Factory Farms

Deregulation Is Turning Oklahoma Into A Factory Farm Sacrifice Zone

January 2, 2024 Ben Felder, In These Times. Educate! Deregulation, Factory Farms, Food and Agriculture, Oklahoma, sacrifice zone

As Barbara Dozhier prepared a ham before the arrival of her great-grandchildren and the rest of her family last Christmas Eve, she prayed for a weather forecast with wind out of the south. A breeze in the opposite direction meant her home four miles outside the east Oklahoma town of Kansas would be overcome with the stench of chicken litter. Ever since a six-building poultry farm opened across the street in 2018 — where 336,000 birds are raised at a time — family gatherings at the Dozhier home have been forced inside. “Sometimes the wind is out of the north and you just hurry up, get in the house and shut your door,” Dozhier said. “At first I was upset all the time but after all these years there is nothing you can do.”

There Is No Fixing This Industry

August 25, 2021 Mike Ferner, Popular Resistance. Educate! Big Ag, Factory Farms, Lake Erie, Water

Ohio - My city sits on the western edge of a body of water that has figured large in the nation’s history, Lake Erie. My wife and I are fortunate to live in the part of Toledo where the lake is literally our front yard. Grade school history classes, consisting mostly of memorizing wars and generals, taught that in the first battle for Lake Erie a small American fleet of wooden ships built in Erie, Pennsylvania, by Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, defeated the British in the War of 1812 and that’s the reason Michigan and Ohio are not the southern boundary of Canada. Later, I witnessed a second battle for Lake Erie in the 1960s and ’70s when outraged citizens demanded industries and cities quit dumping waste and raw sewage that threatened to turn the world’s 11th largest body of fresh water into a thick, fetid stew unable to sustain life.

Lake Erie Advocates Launch Billboard Against ‘Factory Farms’

July 16, 2021 Alexandra Mester, The Blade. Resist! Big Ag, Environment, Factory Farms, Food and Agriculture

Digital ads now showing on electronic billboards across Toledo and elsewhere in the state are part of a local campaign taking aim against concentrated animal feeding operations. Mike Ferner, coordinator for Lake Erie Advocates, said during a news conference Thursday morning the ads showing an iconic photo of a glass of green Lake Erie water and cows and hogs on so-called “factory farms” are meant to provoke discussion. “Nothing happens until we start talking about it, and that’s why we’ve kicked off this campaign to start the conversation about banning factory farms,” Mr. Ferner said. “When enough people demand that, it will happen, thousands of farmers will be able to go back onto the land that they’ve been kicked off of by this industry to produce the meat, milk, and eggs that we need just like they did a mere 20 years ago.”

Smithfield Sued For Misleading Consumers With False Claims Of Superior Safety

May 27, 2020 By Katherine Paul, Organic Consumers Association. Resist! Agribusiness, Factory Farms, Food Safety, Meat

The Organic Consumers Association announced that it has sued Smithfield Foods for falsely advertising Smithfield pork products as the “safest” U.S. pork products. In the complaint, OCA alleges that on numerous occasions, the U.S. Department of Agriculture testing of Smithfield pork has detected pathogens that are “commonly associated with human illness” and resistant to antibiotics. This makes the products far less than the “safest possible” in the U.S., according to OCA. The suit also alleges that many disease strains detected in Smithfield products have been found to be resistant to antibiotics that are designated by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration as “highly important” or even “critically important” for human health. OCA also alleges that Smithfield employs production practices that result in less safe conditions and products, including crowded conditions, the use of potentially carcinogenic drugs and rapid slaughter methods.

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