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HSUS releases video shot at Wyo. pig facility
Story Date: 5/9/2012
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Source: Lisa M. Keefe, MEATINGPLACE, 5/8/12
In a news conference this morning, the Humane Society of the United States unveiled its most recent video, captured surreptitiously, of “cruel treatment of animals and inhumane conditions” at a Wyoming Premium Farms facility.
Wyoming Premium is a supplier to Tyson Foods, HSUS says.
The video was taken last month at the pig breeding facility in Wheatland, Wyo., one of four hog farms the company has in the state. Wyoming Premium is owned by Itoham America Inc., the Hayward, Calif.-based unit of Japan’s Itoham Foods Inc.
In the video, farm workers are shown kicking live piglets and swinging them by their hind legs, and sitting on the back of a sow whose leg was broken. Hogs were videotaped with untreated abscesses and rectal and uterine prolapses. Baby piglets were caught on tape having fallen through floor slats, some of them drowning in the manure pits below.
In a press conference accompanying the video’s release, HSUS CEO Wayne Pacelle noted that local authorities were alerted to the conditions the HSUS representative documented. In addition, he noted that the representative on-site took steps to provide water and other care to injured or ill pigs.
Gestation crates
Pacelle also used the occasion to reinforce the organization’s campaign to end the use of gestation stalls on hog farms, although the gestation stalls used at the Wyoming facility were only part of the videotape’s subject matter.
The Wyoming Premium facility is “part of a larger food production and food retail system … [and] there is something wrong with this system,” he said. “We hope that these [issues at the Wyoming facility] are addressed quickly but there’s a much larger concern.”
Response
Tuesday afternoon, Tyson Foods released a statement saying "there is no connection between this Wyoming farm and the pork that we process. ... We've seen the video and we are appalled by the apparent mistreatment of the animals."
Meanwhile, the National Pork Producers Council said that the video “shows practices that are abhorrent to U.S. pork producers. [NPPC] condemns such actions, which are not in accord with the U.S. pork industry’s best practices … . U.S. pork producers are committed to caring for animals in a way that protects their well-being. Just as it is to others, mistreatment of animals is appalling to pork producers. We do not defend and will not accept mistreatment of animals.
“NPPC understands that the farm in question is taking immediate steps to address the situation, including an unannounced inspection of the facility by the farm’s consulting veterinarian. Individuals responsible for willful abuse of animals must be held accountable.”
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