The problems with pig farms in St. Marie, New Brunswick are all too familiar to North Carolina resident, Rick Dove.

"This happened to us in North Carolina before we knew it was happening. By the time it was over, we were stuck with this mess."

North Carolina is a state with one of the highest concentrations of hog farms in the U.S. More than 4,000 pig farms are packed into the coastal plain. For 20 years, the land in this state has paid the price for profit.

"Everywhere you look now there is a lagoon and a spray field," says Dove.

After a career with the Marines, Dove semi-retired and fished crabs on the Neuse River. But when he noticed dead fish and sores on his legs, he quit fishing and took up the fight, as Riverkeeper - the man in charge of the river.

"In eastern North Carolina the ten million hogs are producing more fecal waste each and every day than all the people in this state California, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, New Hampshire, North Dakota combined."

After decades of complaints and over-saturation of the land, North Carolina put a moratorium on any new hog farms. But Dove says it's come far too late.

In 1999, Hurricane Floyd hit North Carolina with high winds and torrential rains. Thousands of lagoons flooded, thousands of pigs killed. The government and hog industry were unprepared for this environmental disaster.

"This industry will reassure you. They will get government to reassure you that they are ready for disasters. If you make them show you exactly what they're talking about, they never will because they're not ready. They can't be ready. Where do you bury ten million hogs?" says Dove.

Scientists in North Carolina have been studying the health problems of people living close to these factory farms. Steve Wing is an epidemiologist at North Carolina University. He says in neighborhoods like St. Marie, New Brunswick, it's the most vulnerable who are at risk.

"People with existing respiratory disease, the elderly, children... It's up to governments to balance the people's health against profits for the industry."

It was that sense of social responsibility that drove Don Webb out of the pork producing industry.

"I was stinking up the neighbours in the area that I had my hogs and I know I wasn't doing anything different than anybody else... And I was wrong in what I was doing and I had to correct it. So I did correct it, and I got out of the hog business."

When a hog farm tried to move into a field across the road from his fishing camp, Webb fought back. He says he knows from experience that the lagoons don't work to deal with the waste.

"The only solution they got is to put in sewage treatment facilities, like our cities have that to work. We've known for a long time they can solve the problem. But they would rather pay fines because it's cheaper to pollute than it is to do right. And our government has failed us there."

Webb has been trying to open up a dialogue with farmers in the area. Chuck Stokes is an independent farmer with 60,000 hogs. He's also part of a group called Frontline Farmers, created originally to fight their opponents and defend the industry.

But after years of backlash and studies proving the problems associated with the lagoons, the Frontline Farmers joined an environmental group called Save Our State to publicly state their need for other options to waste management.

"Our biggest concern is that farmers would be forced into an alternative technology that would not solve the problems. We feel that the technology would have to eliminate spraying altogether," says Stokes.

North Carolina is looking for options. Smithfield Foods, the largest hog producer and processor in the world, has committed $15-million to research viable options to the lagoon and spray field method.

Meanwhile, Rick continues his vigil.

"If there's anything I'd say to the people in Canada you better learn from us in North Carolina. If you don't, then shame on you," says Dove.