Beef Farm Cattle Farm Types of Farms
Thousands of British cattle reared for supermarket beef are being fattened in industrial-scale units where livestock have lilliputian or no access to pasture.
Inquiry by the Guardian and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism has established that the UK is now abode to a number of industrial-calibration fattening units with herds of upwardly to 3,000 cattle at a fourth dimension beingness held in grassless pens for extended periods rather than being grazed or barn-reared.
Intensive beef farms, known as Concentrated Creature Feeding Operations (CAFOs) are commonplace in the US. But the practice of intensive beef farming in the Britain has not previously been widely best-selling – and the findings have sparked the latest clash over the future of British farming.
The beef industry says that the scale of operations involved enables farmers to rear cattle efficiently and profitably, and ensure high welfare standards. But critics say there are welfare and environmental concerns around this style of farming, and believe that the farms are evidence of a wider intensification of the United kingdom of great britain and northern ireland'south livestock sector which is not beingness sufficiently debated, and which may have an impact on small farmers.
In contrast to big intensive sus scrofa and poultry farms, industrial beef units do non require a government permit, and there are no official records held by DEFRA on how many intensive beef units are in operation.
But the Guardian and the Bureau has identified nearly a dozen operating beyond England, including at sites in Kent, Northamptonshire, Suffolk, Norfolk, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire. The largest farms fatten up to 6,000 cattle a twelvemonth.
Drone footage and satellite images reveal how thousands of cattle are being kept at some sites in outdoor pens, known as corrals, sometimes surrounded by walls, fences or straw bales. Although the cattle volition have spent time grazing in fields prior to fattening, some will be confined in pens for effectually a quarter of their lives, until they are slaughtered.
Supermarket demand is believed to be, at least in function, driving the trend. In add-on, some smaller and medium-scale beef producers have struggled to farm profitably in recent years, with sometimes tight margins and fluctuating costs. Near of the units identified are believed to take grown incrementally, rather than setting up from scratch.
A number of retailers, including the Co-op, Lidl and Waitrose, are among those found to exist sourcing beefiness from Britain intensive industrial calibration farms, most of which are privately owned but sell to beef processing companies, which in turn supply retailers.
Chris Mallon, director of the National Beef Association (NBA), the industry trade body, said the reason the largest units have come about was purely downward to "efficiency".
"What we're talking about hither is commercial product, for feeding people. It's not niche marketplace. A lot of this will exist on supermarket shelves – that's where it's coming into its own. In the catering side too, they'll exist doing information technology," he said.
"One of the things nosotros've seen over the years is supermarket domination of the beef merchandise. What they desire is specification, size of cuts, size to fit certain packaging, size of roasts – this has all go incredibly important."
But he cautioned that farms dedicated to fattening cattle had always been bigger than those rearing them, "and so actually having higher concentration of feeding cattle on units [isn't new].
"The difference is we're getting some larger units now and that will be because of economies of scale … if y'all tin give the people yous're supplying a constant supply of cattle that are in the right specification, that makes you more valuable. And that's 1 of the reasons nosotros've seen a move towards it."
Dr Jude Capper, a livestock practiced who has studied intensive beefiness units in the Usa and elsewhere said that due to economies of scale "it'south nigh inevitable that a larger farm tin can produce a greater quantity of a more affordable production – we see this in almost all agronomical sectors globally, but as we do in other industries".
The Guardian and Bureau final yr revealed that 800 poultry and pig "mega farms" or CAFOs accept appeared in the British countryside in recent years, some housing more than than a meg chickens or about 20,000 pigs.
Following the revelations, the environment secretary, Michael Gove, pledged that Brexit would not be allowed to result in the spread of US-style agribusiness: "I do not want to see, and nosotros will not have, Us-manner farming in this country," he said in a parliamentary statement.
Although the number of beef units is tiny in comparison with intensive poultry or hog farms, the latest findings have further fuelled fears that the UK could be embracing industrial-scale practices.
Caroline Lucas, MP for Brighton Pavillion, said the farms were "gravely concerning" and that "with United kingdom of great britain and northern ireland hurtling towards Brexit, and with our animal and ecology protections facing an uncertain future, I'm worried that nosotros could cease upward adopting more of this U.s.a.-style agronomical do".
Richard Immature, Policy Director at the Sustainable Food Trust, said: "Keeping large number of cattle together in intensive weather removes all justification for rearing them and for consumers to eat red meat... More than two-thirds of United kingdom farmland is under grass for sound environmental reasons and the major justifications for keeping cattle and eating red meat are that they produce high quality protein and healthy fats from land that is not suitable for growing crops."
Young added that that smaller scale beefiness farmers might feel the impact, every bit larger farms were likely to be "more efficient in purely economic terms", allowing the supermarkets "to drive downwardly the retail cost of beef below the toll at which more traditional farmers can produce it. As a effect they go out of business."
The changing face up of traditional United kingdom beef production
Beef product in the United kingdom typically involves three distinct stages - calf rearing, growing and fattening - with many farms specialising in 1 part of the rearing process. Cattle may move between a number of different farms during their lifecycle. (A smaller number of farms rear cattle from nativity and continue them on the same farm until being sent to the shambles.)
After spending fourth dimension on pasture many cattle are moved to dedicated "finishing units" and are typically housed in barns or grazed whilst being fattened ahead of slaughter, ofttimes for effectually half-dozen months. Many are fed specialist diets designed to encourage weight gain.
But in the US, much beef fattening takes place in "feedlots" with cattle held in vast outdoor pens where the largest facilities confine up to 85,000 livestock. Such "feedlots" have proved controversial in the past, both considering of their size and because many cattle were given hormones and antibiotics, sometimes to encourage rapid growth. (Such practices are not permitted in the UK).
Despite acknowledging the arrival of intensive beef farming in the Uk, experts reject the notion that the British beefiness sector volition see a wholesale shift towards farming on a US-scale.
"Are we probable to encounter huge – 100,000 caput – feedlots? No. We don't have the market, infrastructure or public demand for them," said Capper. "Nonetheless, could we brand meliorate use of male calves from dairy farms by rearing them for beef in feedlot-fashion operations, using feeds that we cannot [or] will not swallow, such as by-products from human food crop product? Admittedly – some beef producers are already doing this."
Caroline Lucas called for the system of permits to be tightened up, and said "the Government should be officially recording the number of feedlots rather than letting reporting slip through a loophole … we need a proper debate in this country over what kind of agriculture we want in the futurity."
A spokesperson for DEFRA said that "beef farms are regulated in exactly the same style as any other farms". Only it later best-selling that "Defra does not take a database of feedlot style units...The Cattle Tracing System tin provide figures on the number of holdings carve up past premised type e.g. Agricultural Holding, Abattoir, Market etc. and the number of animals registered to each. However, it does not concord any data in respect of the feeding practices on the holdings."
Waitrose said of its own supplier: "Animal welfare is of the highest importance to usa and a big subcontract does non equal poor animal welfare standards. The farm is run nether a bespoke environmental management plan in conjunction with Natural England. All the cattle graze the marshes during the summertime flavour so during the winter months, when the grass is fallow the cattle are bought dorsum to the yard when the finishing/fattening cattle are housed in covered sheds. For clarification the length of grazing season is weather condition dependent, one time the grass stops growing the cattle need to be yarded and fed a forage based ration in accordance with brute welfare and all-time practice."
A spokesperson for the British Retail Consortium said: "Our members have their responsibilities to animal welfare very seriously and work closely with trusted suppliers so that high welfare standards are upheld. They have strict processes in place and will thoroughly investigate any show of not-conformity to ensure that whatsoever problems are immediately addressed."
The Guardian approached several of the largest units but all declined to comment.
Some in the beef industry itself have expressed unease about the intensive farming organisation. Russ Carrington, of the Pasture Fed Livestock Association, said: "Information technology is sorry that the travel towards cheap, de-valued food has led to the removal of livestock from fields. There is a very different, more than sustainable manner of producing high quality beefiness which is likewise considerably healthier for humans to eat – 100% grass-fed and grain-free, which has lower total and saturated fat content, a better ratio of omega iii to omega six fatty acids and more vitamins and minerals, which comes from the various pasture they eat."
Pressure grouping Compassion In World Farming (CIWF) have raised concerns that some cattle held at in "feedlots" are kept in "high stocking densities" with little or no shelter or shade and "no dry ground to rest on." The grouping says information technology believes "cows vest on pasture".
In response Dr Jude Capper said: "In my experience at feedlots all over the world, I've withal to meet whatsoever welfare problems that are inherent to the system. If we are to assume that cattle must be able to graze to lead a 'happy' life, then confinement may be regarded as an issue. Still, I've yet to see this being backed by [any show-base]."
Evidence compiled by the Bureau and Guardian suggests that about intensive beef farms appear to operate to high welfare standards.
Chris Mallon said: "Cattle actually volition be very happy in [these systems]. Cattle in the wild don't build nests for themselves or hide in caves, they're an outdoor fauna and I recollect nosotros've got to recollect that."
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/29/revealed-industrial-scale-beef-farming-comes-to-the-uk
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