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U.S. Lags Far Behind Europe in
Protections for Farmed Animals
Blog: Posted by Joyce Tischler,
ALDF's Founder and General Counsel on August 15th, 2011
Mahatma Gandhi once said
that, “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way
in which its animals are treated.” In its treatment of farmed animals, how does
the United States compare to Europe? Sadly, the answer is: not so great.
Factory farming, a system in which animals are
confined in tiny cages
and fed hormones and antibiotics, rather being allowed to graze outdoors in
natural settings, is an invention of the mid-twentieth Century. Intensive
confinement, such as the crowding of
too many egg-laying hens
into a small cage, constitutes one of the worst
abuses visited upon animals: it denies living beings even their most basic needs
and condemns them to a life of misery and suffering. And, it impacts over nine
billion animals each year in the U.S. alone. Surprisingly, most U.S. consumers
of animal products have little or no idea of the conditions that farmed animals
are raised in or
the devastating impacts these conditions have on the animals, the environment
and human health.
Europeans began questioning factory farming thirty years ago, both on a
scientific and ethical basis. As a result, Europe has made steady progress
in improving the quality of life for farmed animals. In 1981, Switzerland banned
the use of battery cages to house egg laying hens by the end of 1991. The Swedes
banned battery cages in 1988; the Dutch followed suit in 1994 and a West German
appellate court declared battery cages to be cruel as early as 1979. The British
banned the veal crate in 1987 and intensive confinement of sows in 1991, to go
into effect by the end of 1999.
The European Union (EU) is a political and economic organization of 27 countries
with a standardized system of laws. The EU has adopted legislation that leads
the world in protecting farmed animals. In 1998, the Council of the European
Union adopted Council Directive 98/58/EC, which sets general rules for the
protection of farmed animals. This Directive incorporates what are commonly
referred to as the
“Five Freedoms,”
to wit, farmed animals must be given:
- Freedom to express normal
behavior - by providing sufficient space, proper facilities and company of
the animals’ own kind.
- Freedom from thirst, hunger
and malnutrition - by ready access to fresh water and a diet to maintain
full health and vigor.
- Freedom from discomfort - by
providing a suitable environment including shelter and a comfortable resting
area.
- Freedom from pain, injury
and disease - by prevention or rapid diagnosis and treatment.
- Freedom from fear and
distress - by ensuring conditions that avoid mental suffering.
European animal advocates
were able to negotiate a critically important addition to the Treaty of Lisbon,
which took effect in 2009. For the first time in European law, animals were
referred to as “sentient beings” and the welfare of the animals is to be a
consideration in European Union lawmaking. These are just a few of the advances
that have been made in Europe.
The U.S. on the other hand, is just becoming aware of the egregious conditions
in which farmed animals are forced to live and has not, as yet, witnessed an
analogous broad based acknowledgment of the sentience of animals, nor of our
responsibility to provide farmed animals with basic humane care and treatment.
A quick overview of federal and state laws “protecting” farmed animals will make
this obvious. The federal Humane Methods of Livestock Slaughter Act defines
humane slaughter, but specifically excludes ritual slaughter from its
protections and fails to mention poultry, who constitute 95% of the animals
killed to be eaten. The federal Humane Transport Act, also known as the 28 Hour
Law mandates that those who transport animals across state lines may not confine
the animals for more than 28 hours. At some point during the 28 hours, the
animals must be unloaded from the vehicle in a humane manner and taken to an
area where they can rest and be provided with food and water. The federal Animal
Welfare Act does not apply to animals raised for food.
No federal law covers the 99% of the time that farmed animals are alive,
in other words, there is no federal regulation of the conditions or the
treatment they receive while confined for their short, miserable lives in the
factory farm. They fare little better under state law: thirty-seven state
anti-cruelty laws specifically exempt farmed animals from coverage, as per
Stephan Otto, ALDF’s legislative director, and in the remaining states, cruelty
cases are rarely filed against farmers. Thus, it is no exaggeration to say
that the U.S. agricultural industry has enjoyed a complete stranglehold on
setting the rules (or lack thereof) by which farmed animals are raised. Current
“standards” for the raising of farmed animals in the U.S. meet the needs of
industry, almost completely ignoring even the most basic needs of the animals.
Farming practices that are common or “normal” in U.S. are viewed as unacceptable
in many European countries. And, the distribution of undercover
videos of abuses at
factory farms and slaughterhouses has been an
embarrassment to the agricultural industry.
The first chink in Big Ag’s seemingly impenetrable armor came in 2000, when the
voters of Florida passed an initiative banning the use of gestation crates for
sows in that state. Arizona voters followed suit and
Prop 2 in California
enabled voters to call for the end of battery cages, veal crates and gestation
crates for sows. American consumers are starting to tell the agricultural
industry that they want farmed animals to be raised humanely. Big Ag has played
lip service to caring about welfare concerns, however, this year, lobbyists in
four states attempted to pass “Ag Gag” laws, which would have made it illegal to
photograph or videotape at agricultural facilities or to possess or distribute
such evidence. In other words, the Ag-Gag approach is to shut up
whistleblowers and eliminate their access to that embarrassing evidence of
farmed animal abuse.
The recent news of
the HSUS/United Egg
Producer deal provides a peek into the changing
tactics of some in the industry. As to whether that deal will ultimately be
codified into law remains to be seen. If it does, the U.S. will still lag far
behind Europe in its treatment of farmed animals, but a federal law offering
some protections to egg laying hens will be a marker of forward progress.
American animal activists remain hopeful that the industry will respond in good
faith to public pressure for increased protections and a move away from the
present factory farming system, in which sentient beings are being treated as if
they were pencils to be shoved in a drawer, until they reach market weight.
Comment: Canada's
legislation is similarly poor, both at the federal level and at provincial
levels. Some provinces are better than others.
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