Popular Netflix documentaries such as “Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret” and “Vegucated” urge viewers to trade in their carnivorous lifestyles for plant-based diets.

These documentaries highlight facts arguing against factory farming, more correctly known as integrated farming, to support plant-based diets.

What is integrated farming?

“A farm that is basically owned by the same family or the same shareholding company from start to finish,” said Trey Kellner, graduate student in animal science. “They have ownership of the sows, and the offspring, and those pigs that are then grown out and then the harvesting facility and the distribution.”

Kellner focuses on swine health, and a major aspiration of his would be to work for a large integrator.

“I have a lot of friends who are vegetarian or vegan,” Kellner said. “I always ask why because I think it’s always important to listen, not necessarily persuade.”

Kellner asks why because he believes animal agriculture has a good story that hasn’t been told.

The so-called factory farms have a reputation for being overcrowded, and perhaps more troubling to some people, are indoors.

“The reason that we raise [animals] indoors is to keep their thermal regulation constant, and that is a win-win,” Kellner said.

Since the animals are kept thermoregulated, they are better able to maintain their health status. Energy is a large component of how meat is purchased. Using pigs as an example, in the cold, they shiver to keep warm.

This act expends extra energy and is less efficient from a farming perspective.

Keeping animals enclosed and away from outside factors ensures a higher level of biosecurity and keeps disease from running rampant among them.

Many people prefer the romanticized version of farming, with the entire family working together, and integrated farming still employs some of the same tactics.

Many of these farms are still family-owned, but they allow for much more diverse workers, both in ethnicity and gender. There are now opportunities to work at farms that were previously never available, due in part to their larger size.

One argument against plant-based diets is the nutritional value of animal protein. Without animal protein, people must depend on alternatives such as soy protein, and must find alternative sources for vitamins, minerals and calories. These alternative sources would have environmental impacts.

“We would need a lot more land, and we’d have to farm a lot more land,” Kellner said. “That [increase in] land, in a Capper Study in 2008, has shown that the carbon footprint would increase twofold.”

While the environmental effects play into the story, veganism and vegetarianism still have known health benefits. Thanks to these benefits, coupled with ethical reasonings, the lifestyles are on the rise.

A vegan diet can help reduce critical issues such as obesity, heart disease, diabetes and cancer, according to The Vegan Society.

Tanner Wahlin, president of the Ethical Eating Club and junior in women’s studies, has been vegan for almost three years. It started his senior year of high school, when he was working on losing weight.

“That led me to read more about healthy eating, and so I got curious about healthy eating and being a vegetarian for that reason,” Wahlin said. “The more I read about it, the more arguments for [the] ethical and environmental side of things that I encountered.”

After a few months of research, Wahlin knew he needed to go vegan.

“There was a transition period where I had to learn how to cook my own food,” Wahlin said of the difficulties of changing his lifestyle.

It took him four to five months to fully transition from eating meat to cutting out all animal products.

While Wahlin didn’t find veganism difficult to follow in high school, things became more challenging his freshman year of college while he lived on campus.

“The vegan options [on campus] are not very good,” Wahlin said. “But now that I’m not living in a dorm anymore it’s a lot easier because I have a kitchen.”

Wahlin has heard the options have improved since his freshman year, but he and other vegan and vegetarian students feel there isn’t enough care put into the dishes. 

“Personally, I would really appreciate vegan-baked goods at the cafés,” Wahlin said.

The number of students eating these special diets is on the rise.

Union Drive Marketplace has always been campus’s special diet facility, meaning it caters to students who have restricted diets. This is done through a special diet kitchen.

While the special diet kitchen serves students who are vegetarians and vegans, it also serves those who have medically-necessary altered diets. Medically-necessary diets range from those that help with celiac disease to doctor-ordered diets.

In recent years, students who practice veganism and vegetarianism have also been presented with more options through Simple Plate at Union Drive Marketplace.

Simple Plate serves gluten-free entrees and includes one vegan option per day. Through student feedback, Simple Plate serves meals with complete carbohydrates so students can get their whole meal in one spot.

“We try to incorporate more beans, nuts of those sorts, so if [students] are eating vegan, they are getting a complete meal,” said Jeremy Bowker, chef de cuisine of Campus Dining Services.

Aside from Simple Plate, students with plant-based diets can find more options across the rest of the dining center, including vegan pasta sauce and noodles.

While feedback is always welcome, even encouraged, the menu is planned six months in advance and is hard to change quickly.