Improved Animal Welfare in Europe: A Priority for Three Agriculture Ministers

 Three European ministers of agriculture—Christian Schmidt of Germany, Sharon Dijksma of the Netherlands, and Dan Jorgensen of Denmark—met in Vught (Netherlands), on December 14, to call for new measures to advance animal welfare in Europe. They signed a joint declaration on animal protection to urge the European Commission to adopt new standards and enforce existing ones. These three countries, which are major producers and exporters of Livestock, plan to combine their efforts in the areas of research, the exchange of best practices, and the improvement of production systems with regard to animal welfare. They invite other Member States to follow their lead.   Strengthening and Raising Awareness All three agree that the European Union’s current animal welfare provisions must be enforced with greater consistency and synergy, particularly in the areas of housing, transport, and slaughter. In their view, existing regulations must take greater account of new scientific knowledge, technological innovation, and socioeconomic developments. The goal is also to better inform consumers and foster greater awareness at the European level.   8 hours of transport The three signatory countries specifically support the objective of the “European Declaration on Alternatives to Surgical Castration of Pigs” and proposes not only eliminating non-therapeutic mutilations but also reducing the animal transport time to a maximum of eight hours, adopting specific standards for species that currently lack them (turkeys, rabbits, broiler chickens), and so on. “The European Union must continue to make animal welfare a priority and should actively work to raise greater awareness of animal protection at the international level,” they conclude. This declaration of intent represents an important step toward improving the living and dying conditions of animals in Europe and aligns with certain measures that animal welfare organizations (OABA, CIWF, etc.) have long advocated for. Read the declaration: HERE