Hog wars in MO

Tim Jones and Andrew Martin of the Chicago Tribune have a great article on rural opposition to concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs). Neighbors of such facilities, which feed and produce waste from hundreds or thousands of pigs, frequently experience air and water pollution. CAFOs have been challenged under various federal environmental statutes and under nuisance and zoning law. (Per the National Agricultural Law Center.)

Jones and Martin's "hog wars" article discusses the different ways states have dealt with county-wide bans of feeding operations. In Missouri, fourteen counties have banned larger operations and agribusiness is fixing to pass a statewide law to end such bans. In Illinois, the legislature has already transferred the power to approve such operations into the control of a commissioner who farms pigs himself. In fact, Illinois legislators, an otherwise relatively progressive bunch, are considering legislation which would only allow facilities to be challenged as nuisances once they are already polluting, rather than before they are built. (Hat tip: Families Against Rural Messes.) There is a lot of posturing going on here--e.g.,"[f]armers are not effete, Northeastern tailpipe sniffers," "[i]t's the new Civil War"--but it would great for humans and animals both if these CAFOs could be shut down. Hog wars, yet another reason to support soy farmers.

See also (3/18/06): As with hogs in Missouri, so with cows in Wisconsin. Recent grassroots action against large dairy operations has perhaps been canceled out by a state bill standardizing permits for building such "megafarms", reports the Appleton Post-Crescent.