Transport & Animals
Thousands of animals are daily transported within Europe and to third countries for slaughter, fattening and breeding.
The transportation of animals is the intentional movement of animals by transport. Common categories of animals which are transported include livestock destined for sale or slaughter; zoological specimens; laboratory animals; race horses; pets; and wild animals being rescued or relocated. Methods of transporting animals vary greatly from species to species.
Every year, millions of animals are transported long distances across the EU and to non-EU countries.
From 2009 to 2015, the number of animals transported within the EU increased by 19% - from 1.25 billion to 1.49 billion. The numbers for pigs, poultry and horses increased, whereas those for cattle, sheep and goats decreased. Over the same period, the number of consignments of live animals in the EU increased from about 400,000 to 430,000 per year.
There are laws and regulations regarding animal transport to ensure animal welfare. Sometimes things go wrong, and there are many that are violating the law. During transport animals get injured, are too hot or cold, or do not get enough rest and opportunities to eat and drink.
In the 1960s, a report by the UK Technical Committee to inquire into the Welfare of Animals kept under Intensive Livestock Husbandry Systems led to the establishment of the 'Five Freedoms', describing the right to welfare of animals under human control:
freedom from hunger and thirst;
freedom from discomfort;
freedom from pain, injury and disease;
freedom to express normal behavior; and
freedom from fear and distress.
These freedoms are nowadays internationally recognized as guiding principles for rules and policies relating to animal welfare. Nevertheless, animal welfare, today is not always respected, and many animals are being mistreated, not only while raising but also while transporting them.
Laws in the EU
The table below presents the main achievements relating to the protection of animals in the
European Union;
Law Violations
WELFARM and Animal Welfare Foundation released a new investigation showing massive violations of the EU transport regulation. By following a truck loaded with 155 young calves transported from Poland to the Franco-German border, investigators found that the animals were kept in the truck for 20 hours, with no breaks or unloading and no access to water and food.
Every year more than 1.3 million unweaned calves are being transported across Europe, often to end up in Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium or Italy to be fattened and slaughtered. Mostly exported from France or Germany, the animals represent what’s considered to be the by-products of the dairy industry – transported to be slaughtered and used for meat. Although Article 3 of Transport Regulation (EC Regulation (EC) 1/2005) requires animals to be transported in a way to do not cause them injuries or unnecessary suffering, numerous animal protection organisations have been exposing its systematic violation over the past decade.
Another 5 year investigation (2010-2015) carried out by Eyes on Animals and TSB/AWF, demonstrated 70% of the truck inspected at the Bulgarian border, which is a notorious exit door from the EU, were breaching the EU Transport Regulation. Their teams have found animals starving, without water into a truck parked in direct sunlight for 24 hours, sheep waiting for 5 days before continuing their journey and standing on carcasses of lambs that were trampled to death.
ALERT: TRIGGER WARNING
According to Ottawa Humane Society: "With only hot air to breathe, a dog's normal cooling process -- panting -- doesn't work. A dog can withstand internal body temperatures of 40°C for only a few minutes before brain damage or death can occur." A pig cannot pant like a dog, and thus suffers even more in hot weather. Toronto Pig Save activists have bore witness to pigs vocalizing extreme distress and dying of heatstroke and heart attacks.
Article 3 of EC Regulation 1/2005 requires that "No person shall transport or cause to be transported animals in such a way that they are likely to be injured or suffer unnecessary suffering. The surveys carried out in Europe by NGOs in recent years all come to the same conclusion: during long transport, regulation 1/2005 concerning the feeding of unweaned calves is systematically violated. Feeding unweaned calves during transport is technically impossible. Transporting them for more than 8 hours is therefore necessarily a source of suffering. WELFARM therefore asks for the ban on transporting unweaned calves beyond 8 hours.
They also systematically find animals in terrible suffering, shipped alive on old vessels not conceived to transport livestock from infrastructures. With no veterinarian officer on board, sick, injured and dead animals are only found after days in destination countries. Not once, not twice, but routinely their teams have been confronted with and evidenced these shocking realities.
ALERT: TRIGGER WARNING
Condition in which animals are transferred, don’t respect any regulations.
Long Hours
Long journeys stress animals, which suffer from reduced space, changing temperatures, limited food and water as well as vehicle motion. Inadequate equipment or poor weather conditions may mean animals are injured or become ill during transportation. Crossing borders to non-EU countries, with long stops to check documents, vehicles and animals represents an additional problem.
Animals transported for more than eight hours within the EU every year
4 million cattle
4 million sheep
150,000 horses
28 million pigs
243 million poultry
ALERT: TRIGGER WARNING
Observations during the inspection of livestock trucks from the Romanian transport company "Dobrota" at the border of Turkey and Bulgaria (Kapikule) in July 2015. Horrific conditions can be seen where the animals travel long distances without water or rest.
Export & Import
Why alive animals are being transported from one country to another?
In 2017, 1.3 million unweaned calves were transported within the European Union. The majority to Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium or Italy. With 225,000 young calves exported in 2017 to Spain, France is by far the largest supplier. France is thus the second largest exporter of calves weighing less than 80 kg in Europe (behind Germany). They are male calves that do not produce milk or females that will not be used for livestock renewal: in other words, by-products of the dairy industry, exported from one country to another as simple merchandise.
In 2016, around 2,400 sheep were sent from Scotland for slaughter to Germany and France and 3,000 Scottish calves were exported to Spain.
Seasonal factors mean that ruminant production is not necessarily efficient and sustainable all year round, so that imported product can complement domestic production and keep a consistent year round supply, as in the case of lamb.
Meat is a unique sector of the food market as meat production is a process of de-construction rather than manufacturing from a mix of raw materials. Imports thus play an important part in matching supply and demand.
On the global market the dynamics are changing with rising affluence in countries such as China, India and Brazil where there is an increasing demand for meat.
ALERT: TRIGGER WARNING
Compassion, joined by Eyes on Animals and Animal Welfare Foundation, are making an urgent appeal to the European Commission to suspend live animal exports to Turkey, after uncovering terrible conditions in their transport and slaughter. This video documents widespread abuse of EU regulations on transport and slaughter in contravention of international standards.
Netherlands
The Netherlands is too small a country for intensive (and extensive) cattle farming on the present scale. On a yearly basis, more than 450 million animals are kept in confined spaces, resulting in so much overproduction that two thirds of the meat and poultry production is exported. A reduction in this level of production is absolutely necessary.
Live animals are transported to and from The Netherlands. These transports take several days and cause much stress to the animals involved.
Solutions
Quit Meat
A first step will be to stop the demand for meat. Individuals have the power to stop their consumption of meat. If the demand for meat decreases there the industry will have to stop exploiting animals or importing animals from other countries.
At the recent Thame Market Animal Save a conversation with farmers about their lifestyles and livelihoods.
Travel Times
Transporting times of the animals should be as short as possible, and recommend alternative solutions, such as the transport of animal products rather than live animals and the development of on-farm or local slaughter and meat processing facilities.
Stricter controls and tougher penalties
The use of modern technologies, such as geo-location systems, to allow journeys to be tracked in real time. Also urge EU countries to carry out more spot checks to help reduce the number of infringements. The level of inspections varies widely across the EU, from zero to several million inspections per year. The incidence of infringements ranges from 0% to 16.6%.
Parliament is also pushing for tougher penalties to discourage bad practice, including sanctions for member states that don’t properly apply EU rules. Companies who breach the rules should face bans on inadequate vehicles and vessels, withdrawal of transport licences and compulsory staff training on animal welfare.
Higher standards abroad
To protect animals exported to non-EU countries, a bilateral agreements is needed or a ban on the transport of live animals when national standards are not aligned with EU law. Also, appropriate resting areas should be provided at customs posts, where animals can eat and drink .
Driving and rest times during transportation of heifers
Optimal conditions: enough time to eat, rest and drink, the animals have plenty of space and the climate can be adapted. To assess animal welfare, both behavioural and physiological measurements are performed during a number of long-distance transports.
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Sources:
https://www.wur.nl/en/Dossiers/file/Animal-Transport.htm
https://www.eurogroupforanimals.org/welfarm-and-animal-welfare-foundation-new-investigation-on-the-transport-of-unweaned-calves-shows-violation-of-eu-law
http://www.stopthetrucks.eu/stopthetrucks/
http://animaltransportguides.eu/about-the-project/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22445408
https://ecrgroup.eu/article/improving_animal_welfare_during_transport
https://welfarm.fr/news/565/86/Enqu%C3%AAte-le-calvaire-des-veaux-nourrissons
https://www.eurogroupforanimals.org/stopthetrucks
http://www.stopthetrucks.eu/stopthetrucks/
https://ec.europa.eu/food/sites/food/files/safety/docs/ia_trade_import-cond-meat_en.pdf
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/20190206STO25113/animal-transport-parliament-wants-better-protection
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2018/621853/EPRS_STU(2018)621853_EN.pdf
http://animalfreedom.org/english/information/boycott.html
https://www.imta-uk.org/import-export/importing/why-imported-meat
https://www.beefmagazine.com/cowcalfweekly/0611-why-does-us-import-export-beef
https://thebrazilbusiness.com/article/countries-that-import-meat-from-brazil https://www.drovers.com/article/more-us-beef-could-be-destined-europe https://ec.europa.eu/food/animals/welfare/practice/transport_en