Thursday, October 16, 2003

By Don Hopey, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

Large factory farms are pigging out in Pennsylvania, generating huge piles of manure that threaten to degrade soil, streams and ground water, cause human health problems and pollute the air with pungent odors, according to a study by Citizens for Pennsylvania's Future.

The 31-page study, scheduled for release this morning, says agricultural and environmental regulations have not kept pace with the explosive growth of factory farms, which number more than 118 in 22 counties. Most are pig farms.

	Online Map: Concentrated animal feeding operations in Pennsylvania

Although Pennsylvania was the first state to regulate the storage and disposal of farm animal waste in its Nutrient Management Act of 1993, many manure management plans have not been implemented, and regulators do not review the cumulative impact of multiple farms in one watershed.

"Nutrient management plans are not being fully implemented, and the state requirement to have one is only a paper facade that masks what's really going on in factory farms," said Jan Jarrett, PennFuture's outreach director.

She said no state regulations control odors, air pollution and the excessive levels of phosphorus from manure that is spread on farm fields. Phosphorous and nitrogen are present in manure and other fertilizers. Both can run off farm fields and pollute local waterways and regional water bodies like the Chesapeake Bay.

Jarrett said state regulations should be revised to address those omissions and to impose greater restrictions on the land application of manure.

Amy Van Blarcom-Lackey, director of government affairs for PennAg Industries, an agribusiness trade organization in Harrisburg, had not seen the report yesterday but said concentrated animal-feeding operations "go beyond what the law requires" to control odors and limit phosphorous.

"We have no problem with including phosphorous controls in the state nutrient-management plans, and feel that will happen soon," Blarcom-Lackey said.

Factory farm operations -- those with more than 1,000 pigs -- now make up three-fourths of all hog operations in the state, up from 47 percent in 1991.

The 118 farms that have approved state permits for water-pollution control are allowed to store more than 369 million gallons of liquid manure. According to the study, permit applications under review now would add more than 60 million gallons of storage, including additional storage in watersheds that are already degraded.

The report also is critical of factory farms that feed low levels of antibiotics to healthy livestock to ward off disease and promote growth, a practice that is also opposed by the American Medical Association.

The report says that practice "poses the most far-reaching threat to human health" because antibiotic-resistant bacteria can be created and infect people.

Bob Ruth, of Country View Family Farms in Mount Joy, Lancaster County, which owns several hog farms in sizes ranging up to 2,800 sows, said the link between antibiotic use and antibiotic-resistant bacteria has been "exaggerated and is not a proven fact."

"There may be some people that do that but we only do that when we have sick pigs," Ruth said, noting that farm industry studies show antibiotic use has declined significantly in recent years.

E-mail this story   Print this story