation, asthma-like problems, and acute respiratory distress syndrome.