For Food's Sake

This year for Thanksgiving, Americans will consume 46 million turkeys. Factory farming has never been more 'efficient'. This same year, the US has consumed 9 billion chickens. Worldwide, we managed to eat 50 billion. How does this system function? What makes it so effective and profitable? It all comes down to one word: genetics. Since the 1950s, heritage breeds of poultry, or standard-bred poultry, have been gradually replaced by an army of uniform hybrid birds. Bred to grow as large as possible and as quickly as possible, hybrids are exceptionally profitable for Big Agriculture, and have come to dominate the global poultry industry. In this episode, I talk with Andrew DeCoriolis from Farm Forward and Frank R. Reese Jr., owner of the Good Shepherd Poultry Farm, about the need to preserve heritage breeds. We explore: How animal welfare, the livelihoods of farmers and the environment are best protected when the genetic diversity of these birds is preserved. How free-range, pasture-raised and organic meat mov