Category Archives: Agriculture

INDUSTRIAL AGRICULTURE: Air pollution from hog farms linked to illnesses

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A University of North Carolina study has tied air pollution that is emitted by hog farms to illnesses of people that live nearby. Via North Carolina Public Radio:

Epidemiologist Steve Wing from the Gillings School of Global Public Health placed air pollution monitors in communities surrounded by large hog farms. He says one of the most important gasses he measured is hydrogen sulfide. The rotten egg smelling gas is known to be toxic to the nervous and the respiratory systems.  Wing also asked residents to keep diaries of their symptoms.

Steve Wing: What we found in our research was that as the levels of hydrogen sulfide went up, the reporting of symptoms and problems with quality of life and actual stress levels, that all of those responses went higher in proportion to the amount of hydrogen sulfide in the air, in the community …

Wing says other pollutants get into the air when farmers spray hog waste onto fields, and when they ventilate large barns containing hundreds of hogs.

On the Net:

  1. Air Pollution, Lung Function, and Physical Symptoms in Communities Near Concentrated Swine Feeding Operations
  2. Environmental Justice Case Study: Hog Farming in North Carolina

ACID RAIN is increasing

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Image via numbphoto – Color mad on Flickr

Acid rain is an environmental problem, because it destroys forests and aquatic ecosystems. More from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency:

Acid rain causes acidification of lakes and streams and contributes to the damage of trees at high elevations (for example, red spruce trees above 2,000 feet) and many sensitive forest soils. In addition, acid rain accelerates the decay of building materials and paints, including irreplaceable buildings, statues, and sculptures that are part of our nation’s cultural heritage. Prior to falling to the earth, sulfur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen oxide (NOx) gases and their particulate matter derivatives—sulfates and nitrates—contribute to visibility degradation and harm public health.

Emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides from utilities contribute to the problem of acid rain. However, emissions trading or cap and trade, a market-based regulatory program, which is also “a program within the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments,” was successful in reducing these pollutants. As a result, the Acid Rain Program was successful in reducing acid rain. However, an increase in other types of anthropogenic activities is contributing to the problem of acid rain. For example, industrial agriculture operations, such as concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, also contribute to acid rain. Other factors for the return of acid rain include agricultural nitrogen runoff and more vehicles, which are displacing the gains made from the introduction of the catalytic converter. More from Scientific American:

The acid rain scourge of the ’70s and ’80s that killed trees and fish and even dissolved parts of statues on Washington, D.C.’s National Mall is back. But unlike the first round, in which sulfur emissions from power plants mixed with rain to create sulfuric acid, the current problem stems primarily from nitrogen emissions mixed with rain to create nitric acid.

.       .       .

Sulfur emissions from power plants were one of the primary motivations for the U.S.’s Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, which set reduction targets for both sulfur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen oxides (NOx). However, whereas sulfur dioxide emissions decreased almost 70 percent from 1990 to 2008, emissions of one NOx—nitrogen dioxide (NO2)—went down only 35 percent for that same period, and amendment targets have yet to be made, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). “This comes as scientists have grown increasingly aware of the consequences of the remaining nitric acid deposition,” Schlesinger says.

.       .       .

Nitric acid rain is derived primarily from power plant, car and truck emissions as well as from gases released by fertilizer use. Part of the problem dates back to WWI, when two German scientists invented the Haber–Bosch process, which took nonreactive nitrogen from the air (N2) and converted it into reactive, usable ammonia (NH3). Most of the nitrogen harvested via this process has been used in fertilizers, and the runoff from farms has created dead zones in Chesapeake Bay and at the mouths of the Columbia and Mississippi rivers. Some efforts have been made to regulate the agricultural nitrogen runoff, but atmospheric emissions of agricultural ammonia remain virtually unrestricted.

Agri-ammonia vapors also derive from concentrated animal feeding operations in the U.S. South. The gas rises into the air and is deposited dry or in rainfall where in the ground bacteria breaks it into nitrogen and nitric acid, which can kill fish and plants. “Agriculture is increasingly functioning as an intensively managed industrial operation, and that is creating serious water, soil, and air problems,” says Viney Aneja, a professor at North Carolina State University in Raleigh. Aneja says that state’s concentrated animal feeding operations may also emit particulate matter from swine and chicken manure into the atmosphere, which can carry diseases.

NOx escapes from power plants as a by-product of coal combustion, whereas vehicular engines run at high enough pressures and temperatures to combine nitrogen and oxygen in the air. “Though catalytic converters have decreased the amount of pollution per vehicle, there are more vehicles on the road and more miles driven,” Schlesinger says. Emissions from fertilizers are the chief source of atmospheric nitric oxide, but motor vehicles have now overtaken coal power plants as the secondary most critical source of this problem.

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COLONY COLLAPSE DISORDER increasing costs for farmers

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Colony collapse disorder or CCD occurs when a bee colony collapses or fails due to the sudden disappearance of its worker bees. Bee colonies may be destroyed or may withdraw from a hive for a number of reasons. For example, Varroa mite infestations can be particularly destructive. However, the exact cause of CCD or “the mass disappearance of worker honey bees” is unknown. There are several theories to explain what’s causing CCD, but it probably results from a combination of factors. Though, there may be one or two factors—probably resulting from anthropogenic activities—which play a more prominent role in the manifestation of CCD. For instance, according to the Daily Green, bee frames, which house the honey, pollen, bee larva, and unhatched bee eggs, have “to be replaced every 2 or 3 years because of the agricultural toxins that build up inside.” More from the Washington Times:

The prevailing theory on the cause of CCD includes several factors. The three main suspects of CCD are: viruses, stress and pesticides. When joined together these factors may create the deadly disease, researchers say.

As a result of the increasing scarcity of bees and beekeepers, the cost of bee rental has skyrocketed. Farmers rent beehives to increase pollination thus crop productivity, so bees do more than just make honey—they’re important pollinators as well. According to estimates from a Cornell University study, “Nearly one-third of U.S. agriculture depends on the 2.4 million bee colonies for big crop production, where they annually pollinate $14 billion worth of seeds and crops.” More from Economist.com:

Since 2006, however, bees have been suffering from “colony collapse disorder” (CCD), a mysterious affliction that has drastically reduced their numbers. As a result, says Joe MacIlvaine, the president of Paramount Farming and the largest almond-grower in the world, the rental cost of a hive has tripled in the past five years to about $150. Bee rental now accounts for 15% of Paramount’s costs.

So Paramount has hired Mr Wardell, who has been studying bees for 30 years and CCD since it broke out. Its cause may be mobile-telephony radiation, viruses, fungi, mites and pesticides—or none of the above. In the absence of a clear explanation, Mr Wardell is concentrating on something different: nutrition.

A healthy worker bee spends about four weeks in its hive, feeding on protein-rich pollen and nursing larvae, and then another two weeks in the field eating sugary honey until its proteins are depleted and it dies. For some reason bees are getting too little protein in the hive, thus dying after only about four weeks, almost as soon as they venture outside. So Mr Wardell is force-feeding them protein. He owns a patent for MegaBee, which he says “looks like cookie dough”. He puts a bit of this into the hives, blocking the bees’ entrance so that they have to chomp their way through it. As part of his new job, Mr Wardell is working with beekeepers across the country to supplement bee diets everywhere.

So far he has noticed that hives are smaller this year and some colonies still collapsing. But he has hopes that his cookies will work, bringing more of a buzz next year.

In addition to nutritional issues, current research into a solution for CCD is focusing on breeding disease-resistant bees. From the Washington Times:

Through the growing science of genomics – the science of looking at molecular information in DNA – Mr. Delaplane’s science team will select a super-resistant bee that is able to naturally combat CCD and a culprit in this disorder: varroa mites.

First, “We’re going to be identifying bees that are resistant to XYZ” diseases, he said. Then, “We will be able to genetically mark these lines.”

The technique of marking and using favorable genetic traits is now done in the animal and plant industry, but marking a natural trait is different than engineering a change.

“We have no plan for doing [genetic] engineered selections,” Mr. Delaplane said. “We’re going to be screening for natural resistance.”

Afterward, Mr. Delaplane’s team will take those disease-resistant bees and breed more of them. Here science is guiding the process of natural selection.

Once the genetically strong bees are developed in the laboratory, they will be shipped to commercial bee breeders. The breeders, in turn, will mass produce them and flood the market with disease-resistant bees to beekeepers across the country. CCD may still be around, but the superbee’s immune system will effectively combat it.

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Photo source for attribution here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. The authors or licensors of these images do not endorse my work or me and their images are protected under an attribution license. The bee graphic is via The New York Times.

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TOXIC CHEMICALS: Big Agriculture and big coal are big polluters, and their policies are having a big impact on our environment and health

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Big Ag is a big polluter

Industrial agriculture has the ability to supply large amounts of food on the cheap. However, cheap food comes with consequences. For starters, the process is resource and energy intensive, and it leaves behind a footprint on the environment and our health. For example, pesticides applied to fruit orchards and vegetable fields leach from the area of application into the landscape, negatively impacting ecosystems. These chemicals also remain as residue on fruits and vegetables. Consequently, in addition to getting the recommended daily servings of fruits and vegetables (and depending on our choices, which are based on how cognizant we are of where our food originates) we might be ingesting herbicides and pesticides on a daily basis. Consequently, sometimes it’s better to buy organic (i.e., “because ‘organic’ can mean ‘pricey,’ it makes sense to focus on buying organic versions of produce that is most likely to harbor pesticide residues when grown conventionally“).

Toxic chemicals leach into foods via the plastic lining of metal cans

Some “canned foods, including soups, juice, tuna, and green beans” have been found to “contain measurable levels of Bisphenol A (BPA).” BPA has also been found in baby bottles and baby food, and research has linked the chemical to a multitude of health problems. However, it’s possible to avoid plastics containing BPA:

BPA is found in polycarbonate plastic food containers often marked on the bottom with the letters “PC” recycling label #7. Not all #7 labeled products are polycarbonate but this is a reasonable guideline for a category of plastics to avoid. Polycarbonate plastics are rigid and transparent and used for sippy cups, baby bottles, food storage, and water bottles. Some polycarbonate water bottles are marketed as ‘non-leaching’ for minimizing plastic taste or odor, however there is still a possibility that trace amounts of BPA will migrate from these containers, particularly if used to heat liquids.

Safer products and uses: When possible it is best to avoid #7 plastics, especially for children’s food. Plastics with the recycling labels #1, #2 and #4 on the bottom are safer choices and do not contain BPA. Find baby bottles in glass versions, or those made from the safer plastics including polyamine, polypropylene and polyethylene. Soft or cloudy-colored plastic does not contain BPA. Bottles used to pump and store expressed breast milk by the brand Medela are also labeled BPA-free.

In addition to a wide range of health problems, research suggests that BPA impacts human reproduction. From Nature.com:

A paper in the journal Human Reproduction adds weight to a long-held (by some) suspicion that the plasticising chemical bisphenol A (BPA) does bad things to the body’s hormone balance.

In this study, male workers in Chinese factories handling BPA were compared to a control group of Chinese factory workers who weren’t exposed to BPA over five years.

The results showed that the workers in the factories handling BPA had four times the risk of erectile dysfunction, and seven times more risk of ejaculation difficulty (press release).

This stark conclusion is the first direct evidence that exposure to BPA in the workplace could have bad health effects, the authors led by De-Kun Li, a reproductive and perinatal epidemiologist at Kaiser Permanente’s Division of Research in Oakland, California.

For years BPA has been associated with a range of health problems, from cancer to diabetes and heart disease.

The suspicion was that BPA was an endocrine disruptor – a substance that mucks up the way hormones in the body, including sexual reproduction hormones – are made and regulated. This study, the authors say, provides the evidence that the US regulators have been after for years. They add that the levels in this study were very high – nothing like the levels people are normally exposed to in everyday life.

The chemical is already regulated. In Canada, for example, BPA is banned in baby bottle manufacture, and in France earlier this year members of the senate sought a ban on BPA. Of course, there is also perhaps a need for caution – don’t be terrified, not all plastics used in baby products or drinks bottles contain BPA, and no links between low exposure levels and adverse health effects have been found. In the US at least, it seems that it is easy to check whether BPA is present: there should be a number 7 printed on any bottle that contains the stuff.

More information on BPA, our food, and our health can be found in these videos:

Video: Bisphenol A (BPA) Contaminating Our Food

Video: BPA risk to men

Video: Call for ban on baby bottle chemical

Big Coal emits a deadly neurotoxin that accumulates within the environment

Invisible toxins are emitted through energy production when fossil fuels such as coal are burned. For example, when coal is burned, mercury—a neurotoxin—is released “into the environment, [and] coal-burning power plants are the largest human-caused source of mercury emissions to the air in the United States, accounting for over 40 percent of all domestic human-caused mercury emissions.” Mercury is converted by natural processes into methylmercury, which accumulates in the food chain. Consequently, our food becomes contaminated with a nerotoxin, which can make people sick.

A toxic soup

There’s no doubt that chemicals and toxins from agriculture, burning fossil fuels, and other industrial processes are negatively impacting our bodies and minds and even resulting in death by triggering diseases such as cancer. “Toxic Soup,” a documentary, “connects the current spikes in childhood cancer, autism, and other serious illnesses with the business practices of Fortune 500 companies: DuPont, Bayer, Ashland Oil, and Massey Energy.” More on the documentary:

‘Toxic Soup’ is a look at the lives of everyday Americans who discover pollution in their backyards and decide to fight for the clean air, water & blood that we all deserve. And it’s David versus Goliath as this enviro documentary follows a team of investigators who explore three industries critical to the growth of US superpower. Coal gave us electricity; Oil gave us the automobile; And chemistry everything in between. But at what price

The trailer for “Toxic Soup”:

To illustrate the stealthy toxic soup we’re exposed to via industrial practices, one study tested the blood and urine of pregnant mothers, and the “study reveal[ed] that children spend their first nine months in an environment that exposes them to known toxic chemicals.” More from Consumer Affairs:

In the WTC study, researchers tested pregnant women from Washington, California, and Oregon and discovered:

• Every woman was exposed to BPA, the hormone disrupting chemical used to make polycarbonate plastic and the lining for food cans. BPA is linked to cancer, early puberty, diabetes, obesity, and reproductive problems, researchers said;

• Each woman had at least two and as many as four “Teflon chemicals,” or perfluorinated compounds, in her blood. Those chemicals are used to create stain-protection products and non-stick cookware and are linked to low birth weight, obesity, and cancer, the groups said.

• Every woman had mercury in her blood. Mercury is known to harm brain development, researchers said. The National Academy of Sciences has also reported that 60,000 children each year may suffer brain problems as a result of exposure to mercury in the womb. This exposure can affect their ability to play and learn.

• Every woman was exposed to at least four phthalates, the plasticizers and fragrance carriers found in shower curtains, shampoo, soaps and other consumer products. Phthalates are linked to reproductive problems and asthma.

The findings shocked and angered women in the study.

There are alternatives to industrial agriculture, fossil fuels, and toxic chemicals such as (1) permaculture or other (2) sustainable farming methods, (3) renewable energy and energy conservation, (4) decentralized energy production, and (5) green chemistry.

Resources:

  1. Bisphenol A: Toxic Plastics Chemical in Canned Food: Consumer tips to avoid BPA exposure
  2. A Survey of Bisphenol A in U.S. Canned Foods
  3. Mercury: Basic Information
  4. EPA’s Mercury News Archive
  5. Green chemistry
  6. Introduction to Permaculture: Concepts and Resources

Photo source for attribution here, here, and here. The authors or licensors of these images do not endorse my work or me and their images are protected under an attribution license.

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INDUSTRIAL FARM ANIMAL PRODUCTION: The cost of corn-fed cattle

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Cattle fed on a heavy diet of corn will eventually become sick and die. Via a transcript from Fresh Air with Terry Gross (emphasis added):

GROSS: Let’s get back to the cow’s stomach.

Mr. POLLAN: Yeah.

GROSS: So the cow now is eating corn instead of eating grass. Its stomach is made for digesting grass and turning it into protein. How does the cow’s digestive system handle corn?

Mr. POLLAN: Well, very poorly. It’ll go kablooey if it’s not done very gradually. And I talked to people who said that most cows, most beef cattle getting a heavy diet of corn–and again, they can tolerate some of it, but when you crank it up to 70, 80, 90 percent grain, their stomachs go haywire. They suffer from a range of different phenomenon, one of which is bloat.

You know, the rumen, this organ, is always producing copious amounts of gas, and these are expelled during rumination, you know, when the animal kind of chews its cud. It regurgitates this bolus of grass and in the process releases all this greenhouse gas, essentially methane and things because when you’re digesting grass much gas is produced. But when they’re eating corn, this layer of slime forms over the mass in the rumen, and it doesn’t allow the gas to escape. So what happens is the rumen begins to expand like a balloon until it’s pressing up against the lungs of the animal. And if nothing is done to release the pressure of that gas, the animal suffocates. It can’t breathe anymore. So what do they do? Well, if it gets to that point, they force a hose down the esophagus of the animal, and that releases the gas, and they very quickly put them back on hay for a little while.

So that’s one of the things that can go wrong. Well, perhaps the most dramatic. But a whole other range of problems are created because the corn acidifies the rumen. The rumen has basically a neutral pH when it’s healthy and getting grass, and that’s very significant for a lot of reasons. But you feed it corn and it gets a lot more acidic. And the rumen can’t deal with acids, and what happens is the acids gradually eat away at the wall of the rumen, creating little lesions or ulcers through which bacteria can pass. And the bacteria get into the bloodstream and travel down to the liver, which collects all such impurities, and infects the liver. And that is why more than 13 percent of the animals slaughtered in this country are found to have abscessed livers that have to be thrown away and is a sign of disease.

But this low-level sickness, acidosis or even subacute acidosis, as they call it, afflicts many, many–probably the majority–of feedlot calves, and it leaves them vulnerable to all sorts of other diseases. Their immune systems are compromised. So they get this, you know, horrifying list of feedlot diseases. You know, we have these diseases of civilization, you know, heart disease and such things. Well, they have their own diseases of civilization: feedlot polio, abscessed livers, rumenitis, all these kinds of things that cows in nature simply don’t get.

GROSS: Is this where the antibiotics come in?

Mr. POLLAN: Yeah. The only way you can keep a cow alive getting this much corn would be with antibiotics. And they get large quantities of antibiotics with their feed every day. They get rumensin, which is technically an ionophore. It’s a kind of antibiotic that helps with the bloat and the acidosis. And then they get tylosin, which is in the erythromycin family. And that antibiotic cuts down on the incidence of liver disease, and without that, they would all have liver disease probably.

So, you know, when people debate antibiotics in livestock, which is a very, you know, important issue, and it’s before the Congress right now, they make this easy distinction between feeding animals antibiotics to promote growth, which is done in the chicken industry and the pig industry, and then feeding them when they’re sick, which even the public health advocates against using antibiotics in livestock say, ‘Of course it’s fine. You must treat sick animals.’ But where do you put the beef calf who is clearly getting these antibiotics to cure him? On the other hand, he wouldn’t be sick if we weren’t feeding him what we feed him? So it kind of confounds the usual distinction. If you took away these antibiotics, everything would have to change.

GROSS: Michael Pollan’s article on the beef industry was published in Sunday’s New York Times Magazine. His book, “The Botany of Desire,” will be published in paperback next month. We’ll talk more about the beef industry in the second half of the show. I’m Terry Gross, and this is FRESH AIR.

(Announcements)

GROSS: Coming up, the consequences of feeding cattle antibiotics and hormones. We continue our conversation with Michael Pollan about the modern industrial steak.

(Soundbite of music)

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. I’m Terry Gross, back with Michael Pollan. We’re talking about how cattle are raised and fed in today’s industrialized beef industry. Michael Pollan’s article, This Steer’s Life, was the cover story of last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine. He usually writes about gardening and organic food. His book “The Botany of Desire: A Plants-Eye View of the World” will be published in paperback next month. When we left off, we were talking about why cattle are fed antibiotics along with their corn feed. Well, the corn wreaks havoc on the cow’s digestive system. The digestive problems are addressed with antibiotics.

Now what about the effects of the antibiotics on we humans that eat the cow meat? Is there still antibiotic residue in the meat?

Mr. POLLAN: Yes, they have found recently that there are antibiotic residues. But the larger problem–and this is one of the key connections between their health and our health, which I believe you simply can’t separate–is that simply by putting this huge quantity of these antibiotic chemicals into the environment–you know, more than half of the antibiotics made in this country go to feed livestock–you are creating resistant bugs, resistant bacteria. This is how evolution works. If you put a poison in the environment, to a population, it will evolve to withstand that poison. And that is happening. And that can be proven. It happens downstream of feedlots in the water that’s getting away. It happens in the manure of the animals.

In their digestive tract, right now, they are selecting for strains of bacteria that can withstand erythromycin, that can withstand penicillin, and those bacteria, having been created through this process, are now everywhere. And there is a connection between the antibiotics that steer number 534 is getting, and all his pen mates, and the fact that when my son has an ear infection, I have a hell of time finding an antibiotic now that will work. The reason that our antibiotics are failing is in part because we are squandering them on all these animals.

Video: Feeding cattle fast food: Some farmers are feeding their cattle a mixture of M&Ms or chocolate and potato chips in addition to the corn-based feed. I imagine the chocolate and potato chips aren’t satisfactory to market or suitable for human consumption.

On the Net:

  1. This Steer’s Life
  2. Diet And Disease In Cattle: High-Grain Feed May Promote Illness And Harmful Bacteria
  3. Junk Food In, Junk Food Out: Ethanol, Corn Prices and the Declining Quality of American Beef
  4. Power Steer