“Agriculture is the largest single industry in Missouri. About 35 million acres or 80 percent of Missouri’s land area is employed in farming. . . There are 266,000 persons employed as operators or farm workers on Missouri’s 165,000 farms” (Missouri Department of Agriculture, n.d.). Agriculture not only significantly helps Missouri as a state, but also helps the people living there as well. Providing jobs is an important advantage to living in a farming state. “Swine is produced in every county in Missouri, with the primary concentration being found in areas with large acreages of corn and other grains” (Ibid). Livestock is an integral part of Missouri’s agriculture, especially pigs which are raised in every county …show more content…
These technologies are helping the environment, but public opinion does not see that. Consumers, theoretically, should be able to trust the new technologies. They need knowledge on them from a credible source. “Consumers often believe that modern agriculture has a more negative environmental impact than traditional agricultural practices of the mid-1900s. Virtually all agricultural practices have decreased their environmental footprint on a per product basis. The US beef industry in 2007 used 70% of animals, 81% of the feed, 88% of water, and 67% of the land than what was used to produce the same amount of product in 1977” (Woolpert, …show more content…
In addition to that, data from the Consumer Reports National Research Center showed that 52% of consumers found better living conditions for animals to be “very important” and 32% still found it to be “important.” Many other animal welfare surveys conducted in different years showcased very similar results. In June 2008, a survey carried out by the Humane Research Council, the majority (73%) said they would support laws requiring enough space for pigs, cows, and chickens to behave naturally. CommonGround, a farmer organization, supplied research that showed that more than half of moms are willing to pay more for hormone-free meat products. Interestingly enough, the USDA prohibits the use of hormones to raise chickens and pigs, so consumers are mostly paying for an assuring label (A Consumer’s Guide to Food Labels and Animal Welfare, 2016). This misunderstanding is just one example of marketing techniques used to persuade their strategic