Law let hog industry keep growing in N.C.

Lawmakers tried to halt the growth of the hog industry in North Carolina 10 years ago, but new hog farms have continued to be built, adding a capacity of more than 500,000 swine.

Seventy-three new hog farms have been given permits, 25 expansions have been allowed and four farms reactivated under exemptions to a 1997 law that established a moratorium on new hog farms, state water regulators say. Nearly all those farms use the type of hog manure disposal systems -- waste pits and spray fields -- that the state would like to phase out because of water pollution concerns.

Molly Diggins, state director of the Sierra Club's North Carolina chapter, described the growth of the industry under the moratorium as "hog creep."

"I'm very surprised," Diggins said when told the number of farms. "People assumed that the total number of hogs has been kept steady and that there are not new lagoons and spray fields being built. People knew those exemptions would allow some slippage, but not at that level. The moratorium isn't working, and it should be replaced with a permanent ban on new lagoons and spray fields."

Others disagree, noting that the increased number of hog farms was allowed under the cap imposed by legislators a decade ago.

"The industry hasn't been growing in spite of the moratorium," said Susan Massengale, a spokesman for the N.C. Division of Water Quality, which issues permits for hog farms. "It's been growing in concert with what was said in that moratorium."

Pressing for a ban

Environmental groups are pressing state lawmakers to adopt a permanent ban this year on lagoons and fields where they spray the waste. They also want state funding to allow the replacement of hog waste lagoons on some farms, using waste disposal systems that pollute less. The 10-year-old moratorium on new and expanded hog farms expires in September.

Meanwhile, Smithfield Foods is seeking to take advantage of the new farms. The company is seeking permission from the state to process 1 million more pigs a year at its massive slaughterhouse in Bladen County. As part of its application, Smithfield is asking regulators to let it buy hogs from new farms that don't have innovative waste disposal methods. Currently, its state permit bars it from buying hogs off farms built after 2002, unless the farms use cleaner waste technology. State regulators have recommended keeping that ban in place.

North Carolina is the nation's second largest hog producer, after Iowa. About 9.5 million hogs are raised each year on 2,300 factory farms concentrated in Eastern North Carolina.

The total number of hog farms has dropped from about 4,500 in 1997 to about 2,300 last year, largely because of the disappearance of smaller farms. The number of hogs produced in the state has fluctuated between 9.3 million and 10 million a year depending on market demand.

Tommy Stevens, director of environmental services for the N.C. Pork Council, an advocacy group for the industry, said he disagrees that the industry has continued expanding under the moratorium. Instead, Stevens said, farmers were simply allowed to move forward if they had already made progress building a hog factory before the cap.

"That's a pretty small percentage increase overall," Stevens said. "I think most of that took place in the first few years of the moratorium."

State lawmakers called a halt to new or expanded hog farms in 1997 because of their environmental threat. The waste pits can flood, fouling creeks and rivers.

But the law allowed construction to proceed in cases where the foundation of the farm had been laid, the farmer had received a loan to build or expand or he had obtained a permit for construction. In the months before the moratorium took effect, state water quality regulators approved a flurry of farm applications allowing nearly 568,000 more hogs.

Spokeswoman Massengale said the hog farms that have been built since the cap fell into one of the exemption categories. About two-thirds of the permits are for new farms and expansions in Sampson, Jones, and Duplin counties.

"North Carolina citizens have been led to believe that the number of hogs and hog lagoons had been frozen in place 10 years ago," said Rick Dove, a representative of the Waterkeeper Alliance, an environmental advocacy group. "That is nothing short of an absolute falsehood. We have allowed this industry to grow at great cost to our environment."