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Britain Surpasses U.S. in Humane Treatment of Farm Animals

  • Spence Cooper
  • June 22, 2011

Under a 10 year-old EU ruling from Brussels, Britain’s farmers face fines if they fail to properly provide for the well-being of their pigs.

Improved standards were directed in the following areas: light requirements and maximum noise levels; permanent access to materials for rooting; permanent access to fresh water; additional restrictive and conditions on mutilations.

Additionally, pigs must be kept in light conditions with an intensity of at least 40 lux for a minimum period of 8 hours per day, and they must have permanent access to a sufficient quantity of straw or other suitable materials. Moreover, fresh water must be available at all times.

The Member States were given 2 years to comply with the new requirements, effective 1 January 2003.

An incredulous Alison Hart, who then farmed pigs in Blue Anchor, Somerset, told BBC news at the time: “If you go abroad and see some of the conditions there, they are not abiding by the conditions that we are all supposed to keep our animals in.”

Apparently Alison Hart believes the shocking and abusive treatment of U.S. farm animals should be the standard followed in Britain.

Sadly, some U.S. farmers have nothing but contempt for farm animals, as was revealed in the film Farm to Fridge, narrated by actor James Cromwell.

The 12 minute film depicts the deeply criminal treatment animals raised for food endure daily on egg, dairy, and veal farms, fish slaughtering facilities, and poultry slaughterhouses.

Some film scenes include piglets having their testicles ripped out and their tails chopped off without painkillers, male chicks being ground up alive in giant macerators, and fish being skinned and dismembered while still alive.

Britain Surpasses U.S. in Humane Treatment of Farm AnimalsThe film was made by Mercy for Animals, whose Executive Director, Nathan Runkle, points out that billions of farm animals are subjected to abuses so extreme that meat, egg, and dairy producers could be jailed if they treated dogs or cats in the same manner.

Animals have emotional feelings. According to a recent study, chickens display signs of empathy” the act of understanding and entering into another’s feelings — which probably evolved to facilitate parental care.

When animals are frightened and terrorized before being slaughtered they secrete adrenalin which lodges in their flesh — another unwanted, and unhealthy animal hormone consumers are forced to ingest into their bodies.

Not a single federal law provides protection to farmed animals during their lives on factory farms. Humanely slaughtering animals for food is natural, but the senseless brutality inflicted en masse on factory farm animals is just plain cruel.

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