Got Pollution? "Canada's 24 million cows and hogs now produce more waste than a human population of 122 million people," writes award-winning environmental journalist Andrew Nikiforuk in Canadian Business. "While most cities treat their sewage, factory farms simply spread the guck around on open fields, where it often finds its way into surface and groundwater. . . .[S]uch practices are likely to invite more political disasters like Walkerton, home to Ontario's densest livestock concentration."
In 1995, the federal government asked its scientists to determine if all that animal waste was getting out of control. Last January, it got its 235-page answer, and the Access to Information Act got it into the hands of National Post reporter Tom Spears, who summed the whole thing up: "The government asked: Are nutrients [refined livestock waste] really a pollution problem? The short answer: Yes."
"The pollutants," Spears wrote, "kill fish and frogs. They acidify lakes and soil, just like acid rain. They are 'on occasion, endangering human health,' according to the report."
Farms (especially factory farms) are the biggest polluter, according to the report. In 1996 alone, they spread nearly two million tons of nitrogen from "manure, sewage plant sludge and other fertilizers" and 441,000 tons of phosphorus. "These loads spill into waterways and kill fish," Spears wrote.
It's not just a water problem. "In the lower Fraser Valley in British Columbia, ammonia from the manure in intensive farms forms a rural smog," Spears writes. The nitrogen becomes food not just for smog, but for acid rain and global warming.
"Although its health effects are not yet fully known," the scientists from five federal agencies concluded, "the direct relationship between fine particles, respiratory disease and mortality has fuelled growing concern over this unusual phenomenon."
VERDICT: Until government grabs "the bull" by the horns, whenever we drink nonorganic milk we're fouling our own nest.
Offline References
Andrew Nikiforuk, "The Ultimate End Product," Canadian Business, June 26, 2000, p. 50.
Tom Spears, "Farm Chemicals Threaten Our Air, Water: Scientists Farming Biggest Source Of Pollutants That Kill Fish, Frogs," National Post, May 1, 2001. (Reprinted here near top of page.)Back to MILK: What is the Deal?