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If your experience with confinement pigs that can't walk was even remotely a significant labor issue that would come close to comparing with non confinement labor requirements, you likely had other issues going on. Confinement operations with that sort of problem don't stay in business very long in the real world. (apparently yours did not either) Those working in successful confinement operations are very good at what they do. You don't get 13 born live, 12 pig weaning averages, 30 pigs per sow per year, low wean to finish death loss with good growth rates and feed efficiency without taking good care of the animals and keeping their stress low without knowing what you are doing. Your experience with confinement production seems to be very much lacking.
We grow the corn and beans here in the midwest that can feed a lot of hogs. Those same corn and beans can also utilize the manure produced by those hogs. There are very few places in the world that can do that with the number of hogs that we raise in the midwest. Sure, you can raise a few pigs most anywhere and preach about how it should be done everywhere else, but the world's population is a lot higher than it was 100 years ago. That means most of the pigs need to be raised more efficiently than they were in the past. If the outdoor production was really so great, we would still be doing it that way. People spend a lot of money on confinement facilities because it is worth doing compared to other systems.
We don't raise the number of pigs necessary for our population in an environmentally sound way without confinement production. If you were raising these numbers with outdoor pigs, they would be crapping and rooting all over all year round. If people think a few million pigs in confinement is such an environmental issue, they would really have a fit if these same millions of pigs were running freely outdoors on every farm up and down the road. Sure, you can raise a few that way, but it would be an environmental disaster if we all did it. Outdoor pigs cost more to raise because they don't utilize resources efficiently. The environmental impact per pig is much higher with outdoor pigs.
Back when the household only needed 20 grand a year to live on, 100 sown farrow to finish could work. Now, health insurance alone can cost 20 grand per year. 100 sows farrow to finish does not pencil out like it used to. Farm size and production efficiency has had to increase. Sure, you can pasture farrow a few outside pigs and sell them for more money to people who are brainwashed into thinking confinement production is evil, but we can't raise enough to feed everyone that way and still be environmentally sound. It's a free country. Anyone is free to raise pigs how they think is best, but one still needs to be economically and environmentally accountable.
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Piggies.
