Shocking Facts About the Meat
Industry
November 25, 2014
Story
at-a-glance
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Industrial-scale farming has wide-ranging problems,
from deteriorating food quality and increasing
safety hazards, to environmental destruction that
places future growth of food at risk
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One techniques used to perpetuate factory farming is
secrecy
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If you don’t know there’s a problem, you won’t root
for change, and that is exactly why the food
industry is fighting to prevent labeling of
genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in the US
By Dr. Mercola
There are many reasons to switch to grass-fed beef.1
For example, I've discussed the
nutritional differences between organic pastured beef2
and that from animals raised in confined animal feeding operations
(CAFOs) on many occasions.
Here, I will focus more on the current farming model, which is
what makes CAFO beef such an inferior product in the first place,
and the regulatory restrictions that sometimes make grass-fed meats
hard to come by in the US.
Our food system is in dire need of change in order to protect
human health, but it's a system that is difficult to change. It's
not impossible, but it will require more people to change their
shopping habits in order to drive up demand, and hence the
industry's resolve to address the shortcomings.
Multi-Faceted Problems Stemming from Industrial Farming Practices
Industrial-scale farming has wide-ranging problems. Typically,
the focus is on deteriorating food quality and safety. Certainly,
the factory farm model directly contributes to Americans' increasing
reliance on processed
junk foods; the very same foods that are making us obese and
riddled with chronic disease.
Emerging diseases in livestock, wildlife, and humans are also
traceable to industrial farming practices. This includes
antibiotic-resistant diseases, mad cow disease in cows, and chronic
wasting disease (CWD) in deer and elk.
Infectious proteins causing mad cow and CWD have also been
implicated in Alzheimer's disease in humans—the only differentiating
factor being the time it takes for symptoms and death to occur.
According to one estimate, up to 13 percent of all Alzheimer's
victims may actually have
mad cow infection, acquired from eating contaminated CAFO meat.
The USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) also attribute
nearly 133,000 illnesses each year to contaminated chicken parts.
The agency has set a goal to reduce illness by 34 percent.
As for salmonellosis cases, the USDA estimates contaminated
chicken and turkey cause about 200,000 illnesses a year. FSIS' goal
is to reduce that number by at least 25 percent by 2020. Factory
farmed chicken is by far the greatest culprit when it comes to food
poisoning.
Beef is also frequently tainted, and a USDA rule requiring
labeling of mechanically tenderized beef has been under
consideration for six years already, for the fact that the procedure
compresses pathogens from the surface down into the meat, where it
can more easily thrive and survive cooking. Mechanically tenderized
beef has been blamed for at least five E.Coli outbreaks between 2003
and 2009.
But like a multi-headed hydra, the adverse effects of industrial
farming sprout in many other directions as well. For example,
large-scale factory farming is also responsible for:
- Loss of water quality through nitrogen and phosphorus
contamination in rivers, streams, and ground water (which
contributes to "dramatic shifts in aquatic ecosystems and
hypoxic zones")
- Agricultural pesticides also contaminate streams, ground
water, and wells, raising safety concerns to agricultural
workers who use them
- A decline in nutrient density of 43 garden crops (primarily
vegetables), which suggests possible tradeoffs between yield and
nutrient content
- Large emission of greenhouse gases including carbon dioxide
and nitrous oxide
- Negative impact on soil quality through such factors as
erosion, compaction, pesticide application, and excessive
fertilization
Industrial Farming Is Destroying Food Quality
"How do you alert people to the problems of industrial-scale
farming?" a recent article in National Geographic3
asks.
"The issues are urgent, but they are also difficult to
confront: The indifference to animal welfare, the strip-mining
of poor countries' resources to feed the rich, the environmental
damage and antibiotic overuse can be so hard to face that many
people just turn away."
Philip Lymbery, an animal-welfare activist and author of the book
Farmageddon: The True Cost of Cheap Meat, notes that one of
the techniques used to perpetuate factory farming is secrecy.
For example, in Europe, eggs from caged hens are marked "battery
eggs," whereas in the US, those same eggs are labeled as "farm
fresh" or "country fresh."
If you don't know there's a problem, you won't root for change,
and that is exactly why the food industry is fighting tooth and nail
to prevent labeling of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in the
US, as well as legislation that would prevent them from fraudulently
labeling
GMOs as "Natural."
It is imperative for the food and chemical technology industries
that currently monopolize agriculture to keep you in the dark about
how your food is produced.
They've even lobbied for gag laws that make it a felony to video
tape animal cruelty or other heinous activities occurring on factory
farms, lest sympathy start upsetting the proverbial apple cart...
When asked if he's opposed to animal farming for food altogether,
Lymbery replies:4
"This is not, in any way, a call to vegetarianism. This
is a call to put animals back on the farm. Pasture is one of the
most ubiquitous habitats on the planet, covering 25 percent of
the ice-free land surface.
This is about using that ubiquitous habitat to produce
great food in a way which is environmentally friendly and kinder
to animals, leaving much-scarcer arable to grow crops directly
for people...
Three times a day, through our meal choices, we have an
opportunity to change our lives and thereby help change the
world.
It's as simple as buying free-range eggs, pasture-raised
beef and chicken, and looking for milk that has come from cows
that have been able to graze... We'll start to support family
farms, will help to support a better environment, and will help
to feed the world in a more humane and efficient way."
The US Meat Racket
Most all conventional meat and poultry (beef, pork, chicken,
turkey, etc.) is raised in
CAFOs. It's a corporate-controlled system characterized by
large-scale, centralized, low profit-margin production, processing,
and distribution systems.
This is the cheapest way to raise meat, for the largest profits.
But the ultimate price is high, as there's a complete disregard for
human health, the environment, and ethical treatment of animals and
plant workers alike.
A series of recent articles, listed on NewAmerica.org,5
delve into the various aspects of the monopoly that is America's
meat market. In one, titled "The Meat Racket," Christopher Leonard
reveals how the US meat industry has been seized by a mere handful
of companies, and how this tightly controlled monopoly drives small
livestock farmers out of business.
Other articles detail the drugs used in CAFO farming, and the
risks this drug based farming poses to human health. One side effect
is the creation of
antibiotic-resistant superbugs, which I've addressed on numerous
occasions.
Martha Rosenberg also recently highlighted a USDA Inspector
General Report,6
which revealed that beef sold to the public have been found to be
contaminated with a staggering 211 different drug residues, as well
as heavy metals.7,
8
Hazardous growth-promoting drugs like
Zilmax and
Ractopamine are also routinely used in American CAFOs, and as
much as 20 percent of the drug administered may remain in the meat
you buy. Their use is disturbing when you consider that side effects
in cattle include brain lesions, lameness, heart failure, and sudden
death. Salon Magazine also recently ran an article9
on the subject of factory farming, penned by Lindsay Abrams, in
which she discusses journalist Ted Genoways' new book, The
Chain—an expose of the American pork industry. She writes in
part:
"What journalist Christopher Leonard recently did for
Tyson and the chicken industry, Genoways... does for pork,
recounting the history of Hormel Foods... as it evolved from
humble beginnings to an industrial giant with a nearly myopic
focus on expansion and acceleration, regardless of the costs.
And boy, are there costs... a mysterious neurological
disorder linked to a machine that has workers breathing in a
fine mist of pork brains... abuse suffered by the animals on
whom workers' frustrations are instead taken out; and a decline
in food safety that, unbelievably, is set to become the new
industry standard."
Genoways book reveals how societal issues "fan out in all
directions," as he puts it, from the way our pork is produced. Sure,
there are many disturbing safety issues, but it doesn't end there.
According to Genoways, another hidden issue is that many of the
health hazards that affect plant workers affect already exploited
immigrant workers to a disproportionate degree.
Agricultural Subsidies Fleece American Taxpayers to Keep Meat
Monopoly Going
As detailed in a previous article by Food Revolution,10
CAFOs and the products they produce are largely sustained by
American taxpayers. In essence, we're being shrewdly fleeced to keep
this flawed and unhealthy system going. Taxpayer-subsidized grain
prices, for example, save CAFOs billions of dollars each year.
Grass-fed cattle operations, on the other hand, receive no benefit
at all from such agricultural subsidies, and hence the price of
grass-fed beef is markedly higher. But that's not the end of
that story either. As the article explains:
"Federal policies also give CAFOs billions of dollars to
address their pollution problems, which arise because they
confine so many animals, often tens of thousands, in a small
area. Small farmers raising cattle on pasture do not have this
problem in the first place.
If feedlots and other CAFOs were required to pay the
price of handling the animal waste in an environmentally health
manner, if they were made to pay to prevent or to clean
up the pollution they create, they wouldn't be dominating the US
meat industry the way they are today. But instead we have had
farm policies that require the taxpayers to foot the bill.
Such policies have made feedlots and other CAFOs feasible..."
[Emphasis mine]
Why Is Most Grass-Fed Beef Sold in the US Imported?
This is a Flash-based audio
and may not be viewable on mobile devices.
Did you know that most of the grass-fed beef sold in the US is
actually imported from Australia and New Zealand?11
One estimate, which is based off of the USDA's import/export data,12,13,14
suggests as much as 85 percent of grass-fed beef sold in the US may
be imported, although it's virtually impossible to ascertain a
definite number. Some grass-fed beef is also sourced from countries
like Mexico, Nicaragua, Brazil, and Uruguay.15
To many, that will probably come as a big surprise. According to
National Journal,16
the restaurant franchise Chipotle is one of the latest companies to
turn to Australian ranchers to meet demand for grass-fed beef, as
American suppliers are falling short, and/or cannot compete with
Australia's lower prices. In a Huffington Post op-ed published
earlier this summer, Chipotle founder Steve Ells said:17
"Over the years, we have had great success serving the
premium beef we call Responsibly Raised... Nevertheless,
sometimes the existing supply of the premium meats we serve is
unable to meet our growing demand... Rather than serve
conventionally raised steak, we recently began sourcing some
steak from ranches in Southern Australia, which is among the
very best places in the world for raising beef cattle entirely
on grass.
The meat produced by these ranchers is 'grass-fed' in the
truest sense of the term: The cattle spend their entire lives
grazing on pastures or rangelands, eating only grass or
forages... In the short-run, the grass-fed beef purchased from
Australia will continue to supplement the premium Responsibly
Raised beef we have long purchased from across the U.S. But over
time, we hope that our demand for grass-fed beef will help pave
the way for more American ranchers to adopt a grass-fed program,
and in doing so turn grass-fed beef from a niche to a mainstream
product."
Some of the reasons driving the import of grass-fed beef include
the fact that Australia and New Zealand have a climate that permits
grazing year-round. You also need a lot of land to allow herds to
graze, and grasslands are plentiful Down Under. In fact, 70 percent
of all Australian cattle are pasture-raised and finished, and many
of the grass-fed cattle operations are massive. Volume makes it
cheaper, so Australians can sell their meat for less than American
grass-fed cattle ranchers can.18
The question is, is it really "impossible" for American ranchers
to produce enough grass-fed beef? Probably not. Neither climate nor
lack of grasslands is a factor in certain states. However, there is
one factor that severely hobbles American cattle ranchers, and that
is slaughterhouse shortage...
USDA's Stranglehold on American Cattle Ranchers
All farmers must use USDA-approved slaughterhouses, and laws
place special restrictions on grass-fed slaughtering. If a grass-fed
rancher doesn't have access to a slaughterhouse, he cannot stay in
business. This is yet another shrewd if not perverse strategy that
effectively maintains the status quo of CAFOs. Large slaughterhouses
can also refuse smaller jobs, as they—just like CAFOs—operate on
economy of scale. As explained by The Carnivore's Dilemma:19
"At harvest time, small family farmers are forced to
transport their animals to the nearest legal 'processing plant'
that will accept their animals. These plants often do not
conform to the high standards farmers have for their animals'
welfare, but the farmers have no choice. Humane certification
requires humane slaughter, which only some slaughterhouses do.
From an animal welfare standpoint, how animals die is as
important as how they live. So unless the farmer is lucky enough
to have access to an outstanding small slaughterhouse with
transparent policies, they can't get the certification, even if
they did the right thing every day of the animals' lives."
Basically, there may be plenty of demand for grass-fed beef, and
plenty of supply, but USDA rules and regulations prevent the
American-bred supply from ever reaching the customer... Across the
US, smaller slaughterhouses catering to grass-fed ranchers have been
closing up shop, pushed out by larger processors, adding to the
shortage of processing facilities to choose from. A recent article
in the Nutrition Business Journal20
addresses the question of: why are there so few meat processors in
the US?
The answer is complex. Part of the problem is that once
refrigeration came into play in the 1950s, slaughterhouses started
moving from the downtown areas of bigger cities to more rural areas,
from where the meat was then distributed to consumers. Again,
economy of scale made this the less expensive option, once meats
could safely be chilled and boxed. And, since rural slaughterhouses
were no longer constrained by limited amounts of space, they grew
increasingly larger. Eventually, they began to consolidate into
fewer companies.
Today, the market is consolidated in the extreme. Just FOUR
companies, Cargill, Tyson Foods, JBS, and National Beef Packaging
Co, control more than 80 percent of all cattle slaughtered in the
US. As noted in the cited article:21
"The Big Four's grip on the market make everything—from
slaughter to distribution to face-time with stretched-too-thin USDA
inspectors—more problematic for small operations."
Small processing facilities are more costly to run across the
board, compared to large-scale slaughterhouses. They cut everything
by hand, which takes longer, and requires workers with a high degree
of specialized skill. The seasonality of grass-fed beef is another
hurdle. Grass-fed beef is typically slaughtered in the fall, after a
full summer of grazing, whereas CAFO beef doesn't follow that same
seasonal pattern. For a slaughterhouse to stay in business, it needs
business year-round.
Small slaughterhouses also struggle to meet USDA's strict, and
costly, regulations—many of which are geared toward mechanized
plants and not a small-scale hands-on butchery. Adding to the list
of complications are restrictive zoning and eco-impact regulations.
Again, change is needed on many fronts, but I am hopeful that change
will be forced to occur once public demand becomes too overwhelming
to ignore.
Greenwashing Meat Industry Standards
A Global Roundtable on Sustainable Beef (GRSB) recently presented
new "sustainability principles and criteria" for beef production.
The proposal has been vehemently rejected by nearly two dozen
consumer, animal welfare, worker, public health, and environmental
groups. The initiative has the potential to shape the definition of
sustainable beef production around the world. As reported by Common
Dreams:22
"In a
letter23
to the Roundtable's Executive Committee, 23 groups...criticized
the principles and criteria, stating: 'We—and no doubt many
other organizations like us—must overwhelmingly reject the
Principles and Criteria for Global Sustainable Beef. Unless
the GRSB addresses the fundamental flaws outlined in our letter,
the document will represent nothing more than an industry-led
attempt to greenwash conventional beef production at a time when
real, measurable, and verifiable change is so desperately
needed.'"
For starters, the GRSB fails to address the overuse of
antibiotics in farming. Nor does it adequately address workers'
rights, animal welfare, environmental sustainability, waste
management systems, or the establishment of a solid verification
system. The latter leaves the door wide open for greenwashing beef
products that are anything but sustainable. According to Andrew
Gunther, Program Director at Animal Welfare Approved:
"We urgently need to change the way we farm and feed
ourselves, yet the GRSB's Principles and Criteria for
Global Sustainable Beef promises nothing more than 'business
as usual' beef. The collective failure of GRSB members to
acknowledge—let alone address—some of the fundamental faults of
modern intensive beef production reveals a staggering lack of
accountability and foresight at the very heart of the beef
industry, particularly when we know public trust in beef is
already at an all-time low."
Rethink Your Shopping Habits to Protect Your Family's Health
Part of the problem is that the current model is focused on
growth; not steady profit, and certainly not sustainability. I
believe the movement toward sustainable food and ethical meat is
very important, both in terms of human health and animal welfare.
Organic,
grass-fed and finished meat that is humanely raised and
butchered is really about the only type of meat that is
healthy to eat. Many grocery chains are now responding to customer
demand, and will provide at least a small assortment of grass-fed
meats.
If your local grocer still doesn't carry any, go ahead and ask
the purchasing manager to consider adding it. Some stores, like
Publix, will even stock specialty items requested by a single
customer... The least expensive way to obtain authentic grass-fed
beef though is to find a local rancher you can trust, and buy it
directly from the farm. Alternatively, you can now purchase
grass-fed beef from organic ranchers online, if you don't have
access to a local source. The following organizations can also help
you locate farm-fresh foods in your local area that has been raised
in a humane, sustainable manner:
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Local Harvest -- This Web site will help
you find farmers' markets, family farms, and other sources of
sustainably grown food in your area where you can buy produce,
grass-fed meats, and many other goodies.
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Eat Wild: With more than 1,400 pasture-based farms,
Eat Wild's Directory of Farms is one of the most comprehensive
sources for grass-fed meat and dairy products in the United
States and Canada.
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Farmers' Markets -- A national listing of
farmers' markets.
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Eat Well Guide: Wholesome Food from Healthy Animals
-- The Eat Well Guide is a free online directory of sustainably
raised meat, poultry, dairy, and eggs from farms, stores,
restaurants, inns, and hotels, and online outlets in the United
States and Canada.
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FoodRoutes -- The FoodRoutes "Find Good
Food" map can help you connect with local farmers to find the
freshest, tastiest food possible. On their interactive map, you
can find a listing for local farmers, CSAs, and markets near
you.
Copyright 1997- 2014 Dr. Joseph Mercola. All Rights Reserved.
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