IATP Hog Report - Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

Section 5
Pollution Shopping by Corporate Interests
Animal factories engage in a form of "pollution shopping" by locating in
communities or other geographical areas where few regulations exist that
could impede their growth or where few people live who could mount
strong opposition.
Corporate hog factory owners often target communities where a high
percentage of residents are impoverished, disenfranchised, unorganized,
and underemployed or unemployed, ensuring little or ineffective
opposition.
When people of color populate these communities, this form of pollution
shopping has been termed "environmental racism" and is a matter of great
concern to environmental justice organizations. 23
According to activist Gary Grant of Halifax Environmental Loss
Prevention, Halifax County, North Carolina, there are 100 counties in
North Carolina, of which fifteen are the top hog-producing counties. 24
Fourteen out of the fifteen rank in the bottom 50% of North Carolina's
state family income ranking. Thirteen out of the 15 have a 25% or higher
African-American poverty rate. In Grant's words, "the corporate hog
industry is not an example of economic development but rather another
example of under development, just like the other unskilled, low-wage
hazardous industries such as sewing factories, textile mills, and poultry
processing plants." 25
It is commonly heard that if hog factories are not allowed to operate
without restrictions in the United States, the hog industry will move to
other countries. Hog factory supporters have used this claim to gain the
public's support for their opposition to regulations on hog factory location
and practices. Speaking of the expansion of Virginia-based Smithfield
Foods outside U.S. borders, their chairman and CEO Joe Luter claimed,
"the current hostility from interest groups in this country has made other
parts of the world look good to us." 26
However, corporate hog factories are moving to other countries even
though areas remain in the United States that are favorable to their
expansion here. Carroll's Foods, Inc., was the first corporate hog producer
to operate factory hog operations outside the United States with two
operations in Brazil. 27 Carroll's also has a 1,300-sow hog factory outside
the village of Perote near Mexico's Gulf Coast, about 150 miles east of
Mexico City. Smithfield Foods, Inc., owns Carroll's.
Smithfield Foods, Inc., has a 50% ownership interest in a Mexican meat
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