Hog farm gets corporate support; Coalition expresses disappointment
 
Posted: Tuesday, September 9, 2014 6:45 am |
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In a letter to the Buffalo River Coalition, international food conglomerate Cargill responded to extensive public outcry in opposition to the location of C & H Hog Farms near the Buffalo National River by steadfastly committing to the factory hog facility’s location. Cargill has self-imposed a moratorium on new swine facilities and expansions of C & H in the Buffalo River watershed, along with committing to explore technology to mitigate the effects of their current facility.
In a letter written to Gordon Watkins of The Buffalo River Watershed Alliance, Mike Luker, president of Cargill Pork said his company had met with numerous individuals and organizations, learning much about “the understandable passion people have for the Buffalo National River in Northwest Arkansas.”
The Buffalo River Coalition is made up of the Buffalo River Watershed Alliance, The Ozark Society, the National Parks Conservation Association and the Arkansas Canoe Club.
Luker went on to say that Cargill, as a 50-year corporate citizen of Arkansas, shared the desire to preserve and protect the Buffalo.
Cargill, Luker said, had committed to the following actions:
• To line the holding pond and settling basin with synthetic liners
• To explore leak detection technology for the liners, as well as water treatment options and systems
• Cover the settling basin
• Install a flare system to burn off gases
• Continue to investigate new, leading-edge technologies with plans to begin installing and testing new technology for nutrient management before the end of the calendar year
• Cargill has established a permanent moratorium on the construction of any new hog facilities in the Buffalo River watershed or expansion of the existing C & H Hog Farm
In a letter sent on August 28, the Buffalo River Coalition responded by thanking Cargill for its efforts, but calling into question the effectiveness of mitigation and remaining firm in calling for the facility’s removal from the watershed.
“While our coalition is pleased that Cargill has voluntarily committed to a moratorium on future hog facilities in the Buffalo River watershed,” said National Parks Conservation Association program manager Emily Jones, “a confined animal feeding operation should not have been placed directly upstream from America’s first national river to begin with. It seems contradictory to acknowledge that expensive, experimental technologies are needed to mitigate a so-called ‘state of the art facility’s’ impacts, while having also stated that no harmful bacteria or nutrients will reach the river undefined which one is correct and are these technologies going to prevent contamination or create more?”
Cargill, the coalition said, has committed to support “new, leading edge technology for nutrient management,” specifically a Plasma Pyrolysis process, which experts call an untested and unproved technology for handling liquid swine waste. In its response to Cargill’s proposal, the Buffalo River Coalition stated that implementing this program as a solution would turn C & H, Mt. Judea and the Buffalo National River into “a research laboratory for a private company to test a new application for a process heretofore used for medical waste and other solid material disposal.” And that “the Buffalo River watershed is not the place to carry out such risky experiments.”
“Rather than moving the facility to a region without porous karst geology, a school next door or a national river six miles downstream, Cargill has dug its heels in and offered the people of Arkansas and national park supporters across the country mitigation measures that leave the fate of our first national river to chance,” Watkins said in the letter. “This is not the place for an experiment and we shouldn’t be rolling the dice with Arkansas’ crown jewel. There is one solution: remove the facility from the Buffalo River watershed.”
According to the letter, during an early meeting between the coalition and Cargill, the hog producer admitted that, in retrospect, Mt. Judea was a poor site choice for the C & H facility and was committed to doing its part to correct the error. The coalition then accused Cargill of reversing its position, and it had decided to fully support the facility in its current location.
According to the Buffalo River Coalition, while liners can provide added protection against waste leakage, published information by the USD and others indicates that installation must be done with great care and that a method for leak detection is highly desirable. Avoiding damage to the liners due to agitation and sludge removal is difficult. Millions of gallons of swine feces and urine will still pose a significant risk to both surface and underground water undefined with the potential for permanent damage to the Buffalo River, said the coalition.
“We’re not talking about a what-if catastrophic scenario, though that’s certainly possible too,” said Bob Allen, board member of the Arkansas Canoe Club. “The National Park Service has expressed concern over the gradual buildup of pollutants in the river. Cargill isn’t just jeopardizing our state’s environmental health, they’re jeopardizing our entire tourism economy. Hardly a fair trade for the six jobs that C & H supports. In contrast, the Buffalo supports $44 million in spending and 610 jobs annually.”
The coalition has made it clear that it believes the hog farm is located in the worst possible location, atop karst geology, immediately adjacent to a school and the town of Mt. Judea and just a few miles upstream on the banks of a major tributary of the Buffalo National River.
The coalition closes its letter to Cargill by stating: “We will also continue to educate the public about the unacceptable risks posed by the inappropriate location of this swine CAFO and we will encourage Cargill as well as state agencies and governmental bodies to recognize the true costs of allowing this risk to continue. We support nothing short of closure or relocation.”
The Buffalo River Coalition was formed to protect the Buffalo National River from this urgent factory hog farm threat. The coalition filed a lawsuit in August 2013 challenging the U.S. Department of Agriculture Farm Service Agency (FSA) and the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) for their inadequate review and improper authorization of loan guarantee assistance to C&H.