Even the confinement of chickens, pigs and cattle to indoor barns and batteries, though it troubles the consciences (mine included) of those who care for animal welfare, undoubtedly results in more meat produced from less feed with less pollution and less disease. When bird flu threatened, it was free-range flocks of chickens, not battery farms, that were at greatest risk. Some intensive farming of animals is unacceptably cruel; but some is no worse than some kinds of free-range farming, and its environmental impact is undoubtedly smaller.
