City dwellers are more likely than rural residents to regard livestock operations as environmentally harmful and to have concerns about impacts on water quality, say Purdue researchers who surveyed 797 Indiana adults during July 2014. Nearly two-thirds of Hoosiers live in urban counties. The survey found that rural and urban residents follow the same patterns when it comes to where they buy food (supermarkets, mostly), the portion of the population that has a home garden and in their sources of information about animal agriculture. Indiana ranks fifth in U.S. hog production and 10th in overall agricultural production.
But urbanites expressed greater concern about the environmental effects of livestock farms. “Residents of rural counties have more favorable views towards livestock production and growth in general, compared to residents of urban counties. It could be hypothesized that the more favorable view by rural residents is due, at least in part, to their more direct linkages to food production and agriculture than their urban counterparts,” said the report. The lead author of the report, Ann Cummings, said in a Purdue release, “Given agriculture’s importance to Indiana, understanding the views of residents in both rural and urban settings is necessary for decision makers.”