Factory farms — large-scale industrial operations that may confine tens of thousands of animals — continue to expand across the United States. Meanwhile, small farms are vanishing, despite what industry marketing may lead consumers to believe.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has just released its 2022 Census of Agriculture, the latest version of data published by the federal agency every five years. Its findings show that the total number of farms nationwide has dropped by seven percent, which may seem on paper to be good news for farmed animals. However, large farms have continued to grow in number and size. Despite there being fewer farms, the number of animals being raised for food in the U.S. has reached 1.7 billion, marking an almost 50 percent increase in the past 20 years.
How can this be? Our food system is increasingly dominated by intensive animal agriculture — by factory farms designed to produce as much meat as possible, cheaply and quickly.
Nearly all animals farmed in the U.S. (99 percent) are raised on factory farms.
The Environmental Protection Agency defines a factory farm (called a large concentrated animal feeding operation or CAFO) mainly by a minimum number of animals being kept there. For example, a large CAFO confines more than 1,000 cattle raised for meat or 700 cows used for dairy. Large CAFOs hold 2,500 or more pigs weighing over 55 pounds.
For egg-laying hens, the number is a staggering 100,000 animals, depending on the type of facility. When it comes to chickens raised for meat, there are at least 125,000 birds in one large CAFO.
Still, some farms far exceed the minimum number of animals. Recent outbreaks of bird flu are a heartbreaking reminder, as some operations with more than one million birds have culled the animals en masse due to the fatal disease. While wild birds have been blamed for the presence of bird flu on poultry farms, it is because of the scale of these intensive farms that so many chickens are in one facility in the first place. It is factory farming that leads to the mass killing of so many animals when just one case of bird flu is detected.
The new USDA census reveals that small farms on less than 10 acres of land account for the biggest decline over the past five years. Large-scale farms make up only four percent of the nation’s farms but “control two-thirds of U.S. agricultural land,” reports The Guardian, which also notes that the number of Black farmers — “forced out of agriculture by decades of discriminatory USDA policies” — has decreased by eight percent since 2017.
The U.S. has seen a 34 percent decline in dairy farms and a 9 percent and 7 percent drop, respectively, for pig farms and those raising cattle for beef, reports The Guardian. Yet, “the livestock numbers stayed more or less constant. That means fewer, but much larger, concentrated lots — which are linked to an array of harms including water and air pollution, poor animal welfare, labor abuses and climate impacts.”
Factory farming serves almost no one. While multibillion-dollar corporations profit, animals, workers, communities, and our environment pay the price.
At Farm Sanctuary, we are building the good for animals, people, and the planet by fighting the harms of animal agriculture.
Each one of the hundreds of rescued farm animals in our care is an ambassador for those still suffering within our food system. With your help, we will continue to save as many animals as we can, bringing many to our sanctuaries and placing others in homes with our trusted Farm Animal Adoption Network partners. We will continue to educate thousands of people on animal agriculture as well as the benefits of a kind and sustainable vegan lifestyle — and advocate for a food system that serves and nourishes us all.
Will you do your part? By choosing plant-based meals, you can protect animals, people, and the planet, too — and you won’t be supporting harmful factory farming.
While the USDA’s latest census is disheartening, through rescue, education, and advocacy, we are working towards a world where slaughter is replaced by sanctuary.
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