Factory Farms in Iowa

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Factory Farms in Iowa

The silos and gentle meadows pictured on the labels of the food most Americans buy have little relation to howthat food is actually produced. The signi cant growth inindustrial-scale, factory-farmed livestock has contributed toa host of environmental, public health, economic and foodsafety problems. Tens of thousands of animals can generatemillions of tons of manure annually, which pollutes waterand air and can have health repercussions on nearby com-

munities. Consumers in distant markets also feel the im-pacts, either through foodborne illness outbreaks or otherpublic health risks, or through the loss of regional food sys-tems. As consumers saw during the 2010 egg recall, foodsafety problems on even a few factory farms can end up ineveryone’s refrigerators. Even the producers are not bene t -ting from this system of production because they are notgetting paid much for the livestock they raise.

The rise of factory farming was no accident. It resulted frompolicy choices driven by big agribusinesses, especiallymeatpackers and processors that dominate the links in thefood chain between livestock producers and consumers.

EggsAlmost all eggs are produced on large-scale operationswith hundreds of thousands of layer hens in each facility.A handful of egg companies produce a large proportion of the eggs most Americans eat. In 2009, the four largest rmsowned 30.2 percent of the laying hens in production. 1 Eggproduction is concentrated in only a few states. Nearly half the hens in 2007 were located in the top ve states . Iowawas the number-one producer of factory-farmed eggs in theUnited States, with more than 52 million layers on the larg-est operations in 2007. The size of average Iowa egg factoryfarms nearly tripled to nearly 1.3 million hens between1997 and 2007, more than double the national average of 614,000.

In the summer of 2010, more than half a billion eggs wererecalled from two large Iowa egg companies after the larg-est salmonella outbreak since the 1970s sickened nearly1,500 people. 2 Wright County Egg, owned by the DeCosterfamily, recalled 380 million eggs, and Hillandale Farms,

O ver the last two decades, small- and medium-scale livestock farms have givenway to factory farms that con ne thousands of cows, hogs and chickens in tightly

packed facilities. In Iowa, there were 17.9 million hogs, 1.18 million beef cattleand 53.5 million chickens on the largest operations in 2007, according to the U.S.Department of Agriculture’s Census of Agriculture. Iowa ranks rst in factory-farmed

egg-laying hens, rst in factory-farmed hogs and fourth in large cattle feedlots.

FOOD

Concentration of factory farms in Iowa, taken from factoryfarmmap.org. Dark red indicates the most severe density.

Total Factory Farm Animals in Iowa

Source: USDA.



which shared a feed and hatchery supplier with WrightCounty Egg, recalled 170 million eggs. 3 Companies con-trolled by the DeCoster family run nine egg con nementfacilities in Wright County, Iowa, with 8.9 million layers. 4 After the recall, U.S. Food and Drug Administration inves-tigators uncovered a host of unsanitary conditions at thefacilities, including y, maggot and rodent infestations andtowering piles of manure.

PorkHog farms have grown dramatically, with thousands of hogs packed into con nement barns. In many regions, hogproducers have few potential buyers for their hogs. Thiseconomic pressure has led many hog producers to “get bigor get out.” 5 The rise of factory hog farms is noteworthy be-cause it happened recently and quickly. In 1992, less thana third of hogs were raised on farms with more than 2,000animals; 6 by 2007, it was 95 percent of hogs. 7 Iowa was thenumber-one producer of factory-farmed hogs in the UnitedStates in 2007, the most recent year for which data is avail-

able. The number of hogs on factory farms in Iowa grew by75 percent between 1997 and 2007, from 10.2 million in1997 to 17.9 million in 2007. There are six times as manyhogs on factory farms as there are people in Iowa.

The tremendous amount of manure produced on hogfactory farms is stored in lagoons and applied oftenover-applied to cropland. Smaller hog operations cansafely apply all the manure to crops as fertilizer, but largeoperations produce so much that some has to be shippedoff-site.8 When lagoons spill or leak or manure is over-applied to farmland, it can run off into local waterways. Inthe upper Midwest, where farmland freezes solid during the

winter, manure applied to frozen elds also quickly runs off into local waters.

BeefOver the past decade, large-scale feedlots that fatten beef cattle prior to slaughter came to dominate the entire cattleindustry. Until the mid-1960s, most feedlots were family-owned operations with fewer than 1,000 head. 9 Now, thelargest beef feedlots nish nearly 16,000 cattle annually.Nearly three-quarters of the nation’s beef comes from theselargest factory-farmed feedlots. 10 As the fourth-largest fac-

tory-farmed beef-producing state, Iowa almost doubled thenumber of cattle on factory feedlots in just ve years (grow -ing by 94 percent) for a total of 1.18 million cattle.

The large number of cattle on these feedlots generateslarge amounts of manure, and feedlots can ood or gen -erate polluted runoff. In 2010, the U.S. EnvironmentalProtection Agency led civil enforcement actions againstthree beef feedlots in Sioux and Mills counties to prevent

unauthorized discharges of manure into local waterways.One of the feedlots agreed to pay a $31,573 ne for its un -authorized manure discharge into Mills County waterways.

DairyIn recent decades, small- and mid-sized dairy farms disap-peared and were replaced by factory-farmed dairies thatnow dominate milk production. Between 1997 and 2007,the United States lost 52,000 dairy farms about 5,000farms every year. 11 The number of cows on factory dairyfarms in Iowa increased tenfold in 10 years, from 6,401 in1997 to 64,531 in 2007. The average size of these opera-tions increased from 800 to almost 1,300.

Small dairies generate less manure than factory farms andcan either apply it to cropland or incorporate it into pas-

0 300,000 600,000 900,000 1,200,000 1,500,000

614,000

1,279,344

The Average Size of a Factory-Farm Egg-LayingOperation

Source: USDA. National Iowa



ture as fertilizer. Big dairies generate far more manure thanthey can use as fertilizer, so it gets stored in lagoons orover-applied to cropland where it can run off into nearbywaterways. In 2010, a 1,200-head dairy in Sioux County,Iowa, paid a $26,288 civil penalty to settle allegations thatit discharged manure waste that owed a quarter mile intoa local waterway without a permit.

PoultryChicken meat comes from billions of chickens raised on

large-scale broiler chicken operations where farmers raisebirds on contract for the few poultry processing companiesthat dominate the industry. The scale of poultry farms hasgrown rapidly as growers try to eke out a living by increas-ing the volume of birds they produce. The average size of U.S. broiler operations rose 7.4 percent between 2002 and2007 to 168,000 birds. The number of factory-farmed broil-er chickens in Iowa increased by a factor of six and a half (550 percent) in 10 years, from 156,000 in 1997 to morethan 1 million in 2007.

Factory farms cause extensive environmental damage andleave communities with fewer independent family farms,unsafe water, reduced air quality and depressed economies.Instead of bene tting, consumers face foodborne illnessoutbreaks and public health threats like antibiotic-resistantbacteria, and fewer real choices about how their food isproduced.

Congress, regulatory agencies and state goverments needto put a stop to the policies that have allowed these facili-ties to proliferate. They must create and enforce farm andfood policies that allow farmers to make a living and do notharm communities, the environment or public health.

Take action: Go to www.factoryfarmmap.org to learn moreabout factory farms in Iowa and to take action to stop thespread of factory farms.

Endnotes1 Dr. Shane, Simon. “2008 Egg Industry Survey.” Watt Egg Industry .

Vol. 114, No. 3. March 2009.2 Martin, Timothy W. Julie Jargon. “In empire of eggs, a dozen opin-

ions.” Wall Street Journal . August 27, 2010.3 Hendee, David. “FDA pushes for passage of stalled inspection bill.”

Omaha World-Herald . August 24, 2010.4 Brasher, Philip and Tony Leys. “DeCosters in Iowa: A checkered

legacy.” Des Moines Register . August 29, 2010.5 Carpenter, Dan. “The high price for Earl’s pearls.” Indianapolis Star .

February 10, 20086 Key, Nigel and William McBride. USDA ERS. “The changing eco-

nomics of U.S. hog production.” ERR-52. December 2007 at 5.7 USDA NASS. 2007 Census of Agriculture. 2009 at Table 20.8 MacDonald, et al. USDA ERS. “Manure Use for Fertilizer and En-

ergy.” Report to Congress. June 2009 at 13.9 MacDonald, James M. and William D. McBride. USDA ERS. “The

Transformation of U.S. Livestock Agriculture: Scale, Ef ciency, andRisks.” EIB-43. January 2009 at 12.

10 Ellis, Shane. Iowa State University. State of the Beef Industry 2008.2009 at 11.

11 USDA NASS. Agricultural Statistics Database. Accessed August 5,2008. Available at http://www.nass.usda.gov/QuickStats; MacDon-ald, James M. and William D. McBride. USDA ERS. “The Transfor-mation of U.S. Livestock Agriculture: Scale, Ef ciency, and Risks.”EIB-43. January 2009; Miller, James J. and Don P. Blayney. USDA,ERS. “Dairy Backgrounder.” (LDP-M-145-01). July 2006 at 7.

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Factory Farms in Iowa