Farming Without the Factory

When many suburban or urban dwellers hear the word "farm" they still think of idyllic scenes of cows munching on grass in the slanting evening light and farmers squatting between rows of strawberries or beans, lovingly tending to their plants and the rich black earth.

But for the vast majority of operations, these scenes couldn't be further from the truth.

Today, most animals, including hogs, cattle and poultry, are raised in confinement operations in which they live in small pens their entire lives. They may never taste a fresh blade of grass; grain is hauled in for them to eat and their waste is hauled out, the manure stored in liquid form in vast stinking lagoons that often leak and contaminate groundwater and rivers with potentially harmful nitrogen.

Animal rights activists tell horror stories of chickens with their beaks cut off, cattle so flaccid from inactivity they can hardly stand and pigs suspended in swirling water for their entire lives, their feet never touching the ground.

While conditions in some of the largest corporate factory farms have indeed been found horrific, even small family farmers who care about the comfort of their animals and feel a connection to their land have for the most part been forced by economics to adopt factory farm-type operations, both with agriculture and livestock. Between recent droughts and other natural challenges, the increasing conglomeration of huge farm corporations and free trade agreements facilitating the importing of crops and meat, family farmers are under pressure to make their operations as economically efficient as possible.

But the economies of scale rule doesn't always necessarily hold true, and many farmers are bucking the trend and finding ways to make organic, healthy and humane farming work.

"We want to raise every animal in a habitat that emphasizes its biological distinctiveness," said Joel Salatin, a second-generation West Virginia farmer and member of the Land Stewardship Project. "There's a reason that a cow has four stomachs, a pig has a plow, a chicken has a beak. It's not meant to be cut off."

Going Organic

In agriculture, the growing popularity of higher-priced organic foods has been a godsend for farmers. Organic berries, vegetables, beans and various other crops can command as much as twice the price of crops grown with pesticides and herbicides, so farmers can afford to turn out less total produce and still make a living if they have organic certification.

A group called the Midwest Food Alliance, a joint project of the Land Stewardship Project and Cooperative Development Services, is among those that promote organic and family-farm-grown products to consumers, and support farmers in their efforts. The alliance offers a handbook about how to get started in organic farming, and also certifies produce as organic, sustainably grown and/or free of certain pesticides. The organization deals with both crops and livestock, certifying that crops were not genetically modified or grown with pesticides, and that livestock was raised without hormones or subtherapeutic antibiotics in a humane environment. The alliance also educates farmers and consumers in sustainable methods that promote conservation of the soil, water and wildlife habitats.

Recent releases from the St. Paul-based alliance note that demand for their certified products is increasing quickly.

"The increase in farmers applying to join the program and products being MWFA-approved, in addition to new consumer research indicating strong interest in environmentally friendly food products, confirms the need for such a program," said Jim Ennis, director of the project, in a release.

Grazing Cows

In livestock some farmers have also discovered that the natural way can be just as profitable as, or even more profitable than, factory farms. Proponents of grazing, rather than confinement, note several benefits. They point out that cows were never intended to eat grain, as they do in confinement. When cows have a grass diet, fresh air and exercise they are notably healthier, and therefore, need fewer antibiotics and medications than animals raised in confinement. They also spread their own manure evenly over fields, essentially self-fertilizing the grass and cutting out the whole labor-intensive and polluting manure storage dilemma.