CAFO Case Study

Part one
1. What is a CAFO and how is it different from traditional farming? Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation. Animals are being forced to live in smaller areas with more animals. 2. What types of CAFOs are in Farmville? How many animals are housed in each CAFO? One poultry, and three swine Poultry: 80,000 hen Two of the three swine: 5,000-8,000 The other swine: 75,000

3. Based upon what you currently know about CAFOs, what can you infer are some of the issues for each side of the CAFO controversy? What are some of the viewpoints that proponents and opponents may state for and against CAFOs? Pro: increase amounts of jobs, increase economy Con: contamination, degradation of land

Part two
1. What did you learn about CAFOs? Animals are forced into living in closed areas with a bunch more animals. There are a lot of waste and contamination in these places. 2. What are or might be some of the negative concerns with CAFOs? Water pollution, contamination of land, more methane in one area 3. During your review of the reference material, which references are biased and which are unbiased? How can you tell? One of them had both the benefits and negative impacts of CAFOs, but the rest of the links only had one side of the story. And one of the link just give out general information about CAFOs.

Part Three
1. What concerns and medical conditions have you heard the residents express? Asthma, heart attack, headaches, stomach ache, nausea, diarrhea 2. What do they believe is the source of their illnesses?

 Runoff from the manure that contaminated their drinking water 3. Should you consider their experiences with the CAFO for your vote? Yes 4. Using the facts you have learned from your independent research and the concerns you have heard from the residents, what is your current position concerning the proposed CAFO expansion? CAFO is not good for the environment; therefore it should not be expanded. It would affect the health of people nearby negatively.

Part Four
1. What are some of the types of microorganisms identified in Hatties water samples? E. Coli 2. What are the levels of E. coli in water that the EPA consider safe for recreational use? What are the levels for drinking water? 133 colonies per 100 ml for recreational usage, but there cannot be any E.coli in drinking water. 3. What are some of the bacteria levels detected in Hatties samples? In a half cup of water, there were 1,000,000 E. Coli colonies 4. What is the proposed plan the farmers are considering to help their cause against the CAFO expansion? To bring evidence, and testimonies from people. 5. If you were one of the farmers, would you participate in the board meeting and/or help collect samples? I would participate in the board meeting because it is important for the world to know about the negative effects of CAFOs, so that they would not follow the same steps as I did.