This post is primarily my review of Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan, for chapter 4, titled The Feedlot.
Pollan unravels a horrifying reality of concentrated animal feeding operations (hereon referred to as a CAFO) that exist throughout the US and globally, with over 21,000 locations existing in the US alone1 . These operations are essentially close confinement animal cities where they’re force fed a mixture of commodity corn (inedible to humans) that is pumped full of pharmaceuticals and various other ingredients to achieve slaughter weight. Here, they live a life of quiet desperation.
He follows his calf, Steer 534, to such a feedlot in Garden City, Kansas known as Poky Feeders and describes his interactions with individuals as well as discusses the environmental and ecological catastrophe that are Wall Street fueled and dominated CAFOs. Firstly, these animals are force fed commodity corn known as type 2 corn that isn’t edible to humans but is processed and broken down into all of the processed ingredients that food corporations refer to as “adding value to their product” outlined in my other post found here. Cows, increasingly farmed fish, hogs, and other animals are force fed this contraption of pharmaceuticals, corn, soy, growth hormones, nutritional supplements, and reportedly even ammonia2. Some of the animals, including cows and fish, aren’t designed to digest corn by the nature of the earth’s caress, but with the pharmaceuticals and other revolting ingredients in their feed, cows are slightly less likely to bloat and die. These cows ultimately have 32 pounds of this concoction stuffed down their throats daily for anywhere from 45 to 300 days before they are killed and consumed by us.
The health implications here are massive, but they fly beneath the radar, masked by controlled narratives. To start, the amount of fecal matter and subsequent fecal dust that blankets the operation and surrounding areas is so grave that asthma rates have spiked dramatically in children3. Increased risks of anemia, COPD, respiratory infection, diabetes, cerebrovascular disease, and kidney disease were also found across the board. Not only this, but the manure lagoons housed by these facilities, which hold up to 10 million gallons of fecal matter, often leak into groundwater and historically overflow when flooding occurs due to increased rates of natural disasters. Lastly, fecal matter coats the animals and is often knee-high or higher in their pens, this causes E.Coli and other infectants to seep into our food supply and introduces us to MRSA, salmonella poisoning, and others. The four major meatpacking companies that slaughter and market beef (JBS, Cargill, Tyson, & National Beef) dominate about 85% of the market. These companies have convinced political leaders, often with hefty donations, that the responsibility of reducing illness exposure from the food supply is through consumer action, rather than corporate duty. Additionally, this inedible corn is mixed with fossil fuels to create synthetic fertilizers, enabling farmers to grow exponentially more corn in recent decades as well as negate the need to rely on nature’s slow but reliable process of sunlight as the basis for energy at the root of global food systems.
Instead insisting to replace sunlight with rapid fossil fuel consumption to provide the mass of nutrients required for humanity’s existence. This swap causes global ecological and environmental decay as fertilizer runoff causes E.coli ridden algae blooms, creates aquatic dead zones upstream or in the ocean (some as large as the state of New Jersey, and growing) and degradation of soil health in Iowa and other midwestern states, as well as globally. For every calorie of food produced for consumers, more caloric energy is consumed many times over to create that tiny spec of nourishment. It is estimated that one 42-gallon barrel of oil is used to generate one calorie of feed energy, this includes the accumulative total all the way from gas consumption of the tractor to plant the seeds, to the processing of the ingredients in the feed, and the trucking supply chains used to deliver products to what economists call the ultimate consumer (IE you or I at the local supermarket)4.
Despite the existence of deplorable conditions worldwide to procure such a debacle, critics argue that the industry is effective, lowering prices on meat for consumers around the globe for decades (with politicians’ using phrases such as “a chicken in every pot” to win political favor5). This may be true, however, I argue these practices post a systemic risk that requires urgent, coordinated, and resource-backed multilateral action to ensure the sustainability and survival of our planet and species. Lastly, taxpayers worldwide contribute to such abhorred cycles by subsidizing farm programs resulting from farm lobbies that set minimum prices for agricultural products regardless of supply (the difference between the market price and the minimum set price is paid by the government with taxpayer money, and the price is set by the farm lobby in working alongside other political institutions such as government). This also feeds the cycle of increasing yield per acre to increase profit, which in turn increases debt incurred by farmers, as well as increases synthetic fertilizer and pesticide consumption and so on and so forth.
To help counteract this classic global example of what economists refer to as capitalism’s unique ability to generate creative destruction, I recommend shopping at local butchers and farmers markets with a locally rooted supply chain. We must come together to practice and demonstrate democracy and show that we will be heard and progress will be made. It is our duty to push humanity in the best direction for the species and for the one planet we have to call home. Individualism, hustle culture, and overwhelming social media distraction have blinded us from the creative destruction that is ruining and evaporating every morsel of natural beauty that surrounds us and is eroding the togetherness that exists between all of us. This is all in the name of superior earnings for Wall Street and institutional investors. Our souls weep alongside the rhythm resulting from demolition of the arts and the rise of STEM programs and the moral bankruptcy seen in countless industries and markets worldwide today. These are the unfortunate consequences resulting from the modern day financial contagion that has perpetrated the agricultural industrial complex among a host of other industries that we will continue to explore on this blog.
Thank you for reading this post! Please feel free to contact me directly at the email below. Additionally, if you’d like to help be part of the movement for change, or take part in the necessary conversations required to achieve these ends, please feel free to join the Discord or subscribe to my YouTube. Let’s make the world a better place one conversation at time! Lastly, communities like EWG are a great place to get involved.
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Contact email: econunpackedinquiry@gmail.com
Sources:
- https://sentientmedia.org/cafo/
- https://www.apha.org/policy-and-advocacy/public-health-policy-briefs/policy-database/2020/01/13/precautionary-moratorium-on-new-and-expanding-concentrated-animal-feeding-operations
- https://overshoot.footprintnetwork.org/fossil/
- https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2730279/
- https://politicaldictionary.com/words/chicken-in-every-pot/
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