Making the holidays cruelty free
As families around the country prepare for their holiday dinner, many may want to know how the animals they plan to consume were raised. Was the Christmas ham from a pig that spent most of its life in a gestation cage, a metal enclosure so tight that the animal cannot turn around? Or, was the hen that laid the eggs for their eggnog jammed into a battery cage that restricts her ability to fully open her wings?
Fortunately, with California’s Proposition 12 set to go into effect New Year’s Day, improving the lives of a million pigs and 40 million egg-laying hens every year, we can increasingly be sure that the answers to those questions will be no.
Passed in 2018, Prop. 12 phases out the use of battery cages, gestation crates and veal crates within California and prohibits the sale of products from these unethical practices. Because California consumes about 15% of the nation’s pork and 12% of its eggs and veal, Prop. 12 will force out-of-state pork and egg producers to abide by the law if they want to continue selling in the Golden State.
While an important step in improving the conditions of livestock and farm workers, Prop. 12 still works within a system that gives power to a few major companies at the expense of consumers, farm workers and millions of farm animals. That power structure needs to change.
American opinion is increasingly shifting against the cruel, factory farm systems used to raise animals like egglaying hens, pigs and calves. According to a 2020 national poll conducted on behalf of the American SPCA by Lake Research Partners, 89% of respondents indicated that they were concerned about industrial animal agriculture, citing animal welfare, worker safety and/or public health risks. In addition to California, 13 other states have also passed laws banning extreme confinement, which prevents farm animals from stretching their limbs or even turning around.
But even as measures like Prop. 12 force industrial agriculture to change some of the ways it raises livestock, they miss a key industrial farming practice that must be specifically addressed to enact systemic change: concentrated animal feeding operations.
These industrialized livestock operations where more than 1,000 beef cattle, 700 dairy cows, 2,500 swine weighing more than 55 pounds, 125,000 broiler chickens or 82,000 egg-laying hens or pullets are confined on a site for more than 45 days during the year. According to 2018 data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, there are 20,382 of these operations in the United States. California has 1,083 of them, the fifth highest number of any state after Iowa, Minnesota, North Carolina and Nebraska. California’s Central Valley is a hub of industrial dairy and beef operations, where hundreds of thousands of cows are confined. These operations pollute waterways, degrade air quality and are disproportionately located in economically disadvantaged communities of color. Both dairy and beef cattle production significantly contribute to the state’s greenhouse gas emissions, with manure management and methane emissions from cattle representing two-thirds of agricultural emissions. Recognizing these kinds of impacts, several other states have introduced bills to ban the construction of concentrated feeding operations, although none of them have passed yet.
Advocates of these bills should expect a fight.
A handful of multinational corporations control most of our food supply, to the detriment of animals, farmers, rural communities and the environment. These agricultural monoliths, that care only about cost and efficiency, trap farmers in unfair contracts that limit their ability to make welfare improvements like switching to cageless and crate-free systems. Under these contracts, farmers don’t actually own the animals they raise but must cover the costs of feeding and housing them until they’re ready to go to market, after which farmers receive only a percentage of the profit. The median net farm income for a pig farmer in 2019 was $19,318. In contrast, Smithfield Foods’ parent company reported profits of almost $1.4 billion.
Industrial animal agriculture is staunchly ignoring growing demands for change. The National Pork Producers Council and its allies continue to pursue failed legal challenges to Prop. 12 while warning of bacon shortages and price hikes caused, at least in part, by its own refusal to eliminate gestation crates. Iowa’s U.S. senators, representing the top pork producing state, recently introduced federal legislation to stop California from enforcing Prop. 12.
To achieve the change that’s so desperately needed, we must give the power back to farmers, consumers and affected communities to determine how our food is produced. One tool is the Farm System Reform Act. Introduced in Congress by New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker and Rep. Ro Khanna of Fremont, the act would place a moratorium on the construction of large concentrated feeding operations and phase them out by 2040. It also provides $10 billion annually to help farmers pay off debts and afford improvements like transitioning to pasture-based systems or to leave animal agriculture entirely to grow food crops. In addition, the bill strengthens laws to provide fair treatment of farmers and enables communities to hold industrial producers responsible for the damage they cause.
As Prop. 12 goes into effect next year, there is reason to be hopeful for the creation of a farming system that provides better lives for animals, supports farmers and local economies, and protects the environment. But working within our current consolidated system won’t be enough. Federal legislation is the essential next step to ensuring a better and more just farming system.