Denver Initiated Ordinance 309 Aims to Strengthen the American Food System
The Center for Responsible Food Business (CRFB) closely follows legislation that has implications for both our national and local food systems. We support a range of initiatives that leverage powers in business and in government to increase transparency, sustainability, and consumer trust. In November, voters in Denver, Colorado will consider Initiated Ordinance 309, commonly referred to as the “Denver Slaughterhouse Ban,” which prohibits industrial slaughterhouse operations within city limits.
As an organization committed to promoting responsible business practices in the food sector, we believe this legislation is an important step toward building a food system that works for workers, communities, and our environment, not just mega-corporations.
CRFB endorses the passing of Denver Measure 309 because it will provide the following benefits:
Reduce the damaging trend of corporate consolidation in the animal agriculture industry
Increase market access for small, independent farmers across the Mountain West region
Offer key financial and additional support to workers, easing an important transition to safer and more sustainable jobs
The Current State of American Agriculture
To understand the context of Initiated Ordinance 309, it's important to consider the broader landscape of American agriculture. Over the past century, the U.S. food system has undergone significant changes, shifting from an economic model based on small, diversified farms to one dominated by larger, corporate operations.
Small, privately owned farms produce a diverse range of regional crops, with small herds of animals integrated into the production cycle. These small family farms have proven to be hubs of innovation especially as the unstable climate introduces new challenges for farming. Smallholder farms account for a disproportionate amount of nutrition relative to the amount of land they occupy, selling nutrient-rich food at just above the cost of production, resulting in lower food prices. Animals are typically slaughtered on site using mobile processing equipment.
However, these farms are increasingly overshadowed, and pushed out of business, by large-scale operations. While proponents of industrial farming argue that larger facilities can achieve economies of scale, potentially reducing costs for consumers, the public is increasingly concerned about the impact on rural communities, environmental sustainability, and the resilience of our food supply chain. On industrial farms, animals are raised inside windowless sheds by the tens of thousands until they are transported to large, industrial processing facilities. Elsewhere, vast acres of farmland are given over to intensive monocropping of corn and soy varieties to be fed exclusively to livestock. As a result of monocropping and profit maximization, corporate farms produce nutritionally impoverished food items and sell them at steep profits.
The Loss of Smaller, Regional Operations
While many Americans are aware of the problems industrial farming causes, most believe that as consumers, they are patronizing small family farms. This is no accident: food businesses and producers alike leverage the reputation of independent farms in advertisement campaigns, leaving consumers unable to discern where their food comes from.
According to a 2020 report by the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future, the vast majority of animal products in the United States now come from large, industrialized operations. The study found that 99 percent of animals are raised in what the USDA classifies as "large confined animal feeding operations” and end up in industrial processing facilities. This represents a dramatic shift from just a few decades ago when smaller, diversified farms were more prevalent.
The disappearance of smaller, more dispersed operations would spell disaster for American food security. As we saw during the Covid-19 pandemic, corporate consolidation has created an incredibly fragile supply chain where single points of failure can lead to significant disruptions. As in all industries, entrepreneurial farmers and a plethora of small businesses are key to innovation, resilience, and consumer choice. By implementing policies like the Denver slaughterhouse ban, which effectively bolsters small-scale “farm-to-table” operations, consumers will benefit not only from more local protein suppliers, but also from lower meat prices.
Plants where animals are slaughtered and processed are similarly consolidated and industrial, growing in size and pushing out smaller operators. But this should not be a foregone conclusion. The Center for Responsible Food Business is dedicated to researching and advocating for common-sense changes to government policy that can reverse the trend of corporate consolidation.
Economic Regulation and Smart Policy Solutions
We must understand that the government has been instrumental in driving the corporate consolidation of farming. Massive and short-sighted government subsidies have encouraged the growth of large industrial farms while leaving small family farms to fend for themselves. If the government had not been tipping the scales for most of the last century, we likely would not be in this predicament at all. That is why government-driven solutions can be the most effective way to decentralize our agricultural system.
Policy solutions play an important role in addressing the challenges we face in the food system. We believe these are key priorities government action can help with:
Increase transparency: We must ensure that consumers can easily understand where a product comes from and that marketing tactics do not obfuscate a product’s footprint or origin.
Restrict subsidies: Large industrial farming is only profitable due to direct and indirect federal subsidies valued at hundreds of billions of dollars per year which almost exclusively benefit corporate farms.
Transition infrastructure: Just as building a new coal-fired power plant effectively locks a region into coal power for the 50+ year lifespan of the plant, expanding the infrastructure of large industrial farming makes a food system transition unachievable for the foreseeable future.
The proposed phase out of industrial processing plants in Denver, Colorado, falls into the third category of transitioning infrastructure away from corporate facilities and toward smaller, independent operations. The proposed ordinance, which will appear as ballot measure 309 in the November 2024 Denver general election, would be a major win for advocates of the smallholder supply chain, undercutting an effective monopoly held by the nation’s largest processing companies. As a result of changes like this one, small farming can bounce back and flourish as a better, healthier, more resilient way to produce food and employ Americans in the process.
A Just Transition for Denver Workers Facing Job Loss
A key benefit to Initiated Ordinance 309 is how it addresses the importance of supporting Denver’s slaughterhouse workers during a transition in Colorado’s local food economy. The initiative includes provisions to prioritize the reemployment of affected workers in emerging green jobs and give access to workforce training programs and employment assistance programs. Most importantly, measure 309 would help employees whose jobs would be affected by the Denver slaughterhouse ban gain access to more sustainable, safer, and secure jobs with far more opportunity for growth.
This approach acknowledges the challenges employees face in large-scale processing facilities, where stressful and potentially hazardous working conditions often exist. According to a 2022 Government Accountability Office report, the meat and poultry industry consistently has among the highest rates of occupational injuries and illnesses in the manufacturing sector. By facilitating a transition away from industrial slaughterhouse labor to alternative job opportunities, the Denver slaughterhouse ban aims to address both immediate economic impact and long-term worker health and well-being.
This shift towards safer, more sustainable employment aligns with broader trends in the evolving job market. The International Labour Organization estimates that the green economy could generate 24 million jobs worldwide by 2030, spanning various sectors including sustainable agriculture and food production. In the United States, the Inflation Reduction Act has already catalyzed the creation of over 100,000 clean energy jobs and is already having a big impact on job opportunities in Colorado. By proactively addressing worker transition, Initiated Ordinance 309 not only provides employment assistance for slaughterhouse workers in Denver but also mitigates any potential economic impact, contributing to building a more resilient and sustainable local economy. This approach demonstrates how thoughtful policy can address multiple interconnected issues in our food system, from environmental sustainability to worker safety and economic stability.
Initiated Ordinance 309 – A Step in the Right Direction
Denver’s initiated ordinance to regulate animal processing facilities is an encouraging example of the kind of policy changes America needs to strengthen and diversify our agricultural economy. While no policy, and certainly no city, can single handedly remedy the entrenched issues of corporate agriculture, Initiated Ordinance 309 is a positive step forward. We encourage Denver voters to do their research and vote Yes for a better food system.