4(f) Livestock management (advantages and disadvantages)

Use of hormones dealt with in Part 4c.

(i) You can limit the of farm animals and keep them in a temperature controlled environment to reduce their movement and reducing the transfer of energy from livestock to the environment.

This increases efficiency because the animals use less energy moving around and controlling their body temperature and so more energy is released in growth for the same feed input.

This seems to me to be a form of factory farming and not a good environment to live in.

(ii) Calves and chickens can be factory farmed by raising them in small confined indoor pens - but many people find this style of farming unacceptable.

The animals like 'battery hens or chickens' (for eggs or meat) are cramped allowing the rapid spread of any disease - requiring animals reared in this way to be treated with antibiotics - again these become part of our food chain.

The animals must be fed with protein based feed, reducing the efficiency of this form of protein production.

People have every right to question the ethics of factory farming and point out the cruel unnatural and uncomfortable conditions under which these animals are made to live.