A Pig Sty: Smithfields Foods
I’m not a vegetarian but do think twice about eating certain meats. I have little use for fast food, especially when local competitors are so much more worthy of the business. News from the beef processing industry, with its grossly overcrowded feed lots and reports of cows grazing in pools of animal waste, leaves me wary. But pork processing leaves even more to be concerned about; namely, human beings.
While I once frequented Smithfields, that “local” fast food chain dishing up copious amounts of fried chicken and barbecue, I stopped eating there after learning about the store’s parent company. Smithfield Foods is the largest pork producer in the world. Its plant in Tar Heel (some 65 miles up the road from Wilmington) is the planet’s single largest pork processor, with approximately 5,500 employees killing and cutting up 32,000 hogs a day. If this seems like a bad deal for the pigs, the workers don’t fare much better. Many don’t belong to unions and have little leverage; others are illegal immigrants. The company was featured in two Human Rights Watch reports (2000 and 2005) for widespread dangerous working conditions. Past legal troubles include employees who were assaulted, threatened, illegally fired, and intimidated. Others were merely the victims of racial slurs.
A report by OSHA found injuries at the plant rose 200% from 2003 to 2006. Many workers have been terminated due to injury, Smithfields cutting off health insurance in the process.
When I heard Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation, speak at UNCW he veered away from a prepared speech to condemn Smithfields, and mentioned that it employs its very own police force to keep disgruntled workers in line. For a while last year the company ran a smiling happy people television ad promoting how great it is to work there (most likely because authorities were cracking down on illegals and Smithfield needed warm bodies).
If you like pork products it’s difficult to ignore Smithfields, whose brands include Lean Generation, Gwaltney and Esskay. Oh yeah, and it also purchased through Conagra Foods the Butterball Turkey brand, making Smithfields the largest turkey processor in the U.S.
It’s looking better and better to eat organic and local (in this case within 60 miles). Beware what you purchase at supermarkets, and let store managers know what products you want to see on the shelves. Not only because processing conditions are more and more suspect, but also because companies like Smithfields don’t treat employees like human beings.
Wow! That shit is tight, Ranald. I feel strange now…I haven’t shaken the swine. I like, um, Jackson’s on Kerr…Do they kill pigs too?
Been half-conscious of the porcine atrocities, and this distills it nicely. I had no idea that Smithfields was so close by. I keep wondering if all these reports about food contamination — and it’s not just meat — are going to force the moment to its crisis, bring about some tectonic shift in our attitudes about eating and food transparency, labels, food miles? (viz. Locavore redux)
You can’t turn around without seeing horrifying news about food products and the conditions that production at this scale forces (?).
Ranald - while I agree with much of your premise, I think you’ve missed on a very basic fact. While I don’t have the time to do the research to back it up right now, I am quite sure that Smithfield’s BBQ and Smithfield Foods are not connected. A rather lurid trial that played out in the Triangle media last fall, never mentioning the big company while making lots of hay with the founder of the small one:
http://www.newsobserver.com/138/story/719079.html
http://www.localtechwire.com/news/local/story/1863450/
[If you wonder how there is no trademark infringement without a connection between the two, I seem to recall reading some years back that it was because he started the chain in Smithfield, N.C., in Johnston County, and as long as he didn’t step on their logo or otherwise claim endorsement or affiliation the big company, from Smithfield, Virginia, originally, didn’t have recourse as they aren’t in the restaurant biz and trademarks are industry/product sector-specific, as well as to some extent limited by state lines.]
Anyway, all that fun stuff aside, unless Smithfield Foods has recently purchased Smithfield Management Company, perhaps as a bargain following Mr. Moore’s legal tribulations, you can rest as easily as anyone can while eating barbecue - which after all is always the result of the slaughter of a smart and charming member of the porcine species. And pretty much all factory-farmed meat products, from shrimp and catfish to the millions of pigs, chickens, turkeys, and more recently, goats, (although they haven’t gotten promoted to the statistics page yet)
http://www.ncagr.com/stats/2007AgStat/LivestockSlaughterBySpecies.pdf
that are slaughtered annually in North Carolina, most of them within 100 miles of Wilmington, involve human suffering in the production. It is just a filthy, disgusting, demoralizing business and for that reason is the main employer of immigrants from Mexico and Central America who have flocked to this state in the past 25 years, although there are also plenty doing construction/landscaping, etc. Smithfield Foods’ “happy-worker” ads recently were nothing more than institutional advertising, to boost the company’s image among viewers.
You can’t have it both ways. If you want to eat meat, an animal has to have been killed first, because we don’t want to eat the ones that just died. Niman Ranch meats, and probably some others available at Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods, et al, are humanely raised and slaughtered, and worth buying if you are concerned. Finally, for fast food that is humane, get the pork selections at Chipotle (which is no longer owned by McDonald’s, by the way) as they use only Niman Ranch pork. There are some Niman Ranch and other humane pork producers in North Carolina, and other restaurants that use Niman Ranch meats, as well as more acceptable beef and poultry producers, so give them a look.
http://www.lucky32.com/niman_wsjournal.htm
http://www.nimanranch.com/control/faq
http://varmintbites.wordpress.com/2007/09/24/this-little-piggie-went-to-market/
Susan: Thanks for clearing up Smithfields BBQ versus Smithfields Foods. My conscience is clear to re-visit the former, even though I’m with Ian and prefer Jackson’s, or A&G in Carolina Beach (great cole slaw!)
As a meat eater I realize I can’t have it both ways. My main point is the mistreatment of workers and the poor processing that goes into too many Big Ag meats. When I look at the plastic deli meats in grocery stores these days and compare them to the glorious cuts I grew up with, it sickens me. My post is merely a suggestion to make educated decisions when buying food, specifically meat. BTW, thanks for the helpful links, particularly the Mike Jones link to maefarmmeats.com.
A good portion of the chemical nastiness that floats down the Cape Fear River comes from the confined pork operations in the swampy coastal plain of eastern NC. The Cape Fear River basin is just naaaaasty, especially after a hurricane.