Europe’s top pork-producing region is ground zero for intensive systems that devour scarce water and cause nitrate pollution.

In the region of Osona, to the north of Barcelona, there are seven times as many pigs as people.

Hectares of pig farms — long, barrack-like brick buildings with half-closed windows — stretch from the roadside into the distance. Metal cylinders containing tons of feed jut out from their sides. Huge pools store decomposing animal waste.

As you get closer, the stench of ammonia and squeals of thousands of pigs overwhelm your senses.

Osona is renowned for its fuet, a traditional Catalan pork sausage, and for its stunning mountains and nature reserves. But water in half of its fountains has stopped flowing, according to a citizens’ platform created to defend the River Ter that cuts through the region. And that’s not just because there is no rain.

“The pig sector’s consumption of water already exceeds that of people,” said the head of the platform, Ginesta Mary. They estimated that the 1 million pigs in the region consume as much water as almost 200,000 people. The census counts a population of just over 150,000.

But water consumption isn’t the only issue angering the pigs’ human neighbors.