Animals farmed: welcome to our series

There has been a revolution in the way we produce and consume meat and fish. Chicken, beef, pork or salmon were once rare Sunday-at-best luxuries. Now billions of people around the world can afford to eat fish and meat daily. Intensive farming has made this possible: the realisation that money could be saved – and prices driven down – by increasing the scale of production, and reducing exposure to what were once seen as essential components of farming, such as sunshine, quality of life for the animals, space and natural grazing. A new artificial lifecycle was introduced instead: electric lights to simulate day and night, heating systems to simulate seasons, selective breeding to speed up growth and fattening. Eggs are hatched on factory belts, chickens are kept in sheds and cages, pigs spend some of their lives in crates, cows are reared in barns. Some farmers stayed small – but not all could not match the cost savings of this model. Some got larger and larger. Farmers became business people. Business people bought out other farmers. In the process they made animal protein available to millions.