FOURTEEN days and nights after they blocked the gate of a huge ranch, the villagers of Tongshan County in central China’s Hubei Province finally backed off in late November when the ranching company signed an agreement with the local government promising to move the ranch by July 2015.

In the two weeks, the villagers protested the pollution caused by the ranch since its introduction of thousands of cows in early 2011.

This marked the third crisis in November for the Modern Farming company, after its ranch in Feidong County of Anhui Province was fined for pollution and a ranch in Baoji, Shaanxi Province, was accused of selling sick cows.

China has 56 ranches with over 10,000 livestock each, a huge portion of the world’s total. The number will reach 100 within two or three years, according to Wang Dingmian, a director at the China Dairy Association.

“About 80 percent of the huge-scale ranches are now in China, most of which were just built in recent years,” says Wang.

But with such big enterprises come big problems, and issues like epidemic prevention and pollution have caused crises for many of these mega ranches.

Established in 2005, Modern Farming set up the first huge ranch in the Anhui city of Ma’anshan in 2006, thus setting off a wave of huge-scale ranches nationwide. Though some professionals warned about the difficulties in tackling pollution, foods and diseases at these pastures, dozens popped up in China quickly, aided by regional governments.

The Modern Farming ranch in Tongshan County in 2010 is a case study. Expecting to shake off poverty by introducing big companies to the county, the local government offered a very generous package to Modern Farming. It included providing 1,000 mu (67 hectares) of land for 50 years free of charge, offering 50 million yuan (US$8 million) for the project construction as well as completing infrastructure of water, electricity, roads and communication facilities to the farm boundary.

However, with thousands of cows brought to the ranch since 2011, pollution arrived far ahead of wealth. Abundant excrement and biogas fluids were discharged wantonly, resulting in stinky water and countless flies and mosquitoes.

As the ranch failed to keep its promise to reform the way it dealt with waste, villagers blocked the entry, preventing feedstuff from getting in and milk from getting out. During the 2-week blockade, some 60 cows died and 2,000 tons of milk went down the drain.

The villagers kept protesting until the local government and Modern Farming made concessions on November 28, agreeing to move all the cows and shut down the pasture next July.

The continuing scandals have not only tarnished the image of Modern Farming but also represented a warning about the sudden emergence of giant ranches in recent years.

The scandal in 2008 in which melamine was found in milk powder helped catalyze the quick development of giant pastures in China, because collecting milk from small farms without proper examination was a major reason for the melamine problem.

Statistics from the Ministry of Agriculture show the demand for raw milk in China in 2014 will be 49 million tons, a 3-million-ton increase from the previous year. And demand keeps rising; by 2020, the consumption of fresh milk will reach 60 million tons, the ministry projects.

Modern Farming alone runs 22 mega ranches with 200,000 cows altogether, while other dairy companies like Feihe Diary also own several huge pastures.

Such giant pastures, despite their popularity among enterprises and governments, have long been questioned by experts throughout the years. Raising cows is a high-pollution industry, and such mega ranches overburden the local environment, as dairy expert Song Liang told the Oriental Morning Post.

“A pasture of 10,000 cows will produce about 400 tons of stool and 200 tons of urine every day, which will result in more than 200,000 tons of excrement every year,” said Song. “It is very difficult for an agricultural region with a condensed population to degrade such a huge amount of excrement. Pollution just seems to be inevitable.”

Excrement has been found near Modern Farming pastures in Tongshan, Baoji, Ma’anshan, Hongya and Feidong, filling the air with a stinky smell.

“It is not always the bigger the better,” says Yang Liguo, vice president of the China Dairy Association. “The bigger scale the pasture is, the more difficult it is to take control of the pollution, disease and cost. It is a fact.”

Data from 2011 show that New Zealand’s 11,600 pastures raise an average of just 370 cows, while the number is only 113 for the 969 pastures in Israel.

A competitive spirit — not reasonable planning — among regional governments has played a big role in the quick development of huge-scale pastures in China, Yang says.

And many dairy companies also take huge-scale pastures a great opportunity for propaganda, says Wang Dingmian from the China Diary Association.

A local government official told reporters of the Oriental Morning Post that they hadn’t expected the conflict between the pasture and the villagers would lead to such chaos.

Yet removing the pasture is really not a solution, according to Yang, who says it is simply kicking it down the road to some other locale.

“It is like treating the head when the head aches and treating the foot when the foot hurts,” says Yang. “Moving the pasture whenever a problem occurs will do nothing but hurt the industry.”

There also may be a hitch in the compromise. As written in the investment agreement between the company and local government, either side should pay a 5-million-yuan penalty when breaking the contract.

No official announcement on the issue has been made so far, but a local official suggests that a top executive of the company mentioned the compensation clause during the negotiation with the Tongshan government.

• Big-head babies

Two infants with big heads and puffy bodies in Fuyang of Anhui Province were sent to the hospital in early 2003. Both infants were fed only milk formula, and doctors’ suspicions about phony milk powder were confirmed via test results by quality inspection departments.

It turned out that the “milk powder” really wasn’t milk at all but made instead from maltodextrin, a thickening agent and food additive. That meant these infants were getting no nutrition.

A total of 13 babies died and about 171 were found suffering diarrhea and serious malnutrition after eating similar milk formula. A dozen babies with big heads got treatment in local hospitals.

• Tainted steamed buns

Shanghai Shenglu Food Company reused expired steamed buns and added a coloring agent to produce maize-steamed buns in April 2011.

The expired buns were collected, ground and made into new buns. A great amount of preservatives were used in the process, and coloring agents were used in the case of maize or wheat buns.

Though such buns may not directly result in discomfort, long-term eating will definitely damage health, experts said. The buns were sold in more than 30 supermarkets in Shanghai, and all were called off shelves.

• Beef extract

Industrial and commercial officials of Anhui Province found beef extract was widely used as an addictive in small, dried meat floss workshops in April 2011. Reporters later discovered beef extract also being used in delicatessens and noodle restaurants in Fuzhou, Guangzhou and Nanjing.

The beef extract, soluble in water, was an open secret among the small workshops to “turn” pork into the more expensive beef. Experts suggest that overuse of beef extract can lead to cancer.

• Toxic capsules

Some processing plants in Hebei Province were reported to produce capsules from waste leathers in April 2012. The waste leathers were made into industrial gelatin and thus made into capsules for medicine.

Since tanning agents with chromium as a major content were widely used in leather for industrial use, the capsules made from waste leathers contained large amounts of chromium that far exceeded the standard.

Thirteen batches of such toxic capsules were used by nine pharmaceutical factories across the country.