How Many Animals are Factory Farmed?
Factory Farming, carried out in CAFOs or Animal Factories, describes the intensive confinement of large numbers of animals in industrial systems designed to maximise output at minimum cost, prioritising profit over the animals' needs and behaviours
Global Factory Farming
>90% of farmed animals worldwide live on factory farms, including:
74% of all farmed land animals (vertebrates only).
Virtually 100% of farmed fish are "factory farmed".
An estimated 23 billion land animals are in a factory farming environment at any given time, globally.
Source: Sentience Institute, Global Farmed & Factory Farmed Animals Estimates
📷: Terrace Farm Free Range Eggs, NSW - ©Animally 2026
United States
Around 99% of farmed animals in the US live in animal factories.
Cattle: 74.9% (combined use of meat and dairy)
Pigs: 98.6%
Egg-laying hens: 98.3%
Turkeys: 99.8%
Meat chickens: over 99.9%
Source: Sentience Institute, updated November 2024, based on the 2022 USDA Census of Agriculture.
Australia
No Australian government, industry, or advocacy body publishes one national percentage of all farmed animals in factory farms¹. Some species-level data is available:
Pigs: Around 90% are housed indoors for every stage of production².
Chickens farmed for meat: Effectively all 'meat' chickens are reared in intensive sheds holding 40,000 to 60,000 birds each. Approximately 756 million were slaughtered in the year to June 2025³.
Hens farmed for eggs: Australia is home to approximately 24.9 million egg-laying hens at any one time. An RSPCA estimate puts caged hens at 65 to 70% of the total⁸. Battery cages are legislated to phase out nationally by 2036.
Turkeys: Housed in sheds of 8,000 to 14,000 birds, at 4 to 5 birds per square metre⁴. Annual slaughter figures of 3 to 5 million are commonly cited but unverified⁵.
Ducks: Dominated by two intensive producers, Pepe's Ducks in New South Wales and Luv-a-Duck in Victoria, each processing 70,000 to over 100,000 birds per week⁶. Both companies were found guilty by the Federal Court of Australia in 2013 of misleading consumers by implying outdoor access when their ducks were, in fact, permanently confined indoors. Pepe's Ducks was fined up to $400,000; Luv-a-Duck was fined $360,000⁷.
Cattle farmed for meat: Almost 40% of Australian cattle pass through a feedlot before slaughter⁹, and about 80% of meat sold in major domestic supermarkets is feedlot-finished¹⁰. Cattle typically spend 50 to 120 days on feed¹¹. A record 9.28 million cattle were slaughtered nationally in 2025, the highest since 1978¹².
Farmed salmon: Tasmania supplies over 90% of Australian Atlantic salmon production, 75,000 to over 83,000 tonnes annually, almost entirely from intensive sea cage systems¹³.
United Kingdom
Over a billion animals are confined in factory farms in the UK every year: 85% of all UK farmed animals. The number of UK factory farms rose 12% between 2016 and 2023, with large pig and poultry units up 20% over the same period.
Source: Compassion in World Farming, Factory Farming Map: relaunched February 2024, compiled from Freedom of Information requests, planning documents, and on-location verification.
Page last reviewed: August 2026
Sources
No single Australian government, industry, or peer-reviewed source publishes a national factory-farming percentage across all species; the absence is the source.
Australian Pork, Indoor system farming. https://australianpork.com.au/about-pig-farming/indoor-system-farming
Australian Chicken Meat Federation, Facts and figures. https://www.chicken.org.au/facts-and-figures/
RSPCA Australia Knowledgebase, How are turkeys farmed in Australia? https://kb.rspca.org.au/knowledge-base/how-are-turkeys-farmed-in-australia/ ; The Poultry Site, Raising Turkeys. https://www.thepoultrysite.com/articles/raising-turkeys
Unverified. Commonly cited figures (3 to 5 million/year) trace to Animal Liberation ACT campaign material only; no ABS, ABARES, or industry breakout for turkey-specific slaughter numbers was found.
PoultryHub Australia, Duck. https://www.poultryhub.org/all-about-poultry/species/duck
Federal Court of Australia, Australian Competition and Consumer Commission v Pepe's Ducks Ltd [2013] FCA 570; Australian Competition and Consumer Commission v Luv-a-Duck Pty Ltd [2013] FCA 1136.
Australian Eggs, Egg Industry. https://www.australianeggs.org.au/egg-industry ; RSPCA Australia Knowledgebase, What is the RSPCA doing to get hens out of battery cages? https://kb.rspca.org.au/knowledge-base/what-is-the-rspca-doing-to-get-hens-out-of-battery-cages/
Meat & Livestock Australia, ALFA/MLA Quarterly Lot Feeding Brief (as cited in MLA Fast Facts 2025, Australia's Beef Industry, published October 2025). https://www.mla.com.au/prices-markets/Trends-analysis/fast-facts/
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, Cattle and beef market study: Final report, March 2017.
Australian Lot Feeders' Association, industry overview. https://www.feedlots.com.au/overview
Meat & Livestock Australia, ABS data confirms record beef production and strong livestock supply in 2025. https://www.mla.com.au/news-and-events/industry-news/abs-data-confirms-record-beef-production-and-strong-livestock-supply-in-2025/
Tasmanian Department of Natural Resources and Environment, Salmon Farming. https://nre.tas.gov.au/aquaculture/aquaculture-species-in-tasmania/salmon-farming
