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industrial agriculture
Behind the USDA's Regenerative Rhetoric Lurks Business as Usual
Secretary Rollins praises American farmers’ independence while advancing policies that strip them of market protections and empower their largest competitors.
Dec 23, 2025
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, in her recent USA Today and Newsweek opinion pieces, has worked hard to present herself as a champion of American farmers and a steward of healthier food options. Alongside Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., she spoke of the values these farmers embody—independence, grit, patriotism—and celebrated a $700 million regenerative agriculture initiative as proof that this administration is delivering for rural America.
But if you pull back the curtain on Secretary Rollins and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), the narrative changes. What looks like a bold vision for “regeneration” quickly reveals itself as a political performance designed to distract from the USDA’s business-as-usual that props up industrial agriculture, not family farmers.
Secretary Rollins held up Alexandre Family Farm as the face of America’s regenerative future. But the truth: The farm is under scrutiny for animal abuse so severe it stands in direct contradiction to everything regenerative agriculture represents.
A USDA investigation obtained through the Freedom of Information Act documented multiple violations of organic and animal-welfare standards. The company has since admitted to serious abuses—including cows dragged with machinery, horn-tipping without pain relief, a teat cut off an animal with mastitis, diesel poured on animals, and animals dying after being left without adequate feed and care. No amount of marketing can turn that into regeneration. It is factory farming with better lighting.
A healthy America requires new, bold regenerative policies, not branding.
Choosing that farm as the model for USDA’s regenerative agenda signals to large industrial livestock companies that even amid serious animal cruelty, the USDA will still hand them a spotlight—and, in many cases, more public dollars. It also sends a message to the farmers Secretary Rollins claims to represent: Their government will not reward those who do the hard, unglamorous work of true regenerative agriculture. Instead, it will reward those who invest in scale, branding, and access, not better practices.
Secretary Rollins frequently praised states as “laboratories of innovation,” a sentiment that should have encouraged rural communities. Yet she is pushing the EATS Act and its twin, the Save Our Bacon Act—federal preemption bills that would wipe out states’ ability to regulate for safer, healthier, and more humane agricultural products sold within their borders. Notably, EATS and SOBA face bipartisan opposition from more than 200 senators and representatives in Congress.
You cannot celebrate state innovation while trying to make it illegal.
Backed by the factory-farm-aligned National Pork Producers Council, both bills would undermine more than 1,000 state health, safety, and animal-welfare laws. These bills would give the largest global agribusinesses the power to override local standards and flood American markets with cheap, low-welfare meat. And they would directly undercut the regenerative and higher-welfare family farms she claims to support.
The USDA’s $700 million regenerative package reveals the same pattern. In reality, it is a drop in the bucket. For decades, federal policy has pumped tens of billions of dollars into the nation’s largest factory farms. From 2018 to 2023 alone, the top 10,000 livestock feeding operations—mostly CAFOs—captured more than $12 billion in federal aid. The largest 10% of producers now take nearly 80% of subsidies, while small and midsize farms receive nothing.
Secretary Rollins knows this—yet her policies do nothing to change it.
The contradiction is glaring: She praises American farmers’ independence while advancing policies that strip them of market protections and empower their largest competitors. She leads an agency that celebrates rural resilience while continuing to concentrate power and resources in the hands of giant corporations.
True regenerative agriculture—the kind practiced by real farm families—requires pasture, biodiversity, humane animal treatment, and a financial landscape where independent farmers can survive. But these farmers are forced to compete against industrial operations that are more heavily subsidized and are now welcomed to call themselves “regenerative” regardless of their animal handling and herd-management practices.
Across the United States, regenerative ranchers, pasture-based dairies, higher-welfare hog farmers, and diversified small producers are already showing what a healthier and more resilient US food system can look like. Consumers want this shift. States are supporting it. Rural communities depend on it. Yet the USDA continues to position factory farming as the American standard—and now as the regenerative standard.
If this administration truly wants to protect American farmers, the path forward is clear.
Stop calling industrial operations regenerative when they are not. Stop pushing federal legislation that handcuffs states and abandons small producers. Stop directing billions toward industrial livestock giants while offering pennies to the people doing the real work of regeneration. And start listening—to independent farmers fighting consolidation, rural communities bearing the cost of industrial expansion, and consumers demanding humane treatment of animals.
A healthy America requires new, bold regenerative policies, not branding. We welcome Secretary Rollins to bring forward those types of policies.
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The $2 Billion Question: Is World Bank’s IFC Enabling Environmental Damage?
The troubling question isn't whether IFC has environmental policies. It does; the question is whether these policies mean anything when clients consistently fail to comply and the public can't verify whether promised improvements ever materialize.
Dec 14, 2025
When the International Finance Corporation, or IFC—the World Bank's private-sector lending arm—invests in developing countries, it promises to uphold rigorous environmental safeguards. But our new analysis of $2 billion in livestock investments reveals an alarming gap between policy and practice that should concern anyone who cares about climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental accountability.
Between 2020 and 2025, the IFC pumped nearly $2 billion into 38 industrial meat, dairy, and feed projects across developing countries. These investments expanded factory farming operations at a time when scientific consensus highlights the urgency of transitioning away from industrial livestock production to protect both people and planet.
The troubling question isn't whether IFC has environmental policies. It does—robust ones, in fact, that 56 other development banks and 130 financial institutions use as benchmarks. The question is whether these policies mean anything when clients consistently fail to comply and the public can't verify whether promised improvements ever materialize.
The Compliance Crisis
Our latest report, Unsustainable Investment Part 2, analyzed publicly disclosed environmental risk assessment summaries for all 38 projects, evaluating whether IFC clients adhered to the bank's own requirements for managing biodiversity loss, pollution, and resource use. The findings are sobering.
On biodiversity, most projects offered superficial habitat assessments without the detailed analysis needed to identify critical or natural habitats. Not a single project demonstrated deliberate avoidance of high-value ecosystems—the most important step in preventing irreversible damage. Out of 10 projects facing supply-chain risks from habitat conversion, only 2 reported plans to establish traceability and transition away from destructive suppliers. This matters because industrial livestock threatens over 21,000 species and is the primary driver of deforestation globally.
Without transparent, ongoing disclosure, environmental safeguards become little more than paperwork exercises.
For pollution, the gaps were equally stark. Only one project assessed both ambient conditions and cumulative impacts as required. A few projects also reported exceeding national and international standards for air emissions and wastewater discharge at the time of approval. While many promised future improvements, there's no public evidence these promises were kept. Meanwhile, 29 projects provided no reporting whatsoever on solid waste management compliance—a glaring gap in transparency.
On resource use, the patterns continued. Only one project applied the full water use reduction hierarchy, with most reporting no evidence of even attempting to avoid unnecessary water consumption. This inefficiency is staggering: Industrial livestock uses 33-40% of agriculture's water to produce just 18% of the world's calories.
These findings build on our first Unsustainable Investment report examining client adherence to climate change related requirements. The gaps in adherence to disclosure and mitigation requirements were significant—despite IFC's commitment to align 100% of new investments with the Paris Agreement starting June 2026. For disclosure, while 68% of clients disclosed emissions, the reporting was highly inconsistent. Some reported only Scope 1 or Scope 2; others aggregated both scopes when they should have been separated. For mitigation, over 60% of projects failed to reduce emissions intensity below national averages. And zero projects—out of all 38—managed physical climate risks in their supply chains, despite industrial livestock's extreme vulnerability to climate change.
The Transparency Problem
Perhaps the most concerning discovery is what we couldn't find: evidence of what happens after approval.
IFC's Environmental and Social Action Plans outline corrective measures that clients legally commit to implement over time. Many projects included plans to install pollution controls, improve resource efficiency, or enhance biodiversity management. But IFC doesn't systematically report whether these measures were actually implemented or whether they proved effective.
This absence of verification creates a dangerous accountability vacuum. Without transparent, ongoing disclosure, environmental safeguards become little more than paperwork exercises—compliance theater that manages reputational risk rather than environmental impact.
The Systemic Stakes
This matters far beyond IFC's portfolio. As the world's largest development finance institution focused on emerging economies, IFC functions as a standard setter. When IFC finances industrial livestock expansion despite weak compliance with environmental requirements, it sends a signal to global markets that such investments are "sustainable"—even when evidence suggests otherwise.
Consider the context: Industrial livestock contributes up to 20% of global greenhouse gas emissions, occupies 70% of agricultural land, and drives the planetary boundary transgressions that scientists warn threaten Earth's capacity to support human civilization. The World Bank's own 2024 report, Recipe for a Livable Planet, acknowledges that "to protect our planet, we need to transform the way we produce and consume food."
Yet IFC continues to invest billions in expanding the very systems the World Bank identifies as unsustainable. Civil society organizations have repeatedly documented environmental and social harms from IFC-financed factory farms in Ecuador, Brazil, China, and Mongolia—harm that occurs despite IFC's safeguards being applied.
A Path Forward
This isn't an argument against development finance. It's a call for development finance that actually delivers sustainable development.
IFC must fundamentally reassess whether industrial livestock expansion is compatible with its mission. The institution should redirect financing toward food production systems that are demonstrably sustainable—agroecological approaches, diversified farming systems, and plant-based proteins that can deliver food security without exacerbating environmental crises.
Equally urgent: IFC must mandate full, transparent disclosure of environmental compliance throughout project lifecycles—not just at approval. Independent verification and meaningful consequences for non-compliance must replace the current honor system. Without enforcement, the world's most influential environmental safeguards are effectively optional.
Billions in public development finance continue flowing to industrial operations that drive climate change, biodiversity collapse, pollution, and resource depletion.
The stakes extend beyond any single institution. With IFC's president announcing plans to double annual agribusiness investments to $9 billion by 2030, and the Paris Agreement alignment deadline now extended to June 2026, the window for course correction is rapidly closing.
As 130 financial institutions benchmark their own environmental standards against IFC's Performance Standards, the compliance failures we've documented likely exist throughout the development finance sector. Systemic problems require systemic solutions.
The Bottom Line
The evidence is clear: IFC's environmental safeguards are robust on paper but weakened by inconsistent client adherence, limited transparency, and absent enforcement. The current approach manages compliance risk rather than environmental impact—a fundamental misalignment with both IFC's stated mission and the urgent imperatives of our environmental moment.
Seven of nine planetary boundaries have already been breached. The Earth system is under unprecedented stress. Yet billions in public development finance continue flowing to industrial operations that drive climate change, biodiversity collapse, pollution, and resource depletion.
The question isn't whether IFC can afford to change course. It's whether we can afford for it not to.
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Why Climate Action Must Start on Our Plates
Rebalancing industrial animal farming cuts emissions, limits disease risk, protects biodiversity, and strengthens food security, reminding us that human, animal, and planetary well-being are inseparable.
Nov 10, 2025
Every year, world leaders gather to tackle the climate crisis. They promise to cut emissions, restore forests, and invest in a greener future. Yet one of the most powerful tools for change often goes unmentioned: the food on our plates.
After more than a decade of working in, and with, the United Nations, I’ve learned something crucial: Food sits at the center of everything we are trying to protect—our climate, biodiversity, health, and livelihoods. This year, for the first time, food systems are formally part of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference of Parties (UNFCCC COP30) Action Agenda—a long-overdue recognition of their central role in solving the climate crisis. Still, too often, they remain the missing piece in global climate discussions.
The science is clear. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates that food systems—from how we grow and process food to how we transport and waste it—account for about a third of global greenhouse gas emissions.
The message is simple: We cannot fix the climate crisis while ignoring what we eat.
A Hopeful Solution Within Reach
This reality should give us hope. Food offers a solution that is immediate, inclusive, and within reach. Every meal is a chance to make things better.
Plant-rich eating is not a trend or a restriction. It is a climate solution, backed by science and rooted in fairness. Research in Nature shows plant-rich diets produce 75% less climate-heating emissions compared with high-meat diets, while using 75% less land and 54% less water. By eating this way, we can cut global food emissions by nearly one-third, improve public health, and ease the pressure on forests and ecosystems.
As negotiations unfold in Belém, COP30 offers a historic opportunity to embed food systems into the heart of climate policy.
But consumption is only part of the picture. World leaders must change how food is produced. Industrial farming, which relies heavily on deforestation and feed crop production, drives much of the problem. At COP30, hosted in Brazil, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has pledged bold action to protect forests, including a $1 billion commitment to the Tropical Forests Forever Fund. Reducing the expansion of soy and maize for feed—a major driver of deforestation—is essential not only for reducing emissions, but also for helping communities adapt, especially in vulnerable regions.
At Compassion in World Farming, we see this every day in our work with farmers, policymakers, and communities. Agroecological and regenerative practices, such as crop rotation, help restore soils and reduce the need for synthetic fertilizers. They also align with traditional and Indigenous knowledge that works with nature rather than against it.
Why This Matters to Me
As a father of a Gen Alpha child, I think about what kind of planet my daughter will inherit. We eat three times a day, every day, and we will do it for the rest of our lives. Our choices shape whether her world is sustainable or fragile.
I have been part of countless UN meetings and summits on climate, food systems, and sustainable development. In the past year, I have witnessed growing momentum across the UN system to integrate food into climate discussions, especially following the UN Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) and the COP28 Declaration on Food and Agriculture’s recommendations. This shift is encouraging and signals the world is ready to treat food systems as central to climate action.
When I look at my daughter’s future, I want to believe that we will have the courage to connect these dots: to see that what we grow and eat is not just personal preference but global policy.
What Leaders Must Do
At COP30 in Belém, governments have a chance to change course. To do so, they must:
- Integrate food into climate plans. Countries’ climate pledges, known as Nationally Determined Contributions, should include agriculture, livestock, strategies to eat more sustainably, and reducing food waste. They must move away from industrial farming and feed crop expansion toward regenerative agricultural practices that cut emissions and build resilience.
- Make plant-rich diets a climate priority. This is not about telling people what to eat but enabling sustainable, lower-emission choices that realistically align with the planet’s ecological boundaries. In practical terms, the recently launched EAT-Lancet 2.0 report, supported by leading scientists and policymakers, offers a clear and actionable framework for countries to adopt healthier, climate-friendly diets.
- Support farmers through a just transition. Those least responsible for climate change, who tend to be the most vulnerable populations, must be supported with finance, capacity building, and fair access to markets.
These shifts must fit local realities. In the Global South, diets, cultural traditions, and nutritional needs vary widely. Supporting plant-rich diets must go hand in hand with respecting local contexts and ensuring food sovereignty.
A New Kind of Climate Leadership
Reframing food as climate action must include the recognition that human, animal, and planetary health are deeply connected and dependent. Rebalancing industrial animal farming cuts emissions, limits disease risk, protects biodiversity, and strengthens food security, reminding us that human, animal, and planetary well-being are inseparable.
As negotiations unfold in Belém, COP30 offers a historic opportunity to embed food systems into the heart of climate policy—not just as a mitigation tool, but as a pathway for adaptation, resilience, and equity. Global action on food must reflect its true potential: to drive down emissions, regenerate ecosystems, and chart a more sustainable future for everyone.
This is the climate leadership we need: bold, inclusive, and rooted in the principle that climate action begins with what we eat.
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