Sodium nitrate, also known as sodium nitrite, is an additive used to cure and preserve meats. It’s both a salt and an antioxidant. It is commonly found in hot dogs, bacon, ham, salami, bologna and poultry products.
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Function
- Manufacturers add sodium nitrate to meat products for the purpose of preventing botulism by inhibiting the growth of the bacteria that causes it. The additive also helps keep meats from spoiling quickly. Without it, cured meats wouldn’t have the same color or flavor. According to the website MeatSafety.org, cured meats must be made with nitrates, by definition.
Dangers
- According to Phil Lempert, food editor at the TODAY show, “nitrites combine with amines naturally present in meat to form carcinogenic N-nitroso compounds” when cooked. It’s thought that these carcinogenic compounds increase the risk for stomach, pancreatic and colorectal cancers. A study published in “Public Health Nutrition” found substantially increased incidents of brain cancer in children of women who ate a large amount of cured meats while pregnant.
Considerations
- Meat is not the only consumption source of sodium nitrate. Due to pollution from fertilizers and manure runoff, nitrates can be present in drinking water. They also exist naturally in green leafy vegetables, like spinach, and root vegetables, such as potatoes. It’s possible that other elements in the vegetables stop the formation of N-nitroso compounds.
The number of animal farms in the US has decreased drastically over the decades, and while a few companies grew exponentially large, much less people are employed in factory farming today than in the industry’s beginnings in the 1920s. One worker now supplies more than 90 consumers (1). The major four food companies in the US produce 81% of cows, 73% of sheep, 57% of pigs, and 50% of chickens (1). 10 billion animals are now killed in US factory farms every year.
US milk production doubled between 1959 and 1990, while the number of dairy cows declined by 40% (26)
Key Characteristics Of Factory Farming
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- Economies of scale dictate everything. One of the world’s largest pig farms in the US holds 500,000 hogs in one Smithfield facility in Utah in tight confinement (33).
pigs on factory farm - Large numbers of animals are usually held indoors in closed confined pens and sheds, and often with physical restraints to control unnecessary movement. The more animals they can crowd into a space, the more profitable it is for the factory farm.
- Factory farms are highly standardized for efficiency. Monocultures of animals and feed crops are created to be highly unified through gene manipulation to help yielding consistent production every year. Less diversity and variety of agricultural products make management and regulation of food quality easier.
- Growth hormones, genetic engineering, and specific breeding programs are used to create more desirable and consistent animal anatomies, and to stimulate faster growth. This potent chemical cocktail fattens only the animal parts that consumers pay most for.
- Huge amounts of antibiotics and pesticides are used to fight the spreading of diseases and bacteria, as farm animals would get sick due to the crowded conditions, dirt, and humidity in the pens.
- All factory farm animals – including fish – are fed grains, mostly high-yield corn and soy mixes, which are cheap but low in nutrition (34). The feed can also contain ground-up parts of other animals of the same or other species that did not make it into human food production (35, 36).
factory farm cows
feed on grains - Fish farming is one of the fastest growing food producing sectors. More than 30% of sea animals consumed each year are raised on fish farms now (20).
- The typical factory farm worker gets low wages, works severe overhours, and won’t complain, as he has no rights. More often than not, illegal immigrants are used, as they would cope with all conditions for fear of deportation. Working conditions at factory farms are harsh, dreadful, and hazardous to safety and health of these workers (40).
- The federal US government subsidizes 35% of feed crop production (41) and US taxpayers paid $56 billion on corn subsidies over the last 12 years (42). 80% of this corn is used for farm animal feed (43). Without these subsidies, industrial farming would be inefficient and much too expensive for producers and consumers.
