Hog Farming Has a Massive Poop Problem

• This video is about the environmental and social justice issues surrounding industrial hog farming practices, focusing on pig farms in North Carolina. 
• Students will learn how industrial hog farms and contract farms "manage" the waste, how these practices impact the health and quality of life in the surrounding communities, the lack of regulations on the industry, proposed solutions, and why things are not yet changing. 

Positives

• This video is a great, in-depth introduction to the systemic problems in the hog farming industry.
• Multiple perspectives are included, which showcase the myriad of ways that this problem is impacting communities in North Carolina.
  

Additional Prerequisites

• Ads play before and during this video.
• Scientific concepts are explained, but students should have prior knowledge on environmental justice issues and the impacts of farming and dietary choices on the environment.

Differentiation

• Language arts classes could use this resource for a debate about the environmental regulations that should be required for businesses to operate, or to analyze different points of view around a common issue.
• This video can be used to think about and discuss how personal and household choices can impact larger and systemic problems. What can individuals do that could impact this type of farming? Why aren't more people making that choice?
• As an extension to that discussion, students can make informational fliers that detail the high environmental cost of these hog farming practices and what individual consumers might do to influence large livestock corporations.
• Biology, ecology, environmental science, health, and Earth science classes could use this video to introduce topics such as water pollution, air pollution, environmental causes of human health conditions, the nitrogen cycle, buffer zones, organic farming, regenerative farming, or plant-based nutrition.

This resource addresses the listed standards. To fully meet standards, search for more related resources.