Yahoo Movies Animals Farmed: China’s pig skyscraper, lab-grown meat and egg shortages
‘High-rise cruelty’: China’s pig skyscraper
An article on a new pig farm in Hubei province that is ready to produce 1 million pigs a year led to a large number of emails from readers. Many lamented the potential welfare of the pigs. “They deserve a natural life. It’s like a nightmare and based on greed,” one reader wrote.
Others said multistorey pig farms (Schweinehochhaus) had been documented as being in use in Germany in the 1970s, although not at the same scale as those in China today. Conditions in these facilities were reported as being “often atrocious”.
In China, reports on the rise – quite literally – of high-rise farms have been cautious, with some noting the social upheaval that would occur in rural China with the end of back yard farming.
China’s top 20 pig companies are projected to account for 50% of all the pigs produced in the country in the next three to five years. But smaller, alternative farming models could still work and companies should not blindly invest in high-rise farms, said one report, noting “getting bigger doesn’t necessarily mean better quality”.
Legislators in China have called for clearer regulations on approval for high-rise farms, which could include height restrictions. Experts have also said that some high-rise farms have had problems controlling odours and disease, and that plans must be in place for emergencies such as power cuts or fire.
News from around the world
Elon Musk’s Neuralink, a medical device company, is under federal investigation for potential animal welfare violations, amid internal staff complaints that its animal testing is being rushed. It caused needless suffering and deaths, according to documents reviewed by Reutersand sources familiar with the investigation.
The US government has cleared the way for Americans to be able to eat lab-grown meat, after authorities deemed a meat product derived from animal cells to be safe for human consumption.
The growth rate of seafood farming worldwide peaked in 1996, according to new research. If we were to rely only on aquaculture to meet the demand for seafood by 2030, the world’s production would need to grow at three times the current projected rate, the study found.
Europe’s biggest meat firms and retailers are driving a wave of human rights and land rights abuses against Indigenous and local communities in Paraguay, says Global Witness. The Guardian reported on the issue more than four years ago, as well as similar abuses in Brazil.
Animal transportation times should be cut to reduce the risk of spreading antimicrobial resistance, according to a new scientific opinion from the European Food Safety Authority. The report says longer transport times allow for greater bacterial multiplication and transmission of bacteria between animals.
The combined methane emissions of 15 of the world’s largest meat and dairy companies are higher than those of several of the world’s largest countries, including Russia, Canada and Australia, according to a new study.
Only 12 nations name emissions from farm animals in their official climate commitments and none seeks to reduce livestock production, according to a new report. Only two countries (Costa Rica and Ethiopia) mention dietary change, arguably the most important of all environmental actions.
UK news
Almost half of the free-range turkeys produced in the UK for Christmas have been culled or have died from flu, the chief executive of the British Poultry Council told MPs. Richard Griffiths said 600,000 out of about 1.3 million free-range birds had been lost. The government recently ordered all poultry and captive birds in England to be kept indoors.
Meanwhile, egg shortages and rationing are expected to last beyond Christmas, an industry body has warned, as the poultry industry grapples with spiralling costs and its worst-ever bout of bird flu. Lidl is limiting customers to three boxes of eggs each, while Asda is restricting purchases to two boxes for each shopper.
The main animal disease facility has been left to deteriorate to an “alarming extent” leaving the UK vulnerable to major outbreaks, MPs have warned. An inquiry found that the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) was “continually vulnerable to a major breakdown” because the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs had “comprehensively failed” in its management of the site.
Just one in 300 complaints about animal welfare at UK farms led to a prosecution over the last four years, with half of the holdings not even inspected, analysis has shown.
Enough protein to feed the entire world could be produced on an area of land smaller than London if we replace animal farming with factories producing micro-organisms, a campaign has said. The Reboot Food manifesto argues that three-quarters of the world’s farmland should be rewilded instead.
From the Animals Farmed series
The Dutch government is offering to buy out up to 3,000 “peak polluter” farms and major industrial polluters in an attempt to reduce ammonia and nitrogen oxide emissions that are illegal under EU law. The nitrogen minister, Christianne van der Wal, said farmers would be offered more than 100% of the value of their farms to quit.
Suppliers of beef to McDonald’s, Taco Bell and Walmart are sourcing meat from US farms that use antibiotics linked to the spread of dangerous superbugs, an investigation has found. Unpublished US government records show that farms producing beef for meat packing firms Cargill, JBS, and Green Bay are risking public health.
US agriculture officials are being lobbied to make it easier for chicken farmers to use the “cruellest option” for killing birds affected by the continuing bird flu epidemic. More than 49 million poultry birds in the US have either died as a result of bird flu or have been culled due to exposure to infected birds.
A Dutch pro-farming party is firing up the anti-establishment vote, as the movement rooted in a protest against plans to cut livestock numbers is rapidly picking up support in the Netherlands.
More than 1,000 mink farms in Denmark were ordered to close over fears that a Covid mutation was a risk to human health. Two years on, most will never reopen. The Guardian takes a look at the “ghost farms”, mink sheds abandoned to the pandemic.
Share your stories and feedback
Thank you to everyone who continues to get in touch to share their thoughts on the series.
Cathy Forde told us:
I read with interest the article on the closure of mink farming in Denmark. I had no idea that Denmark farmed so many mink for their fur. I find this disgusting, given the conditions in which the mink were kept on these farms. I am very glad that these farms were closed due to Covid and that most will remain closed. I sincerely hope that mink farming comes to an end, for good. I confess to being surprised that an advanced country like Denmark would facilitate such backward farming practices.
Jessica Hothersall got in touch to say:
It seems to me that, having got Covid from zoonotic transfers of disease, we are now also at risk of African swine fever, or do those in the know already call it Ebola when in humans? Just a thought? I am a meat eater but I also feel we have a duty to care properly and humanely for the animals during their lifetimes, which sadly is not happening often enough. It is barbaric and unforgivable to bury any sentient being alive.
Please do send your stories and thoughts to us at: animalsfarmed@theguardian.com
