60 second guide to…Factory farming

Battery chickens

Factory farms produce much of our food, but at what cost to animal welfare and the planet?

Factory farming is an industrialised, high-density approach to rearing farm animals. This means ‘intensive’ farms where the animals are kept permanently indoors and where profits are prioritised over animal welfare. The phrase “factory farming” reflects the idea that in some intensive farms, animals are viewed like any other commodity used in manufacturing products.

Factory farming is the opposite end of the spectrum from organic agriculture. On an organic farm, animals have access to free-range areas, and there are strict rules governing diet and husbandry practices.

The factory approach

Intensive farming gradually developed in the 19th and 20th century, with the application of industrial manufacturing techniques – mechanisation, specialisation and economies of scale – to existing agricultural practices. Factory farms tend to be large-scale. There are pig farms in the US, for example, containing hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of animals.

In general, factory-style farms tend to raise one specific type of animal, with cows, pigs, chickens or turkeys being the most common. For some other animals, including sheep, this kind of farming either wouldn’t work or wouldn’t be economical.

As with other factories, the aim of a factory farm is to maximise output (meat, milk or eggs) while minimising cost. Campaign Groups such as Compassion in World Farming  and the RSPCA argue that this leads to unacceptably low welfare standards.

Climate change

Factory farms may be bad news for animal welfare, but their contribution to global warming depends on various factors.

On the one hand, an organic, free-range chicken fed on good grain may have a larger carbon footprint than an intensively reared one given lower quality feed, kept in a shed with thousands of others and slaughtered at just a six weeks old.
On the other hand, free-ranging beef or dairy cows that are largely grass-fed won’t need as much feed as intensively reared ones, which could lower their carbon footprint substantially.

Moreover, and more importantly, factory farms allow for an increase in the total production and consumption of meat. Given that almost all meat has a relatively high carbon footprint, this isn’t good news for the planet.