Background

Several studies have reported environmental disparities regarding exposure to concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs). Public health implications of environmental justice from the intensive livestock industry are of great concern in North Carolina (NC), USA, a state with a large number and extensive history of CAFOs.

Objectives

We examined disparities by exposure to CAFOs using several environmental justice metrics and considering potentially vulnerable subpopulations.

Methods

We obtained data on permitted animal facilities from NC Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ). Using ZIP code level variables from the 2010 Census, we evaluated environmental disparities by eight environmental justice metrics (i.e., percentage of Non-Hispanic White, Non-Hispanic Black, or Hispanic; percentage living below the poverty level; median household income; percentage with education less than high school diploma; racial residential isolation (RI) for Non-Hispanic Black; and educational residential isolation (ERI) for population without college degree). We applied two approaches to assign CAFOs exposure for each ZIP code: (1) a count method based on the number of CAFOs within ZIP code; and (2) a buffer method based on the area-weighted number of CAFOs using a 15 km buffer.

Results

Spatial distributions of CAFOs exposure generally showed similar patterns between the two exposure methods. However, some ZIP codes had different estimated CAFOs exposure for the different approaches, with higher exposure when using the buffer method. Our findings indicate that CAFOs are located disproportionately in communities with higher percentage of minorities and in low-income communities. Distributions of environmental justice metrics generally showed similar patterns for both exposure methods, however starker disparities were observed using a buffer method.

Conclusions

Our findings of the disproportionate location of CAFOs provide evidence of environmental disparities with respect to race and socioeconomic status in NC and have implications for future studies of environmental and health impacts of CAFOs.

中文翻译：

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美国北卡罗来纳州接触 CAFO 的环境正义指标分布

背景

几项研究报告了关于暴露于集中动物饲养操作 (CAFO) 的环境差异。集约化畜牧业对环境正义的公共卫生影响在美国北卡罗来纳州 (NC) 受到高度关注，该州拥有大量和广泛的 CAFO 历史。

目标

我们使用几个环境正义指标并考虑潜在的脆弱亚群，通过接触 CAFO 来检查差异。

方法

我们从北卡罗来纳州环境质量部 (DEQ) 获得了有关允许的动物设施的数据。使用 2010 年人口普查中的邮政编码级别变量，我们通过八项环境正义指标（即非西班牙裔白人、非西班牙裔黑人或西班牙裔的百分比；生活在贫困线以下的百分比；家庭收入中位数；与教育程度低于高中文凭；非西班牙裔黑人的种族居住隔离 (RI)；以及没有大学学历的人群的教育居住隔离 (ERI)。我们应用了两种方法来为每个邮政编码分配 CAFO 暴露：（1）基于邮政编码内 CAFO 数量的计数方法；(2) 基于面积加权 CAFO 数量的缓冲方法，使用 15 公里缓冲。

结果

CAFOs 暴露的空间分布通常在两种暴露方法之间显示出相似的模式。但是，对于不同的方法，一些邮政编码的 CAFO 暴露量估计值不同，使用缓冲法时暴露量更高。我们的研究结果表明，CAFO 不成比例地分布在少数族裔比例较高的社区和低收入社区。环境正义指标的分布通常显示两种暴露方法的相似模式，但是使用缓冲方法观察到更明显的差异。

结论

我们对 CAFO 位置不成比例的研究结果为北卡罗来纳州种族和社会经济地位方面的环境差异提供了证据，并对 CAFO 对环境和健康影响的未来研究产生了影响。