This is an intensive, industrialised factory. Intensive because as many animals as possible are crammed into the smallest spaces. Industrialised because feeding, watering, ventilation and waste removal are performed automatically. Factory because the philosophy of mass production is what lies behind it all. Economists welcome industrial farming, stock-analysts recommend it as a smart investment, and trade representatives want to export it. Customers can buy meat at the cheapest price, and the shareholders make a profit.
The object of farming is to produce meat, eggs or dairy. We might imagine family farms with animals roaming freely across the countryside. These are in decline now, and the UK farming sector is under enormous pressure. Farmers are going out of business. In 1950 a British farmer needed 15 cows to make a decent living, now 120 are required. Factory farming in Britain, began in the 1940’s as a way of coping with post-war shortages to guarantee food supply. By the 1950’s this was well established. The change was immense.
Globally 2/3 of agricultural animals are factory farmed today. It is part of our food system we never see. These farms are located with security outside cities, and they protect their privacy with fierce secrecy. Their modern production methods are more efficient, cheaper, and generate a higher profit, but are incompatible with any genuine concern for the welfare of animals. Every year billions of them are crammed together in tiny spaces, where their movement is restricted, and they are treated little more than machines.
They are denied access to the basic preconditions of happiness, to move, make basic choices, or socialise. All they ever see is steel bars and concrete floors because they live in pens and cages. Scully, M. (2002) pointed out, “Pigs and lambs and cows and chickens are not pieces of machinery, no matter how cost-efficient it may be to treat them as such. Machinery doesn’t cry or feel frightened or lonely. And when a man treats them this way, he might as well be a machine himself.” Farming practices vary hugely. Some freedoms are protected in factory farms, but in many instances are not.
They are morally reprehensible institutions, and are the biggest cause of animal cruelty in the world. The conditions under which animals are raised, subject them to merciless suffering and untimely premature painful deaths. This is entirely unnecessary in the overwhelming majority of cases.
The Farm Animal Welfare Committee (FAWC 2009) outlined the ‘Five Freedoms’ for farm animals which include, freedom from hunger and thirst; freedom from discomfort; freedom from pain, injury and disease; freedom to express normal behaviour; and freedom from fear and distress. These moral standards are inherently impossible to fulfil under this system.
TYPICAL MODERN DAY PRACTICES
Diet: for the system to work, it needs high volumes of cheap high protein food, designed so the animals put on weight in a short time, at a minimum cost. Growth hormones may be used (not allowed in UK) to fatten them up for slaughter or to yield more milk and eggs.
Mutilations: animals, mostly babies, have parts of their bodies removed to control unwanted breeding or aggression and to minimise or reduce injury, from unnatural crowded living conditions. These are designed to conform animals to the farm, rather than safeguarding their integrity by changing the farm to accommodate them. They are practiced on a very large scale in UK and worldwide. The FAWC are against all mutilations of farm animals, but recognise some are required to avoid even worse welfare problems.
Many of these invasive procedures are excruciatingly painful and traumatic. They are often conducted without anaesthetic or painkillers, and farmhands with no special training carry out a lot of it. To further profit and allow animals to bear pain which could be eliminated or reduced is disgraceful. Whoever dulls their ears to crying animals, forfeits their claim to be humane. If vets practiced the same procedures on pets without analgesia, they would lose their licences and face criminal charges.
De-beaking in poultry is an archaic and extremely painful practice, which prevails through the meat and egg industry. This involves removing the sharp tip of a chicken’s sensitive beak (primary sensory organ) by using a hot blade or infra-red beak treatment. Some die after this procedure from bleeding or shock. Others due to beak tenderness cannot grasp their food efficiently and have a hard time eating and drinking, and also difficulty preening themselves (banned in Norway, Sweden, Finland, Austria, Denmark, Switzerland). De-clawing is the removal of their claws and De-toeing is the amputation of the ends of their toes, to eliminate the toenails using microwave technology or a hot blade/wire. De-spurring is the blunting or trimming, of the spur bud on the back of the leg using a heated wire.
De-snooding is removal of the snood from turkeys with scissors, and Dubbing is removal of the comb, wattles and sometimes earlobes with dubbing shears or scissors. De-horning is the process of removing fully grown horns in cattle, sheep and goats, to prevent them injuring each other and handlers. Horned animals take up more space at the feeding trough or in transit when packed tightly together. Horns are not insensitive bone. Blood circulation and nerve endings are involved. They are removed with saws, horn shears or cutting wire.
Disbudding cauterises and destroys the horn buds, before they grow into horns on calves and young goats. A hot iron is used to permanently prevent growth. Horns are necessary for thermoregulation and for the animals to protect themselves. Castration is done to prevent breeding, reduce aggression and improve the taste of meat. Lambs, kids and calves are castrated. Methods include, surgically by a vet, where the testicles are removed. Crushing the spermatic cords with a ‘burdizzo.’ Or commonly in UK, by elastration, a rubber ring is placed around the testicles; which obstructs the blood supply, and they wither and drop off.
Immuno-castration has now been licensed in the EU (involves a vaccine against the male hormones to prevent testes development). Tail docking is amputating part of the tail in sheep and dairy cows, to prevent the accumulation of faeces and reduce lesions and infections from flies, using a knife, hot iron or the elastration method. The tail drops off in 7-10 days. Branding is permanently marking the hide with a hot iron. Ear notching is punching ears of livestock with ear notching pliers, or Ear tagging is done, both for identification.
Ringing is inserting a ring in the nose of pigs and cattle to control movement. Teeth Clipping or Grinding is where piglets have their sharp canine teeth removed down to the gums, by clipping them with a sharp pliers or the tip of these teeth are removed with special grinders. They also have their tails docked with a hot blade or sharp pliers, to prevent tail biting. It is against regulations to routinely amputate their tails and clip teeth, but this rule is flouted on many farms. Routine tail docking has been illegal in UK since 1994 and EU since 2003. Teeth clipping is also banned but exceptions are made on welfare grounds.
Confinement: these animals exercise no free will, and are trapped. They are often confined to small areas and physically restrained to control or limit movement. Most British dairy cows have grazing access and are confined in giant sheds about half the year during the colder months. However in parts of the UK now, for large and high yielding herds, many cows are never outdoors and are kept in ‘zero-grazing’ systems.
Most British beef cattle have access to pasture, but a significant number of cows are being kept indoors a lot of the time and some are permanently inside. When breeding sows are close to giving birth they are forced into farrowing crates, barely wider than their own bodies and can’t even turn around for about five weeks. These are banned in Norway, Sweden, New Zealand and Switzerland. Some lambs are even reared indoors, and never see a field.
Breeding: animals must produce and reproduce quickly. Farmers control reproduction. Hormones are used to regulate breeding. Artificial insemination is common, which is highly invasive and intrusive. Dairy cows are the most exploited animals on the planet. Extracting milk is produced by repeated forced impregnation. The industry is in constant pursuit of genetic improvement and research into production methods. Scientists have ‘perfected’ selective breeding which means modifying animals’ characteristics for production. Some farm animals now differ in appearance and physiology from their ancestors. The goal is to improve the value of the animal as a commodity, which raises ethical and moral issues.
They have been engineered and manipulated to grow larger and produce more milk, meat, eggs, and offspring in the shortest possible time, compared to how they would naturally. Using this principle, hens lay 20 times more eggs than in the past, domestic pigs and meat chickens are produced to grow at a faster rate, beef cattle produce more meat, domestic sheep and goats for faster growth, thicker wool, and more milk and sows produce large litters.
As a result, animals suffer from health problems, including crippling deformities. Current law protects animals suffering from acute pain associated with beating or torture, yet nothing is done about poultry or animals that are misshapen, lame and in chronic pain. It seems to be defined according to their use, rather than their capacity to suffer.
The Royal Society and Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) is against intensive farming and opposes genetic manipulation of animals, because of the suffering caused. Similarly, Compassion In World Farming (CIWF) believe it is unethical for financial gain or medical advancement, because of the exploitation of animals. The law alone unfortunately, is not always strong or detailed enough to ensure animals have a good life. The government is limited by international trade agreements, as to what they can legislate for. Responsibility lies with farmers, the government, food retailers and us.
Disease: due to overcrowding, diseases can thrive and spread quickly and jeopardise millions of animals, so farmers routinely feed or inject them with antibiotics. (Farm animals account for almost 2/3 of antibiotics used in the EU. Since they are passed to humans through the food chain, it risks their effectiveness). Because animals are subjected to remorseless production methods, severe mental and physical stresses result. There are high levels of mortality. Around 12% of pigs and 6% of chickens die before they are slaughtered, many in agony with no medical attention. They succumb to a range of viral, bacterial and parasitic diseases which can affect consumers.
Destruction of newborn: vast numbers of animals are routinely killed as soon as they are born, because there is no profit in keeping them. This includes millions of male chicks produced each year by the egg industry, and thousands of male calves born into dairy herds are shot or slaughtered because they can’t provide milk or sufficient quantities of meat. The same goes for male kid goats born to dairy herds.
Slaughter: most countries require animals to be stunned and rendered unconscious prior to slaughter. This is believed to be more humane, when done properly. There is no proof this is always the case, and they are often slaughtered in ways that do not comply with guidelines which serve the least amount of pain, fear and stress. Slaughter methods that produce kosher and halal meats require animals to be conscious, which means slitting their throats before they are bled out. There is evidence to suggest animals suffer considerably more this way. Countries like Norway, Sweden, New Zealand and Switzerland have banned this.
Meat from animals slaughtered without pre-stunning is routinely being sold on the general market, to unsuspecting members of the public. The way in which farm animals are handled, transported and slaughtered is far from satisfactory. The goal of a slaughterhouse is also to make a profit. Slaughterhouse-men are paid a bonus for the number of animals they kill. There were 4,000 severe breaches of animal welfare regulations in slaughterhouses in the UK over the last 2 years (these are the ones reported). This report was commissioned by Animal Aid, and written by experts headed by Professor Ian Rotherham of Sheffield Hallam University, which can be viewed at www.animalaid.org.uk/go/rotherhamreport.
Between 2009-2014, Animal Aid conducted undercover investigations inside 10 randomly chosen UK slaughterhouses. Evidence of cruelty and law breaking were found in 9 of them. See www.animalaid.org.uk/h/n/CAMPAIGNS/slaughter.
There are many investigations into alleged abuses and endless streams of images depicting animal cruelty obtained from factory farms. PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) are just one of the welfare groups who have documented animals being kicked, bludgeoned, drugged, shocked, mutilated, thrown and sexually assaulted. Viva! (Vegetarian Voice for Animals) exposes graphic footage from some factory farms, using hidden camera investigations (see Cruel Britannia DVD).
RELATED ISSUES: livestock production is at the heart of most of the world’s environmental catastrophes. Rain forest destruction, global warming, water depletion, spreading desserts, loss of soil fertility, soil erosion, ozone depletion and the collapse of the world’s oceans. If an acre of land is used for beef cattle the meat would supply man’s protein needs for 77 days. If the same land was used for soya bean crops it would supply a man with protein for over 2,200 days. Details on these issues are available in publications and online.
Christians Caring For Gods Creatures 