2023-04-18 19:48:01
Animals in a truck, in Sisteron, in the south of France, at the beginning of April. NICOLAS DUCAT / AFP
“The level of animal welfare during transport is not taken into account either in the cost of transport or in the price of meat”, regrets the institution in an analysis document published on Monday.
The “animal suffering» should it be taken into account in the final invoice for the leg of lamb or the slice of veal? Far from being absurd, this idea is put forward by the Court of Auditors of the European Union. In an analysis document published on Monday on the transport of live animals in the European Union, the institution returns to the supervision of these movements, and advances “courses of actionto reinforce it. A work carried out within the framework of the upcoming revision of European regulations on animal welfare.
The court recalls that animals are often transported between Member States by producers to “exploit cost differences between regions», with a view to maximizing profitability, economies of scale and reducing slaughter or production expenses. Gold, “transporting live animals over long distances can have adverse effects on their welfare“, underlines Eva Lindström, responsible for the document. Anxiety, hunger, thirst, heat… The trip, sometimes long – 37% last more than eight hours, including 4% more than 24 hours – can be particularly trying. In addition, not all States equally apply the legislation governing the transport of animals, andflaws» are exploited by the producers, says the manager.
Faced with this worrying observation, the auditors therefore suggest limiting the number of journeys, as well as their duration, and improving the conditions for transporting the animals. And, among the ways suggested to dissuade the producers, the document proposes in particular to “assigning a monetary value to animal suffering during transport and [de] integrate it into the cost of it and the price of the meat“. As it stands, the document points to a lack of information as to the “financial consequences of animal welfare issues during transport“. A failure whichundermines the development of incentive systems that could encourage transport companies to take action to prevent animal welfare failures».
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The court thus hopes to encourage producers to change the way they transport animals, or even to reduce travel, by introducing “incentive schemes encouraging transport companies to prevent animal welfare failures, and to minimize the economic attractiveness of non-compliant practices“. However, it will then be necessary to set up aanimal suffering pricing methodwhich remains to be defined.
More broadly, the analysis document provides avenues for achieving “encourage producers and consumers to adopt sustainable behavior“. A way to reconcile animal welfare, product quality for consumers and compliance with rules for producers. And this, while buyers are more and more sensitive to these questions, in exchange for transparency on the part of producers: they are thus ready to pay more for their purchases, but “only if they are informed of the good breeding conditions».
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