Big Ag & factory farming in the age of the chicken

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This chapter examines animal foods in human diets, (chicken, pork, beef, goat, insects), specifically conventional (industrial) meat produced in concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) and their role in planetary health, sustainability, climate change, and society. It posits that meat is the ultimate ultra-processed food (UPF). Globally, 92 billion animals are slaughtered annually, packed into factory and megafactory farms and fed antibiotics and hormones to produce protein and meat efficiently, cheaply, and inhumanely. CAFOs fuel antibiotic resistance (antimicrobial resistance; AMR), a growing public health threat, while endangering meatpackers. It describes greenhouse gas emissions (GHGe) from deforestation and methane production due to manure lagoons alongside land use, fuel, and water costs—plus air, soil, and water pollution that disproportionately impacts BIPOC communities. It concludes with the “chickenization” of our species, the Earth encrusted with poultry bones, sharing anthropological evidence that sapiens in the Anthropocene are living in the Age of the Chicken.