| Factory FarmingThe big names in American agriculture | | | | largest polluters in the country, and whose Web site |
| would like you to believe that your strip steak, | | | | says, "100% Chicken. Naturally," released 2,195,343 |
| salmon filet, scrambled eggs and bacon came from | | | | pounds of toxic wastes into neighboring |
| healthy, happy animals raised on good, old-fashioned | | | | waterways?* 3% of U.S. farms generate 62% of all |
| family farms. But, as more Americans are coming to | | | | agricultural production?* An average farmed salmon |
| realize, behind those perfectly cellophane-wrapped | | | | steak contains nearly 10 times more toxic PCBs than |
| meats, bright white eggs and plastic milk gallons are | | | | a wild salmon steak?The message of "The Meat You |
| tales so gruesome and downright shocking that it's a | | | | Eat" comes through loud and clear: Large corporations |
| surprise Hollywood has yet to make it a movie about | | | | have taken over the production of food in America |
| it."It" is agribusiness, the term given to describe the | | | | and, unless we get control back to the small farmers |
| mass production of meats, poultry, fish, eggs and | | | | who take pride in producing healthy food from happy |
| milk in America today, and it's the topic of Ken | | | | animals, our food supplies, our environment and our |
| Midkiff's new book, The Meat You Eat: How | | | | own bodies will suffer.It is quite apparent that Ken |
| Corporate Farming Has Endangered America's Food | | | | Midkiff has done extensive homework on the topic |
| Supply -- a book that absolutely every American who | | | | (and, as he is the Sierra Club's Clean Water Campaign |
| values their health, eats meat, believes in humanity, | | | | Director, has access to some "insider" facts), as this |
| and/or values our environment should read!If you've | | | | book is not a "rant" but instead is supported |
| never heard about the unethical conditions and | | | | throughout by researched insights. Here are just a |
| extreme environmental toll of factory farms or the | | | | few of the examples that Midkiff cites:* In McDonald |
| many unsavory and dangerous additives to | | | | County, Mississippi, where 13 million broiler chickens |
| mass-produced meats and animal products, then be | | | | and hundreds of thousands of turkeys are produced, |
| prepared for a huge wakeup call when you read this | | | | every stream is on a government "impaired water |
| important book. And for those who have, this book | | | | body" list.* The smells coming from one hog farm, |
| will open your eyes to the real problem at hand-large | | | | with some 80,000 hogs, in Missouri forced many |
| and incredibly powerful corporations who are in | | | | residents to buy air conditioners because they could |
| control of the food supply-and offer you a solution | | | | no longer open their windows for fresh air.* School |
| that you can really use.Unsavory Mass Farming | | | | officials in an Ohio-town that's home to a chicken |
| Statistics ... Did You Know?* About 70 percent of all | | | | plant with 15 million chickens struggled just to keep |
| antibiotics and similar drugs produced in the United | | | | flies away from students.Clearly the environment |
| States are given to livestock and poultry?* Arsenic | | | | cannot take too much more of this abuse before |
| and selenium are sometimes added to livestock feed | | | | permanent damage sets in, but if this is the damage |
| to stimulate appetite?* Sanderson Farms, a chicken | | | | being done to the environment, imagine the damage |
| plant that is ranked 24th on the EPA's list of the | | | | being done to our bodies. |