Donald Stull & Michael Broadway (Ch. 4, Slaughterhouse Blues )

1. Hog Heaven: The Pork Industry Donald Stull & Michael Broadway (Ch. 4, Slaughterhouse Blues)

2. Road to Porkopolis • Pigs used to run free on family farms & scavenge for wild roots, vegetables, grasses • Hogs were the major meat source for Americans from colonial times until the 1950s (when beef overtook pork) • Piglet gains 1 lb. for every 3-5 lbs. feed & produces a litter of 10 (gestation = 4 mo.), is ready for market in 6 mos. • Calf gains 1 lb. for 10 lbs. feed & produces a single calf (9 mo. gestation) & is ready for market in 12 mos.

3. “Queen City of the West” • Cincinnati’s 1st meatpacking plant opened in 1818 • Dominated pork packing until the Civil War • 1844 Porkopolis boasted 26 packinghouses • 1854 42 packinghouses

4. “Hog Killing Time” • Hogs slaughtered fall/winter—no refrigeration • Winter was the farmers’ ice box, thus meatpacking was seasonal until refrigeration developed after the Civil War • Hogs were cleaned & gutted, cooled, cut up, salted & soaked in brine or vinegar • Entrails dumped into the Ohio River

5. Pork Markets • Pork was exported to Caribbean & Europe • 10% of U.S. foreign trade in late 1870s • 1880 Europe banned U.S. pork due to fear of trichinosis • Exports resumed when the government introduced meat inspection in 1890 • But meat for U.S. consumers was not inspected for 10 more years

6. Hog Heaven or Hell? • For family farmers hog production was an easy way to earn cash • Hog nickname – “mortgage burner” • But by 1990-2000, family farmers were being replaced by CAFOs • $5 million investment in contract production would generate 40-50 new jobs • But 120-150 family farmers were displaced

7. Luring CAFOs • Hog production began to shift from corn belt states to North Carolina, Oklahoma, & Utah • North Carolina Dept. of Agriculture & NC State University identified swine production as a desireable replacement for tobacco • State government provided research funds, gave tax incentives, hog farms were exempt from zoning & minimum wage regulations, workers were banned from organizing unions

8. Environmental racism • 2514 swine CAFOS in North Carolina were disproportionately located in poor, nonwhite communities that depend on local wells for water supply • Hurricane Floyd (1999) caused flood waters to overrun hog farms, inundating 46 lagoons, polluting water systems

9. Conflict Over CAFOs • Proponents: the system is driven by consumer preference for uniform low-cost pork • Critics: Superior feed conversion is only possible due to antibiotics, nutritional supplements, & the stress hogs experience in confinement leads to lower feed conversion

10. A sign at the entrance to three hog barns at one of the Ham Hill Farms sites warns visitors that the site is a "biosecure protection area." • A virus introduced into a CAFO can spread quickly

11. Raising Hogs • In CAFOs, 100 hogs of similar weight are in a room, each in a metal stall, with no room to turn around • In the nursery, sows occasionally smother & crush their offspring • Male semen is collected to inseminate sows who produce 2 litters of 10-12 piglets/year • New litters have their ears notched (for I.D.), tails clipped, teeth filed • They will bite others’ tails, causing infection that can spread • As hogs grow, they are sequentially moved to larger rooms until they reach slaughter weight of 250 lbs.

13. Pig Essense • Pigs don’t sweat (no sweat glands) • When they are deprived of mud holes or shelter & temperatures exceed 860, they wallow in their own feces & urine to avoid heat stroke • Feces & urine are pumped into lagoons or are used as compost • A hog produces 1.5 tons of solid manure & 5270 gal. of liquid manure/year

14. Swine CAFO

15. Manure Holding Pond • Waste samples being collected from a swine manure holding pond in Iowa

16. Hog lagoons emit ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, 100s of volatile organic compounds, dust, endotoxins (cause respiratory dysfunctions in workers) into the air

17. Miss Piggy’s New Frontiers • As North Carolina mandated cleanup & conversion to cleaner technologies, CAFOs began to relocate • Manitoba’s agricultural minister proposed doubling pork production • Offered an “open market” system allowing processors to contract with individuals, waived clean environment commission hearings

18. North Carolina 1982-97: • farms under 100 hogs: 9149 1239 • farms over 1000 hogs: 458 1466 • Maple Leaf Foods (Canadian transnational) • 2000 workers • Slaughter 15,000 hogs/day

19. O-o-o-Oklahoma!(Big pig invades “cattle feeding capital of the world”) • Oklahoma lured hog production • Gave land, tax incentives, sales tax, highway improvements • Seaboard Corporation (transnational) • Slaughters 16,000 hogs/day • Contract farms construct 3 confinement buildings @ $500,000 on10-year contracts • 91% of workers earn under $25,000

20. Seaboard provides 2800 jobs • 9 of 10 workers are Hispanic • Hispanic population tripled • 12% in 1990 to 38% in 2000 • Meatpacking work involves an annual turnover rate of 98% • # Families in poverty increased • Lack of housing at affordable rate • Lack of health care • Many who came can not afford to live there