In a recent radio interview we did with Cris Spinner on WVOX 1460 (you can hear the interview here), a listener asked us to comment on the impacts of the animal agriculture industry. This is potentially an enormous topic of discussion and, unfortunately, the time allotted did not allow for too deep an exploration of this particular subject.

Those familiar with the range of problems associated with the animal agriculture industry could probably readily recite a litany of issues that come quickly to mind. To begin, the way we raise and kill animals destined for our plates is brutal and morally repellent. Most of the meat consumed in this country is sourced from so-called “factory farms” where hundreds and sometimes thousands of animals are confined into spaces so cramped they must stand in their own waste and in some cases can’t even turn around let alone move naturally and express normal animal behaviors such as foraging, establishing social groups, mating and raising young. Based on U.S. Department of Agriculture census figures from 2012, it has been calculated that 99% of farm animals raised and slaughtered in the U.S. country come from such factory farms (source).

Animals in factory farms live in unnatural conditions, are given unnatural food to eat, and are frequently dosed with hormones and antibiotics to keep them alive long enough to slaughter because they become so sick and stressed. The liberal application of antibiotics also promotes an unnatural rate of growth, marginally increasing profits for the farms. Meanwhile, all this overuse of antibiotics in factory farms – in the U.S., about 70% of antibiotics are used for agriculture – is leading to a potential human health catastrophe due to ever evolving strains of bacteria developing resistance through overexposure (source). This reality alone should be sufficient motivation to reduce, or eliminate, meat consumption in protest against cruel and inhumane treatment of innocent animals and the irresponsible use of life-saving medicines.

But there are further problems with this industry. Because of the “efficiencies” created through the concentrated factory farm system, we raise and kill far more animals than is justifiably required to feed all humans (source). And thanks to government agricultural subsidies, the products of these industries will keep getting produced and foisted on the consuming public despite mounting evidence of harmful health consequences of eating so much meat (source) (source) (source). And worse, even though we live in a world where 50 cent hamburgers are available because of the glut of animal flesh in our food system, and even though the average American now consumes 270.7 pounds of meat per year (source) there is still more animal product than we know what to do with. So excess product gets ground into pet food, rendered into cosmetic products and, shockingly, fed back to the factory farm animals, even animals that are herbivores (source) (source). Meanwhile, productive land that could be used to grow crops to feed hungry humans is being used instead to grow feed for the animals in the factory farms.

And consider the resources required to make all those cheap hamburgers: the enormous tracts of land needed to house both the factory farms and all the waste produced by the animals, land and fertilizers required to grow feed for the animals, fuel and other energy inputs needed to transport the feed, the manufacture and transport of antibiotics and hormones to keep the animals alive, transporting animals to the slaughterhouses, then to processing and packaging facilities and finally to your grocery store. This should make clear, by the way, how agricultural subsidies foster the perception of cheap meat production when, in fact, consumers pay much more in “hidden” costs through taxation and healthcare expenses.

A Worldwatch Institute study of the greenhouse gas contributions of the animal agriculture industry concluded that, altogether, the sector contributes a staggering 51 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions (source). Think about that. That is more than transportation, more than the energy sector and everything else, combined!

So, some of these issues may already be familiar to our readers. If not, a great many resources are available online and in very informative books including Michael Pollan’s excellent The Omnivore’s Dilemma and The Sustainability Secret by Kip Andersen and Keegan Kuhn. If you care about animal welfare, the environment, global hunger, your health, and knowing where your food comes from, understanding the industrial agriculture system is critical.

One additional and often overlooked aspect of industrial agriculture practices is how it impacts the health of our water and waterways. To start, animal agriculture is estimated to use up to 76 trillion gallons of water annually. A portion of this is obviously attributable to the fact that animals need to drink water. A typical dairy cow consumes about 30 gallons of water per day (source). In addition, water is needed to grow and process the animals’ feed, to maintain and run farms, clean the animals and their enclosures, and for associated products such as fertilizer for feed crops, production facilities for antibiotics and so on. A Cornell University study showing the U.S. animal agriculture to be a leading consumer of water resources, found that approximately 100,000 liters of water is needed to produce one kilogram of beef compared with only 900 liters for a kilogram of wheat and 500 liters for potatoes (source). To put this another way, it takes about 660 gallons of water just to make a single hamburger, which is about the same amount of water as two months of showers (source).

Water is used for much more than slaking thirst. Most of the water in factory farms is used to grow feed crops, and also to flush waste from animal enclosures and from the animals during the slaughtering process. This water becomes so polluted with manure, which includes antibiotics, hormones and bacteria, that it cannot be reused or recirculated (source).

In the U.S., livestock produce 250,000 pounds of excrement per second – twenty times more than all humans! And while many humans today have access to municipal sewage systems, U.S. livestock operations have no effective waste management or treatment systems, resulting in 1 billion tons annually of unrecycled waste (source).

So what happens to this contaminated water? Industrial farms collect and store contaminated water and manure in gigantic “lagoons.” Unfortunately, these structures typically leak or overflow releasing noxious pollutants that find their way into water supplies. Some farms spray this waste slurry onto farm fields as fertilizer, but because there is far more waste than can be absorbed, much of it often simply runs off into local waterways. In addition to pathogens and bacteria, this waste water can contain pharmaceutical and antibiotic residues, nitrogen and synthetic fertilizers (source).

This contaminated water clearly presents a health hazard for human consumption, but it is also deadly for other creatures, killing aquatic animals and plants and creating “dead zones” in which no fish can live. These “dead zones” form as a result of untreated agricultural runoff (source). One such “dead zone” that is about the size of New Jersey can be found in the Gulf of Mexico. Runoff from all or parts of 31 states (about 41 percent of the contiguous United States) collects in the Mississippi River and flows into the Gulf of Mexico. The U.S. Geological Survey estimates that 70 percent of the excess nitrogen and phosphorus collecting in the Mississippi comes from agricultural runoff (source). These excess nutrients and other fertilizers that find their way into our water systems cause a burst, or “bloom,” of algae. When the algae die and decompose, this sucks up oxygen in the water leaving little for fish and other organisms. The result is a “dead zone” that is devastating for the fish, shellfish, and the ecological and economic health of the waters (source).

A 2006 U.S. Geological Survey report found that over 1,000 documented spills or discharges of manure from livestock operations occurred from 1995 to 1998 just in the Midwestern states. The report states that: “Thirty years after enactment of the Clean Water Act, 40% of our nation’s rivers, lakes, and coastal waters are still considered unfit for fishing, swimming, drinking or aquatic life. The U.S. EPA identified agricultural operations as the primary cause of non-point source pollution in the nation’s impaired rivers and lakes. At least 10% of the nation’s impaired river miles are affected by pollution from livestock operations” (source).

So, in the interest of not belaboring the point (an opportunity that may admittedly have already passed), it is clear that factory farming harms the environment, the animals raised and killed, and the health of humans overconsuming factory farm products. But it is also ruinously devastating in its impact on the health of our water. There is no question we are raising far more animals that is required to feed humanity. This means we are also unnecessarily creating tons of toxic waste that is harmful to the health of the animals, the fields that are sprayed with it, the field workers who must handle it, the groundwater, rivers and lakes that absorb it, and the aquatic life impacted by unnatural additives such as fertilizers, pharmaceuticals and hormones.

We humans are responsible for sending enormous amounts of hazardous and toxic waste into the water we all need to survive. No doubt, we would prefer the water we drink, bathe and swim in to be clean and clear and free of manure, pathogens, antibiotics, and chemical fertilizers. We all need clean and fresh water to survive. On the other hand, there is no biological necessity to consume animal flesh.

So here is a conscious choice every human can make at every mealtime, a way to connect our actions to planetary health and wellbeing. If water were the currency of the day, would you give up two months of showers for one hamburger? Would you choose to divert water, land and other resources for crops to feed livestock and for maintenance of factory farm operations rather than using the same resources to grow food for hungry humans? Would you favor the continued excessive oversupply of cheap animal flesh that our modern factory farms produce over the opportunity to protect clean and healthy waterways for everyone? These choices are available for each of us to make, every day.