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EU countries are not abiding by gestation stall bans, U.K. group says
Story Date: 8/12/2013
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Source: Rita Jane Gabbett, MEATINGPLACE, 8/9/13
Seven months after the European Union introduced a ban on keeping sows in stalls (except for the first four weeks of pregnancy) half of European Union countries have failed to clamp down on pig farms, according to Britain’s National Pig Association.
The group has reason to complain: the U.K. banned gestation stalls in 1999, boosting cost of production and putting its hog industry at a competitive disadvantage to other EU countries.
In 2001 the EU agreed the Pigs Directive, which banned sow stalls starting Jan. 1, 2013 — allowing EU producers an 11-year phase-out period and exemptions for the first four weeks of a sow’s pregnancy as well as the week before farrowing.
According to new data from the European Commission only the following 13 member countries are fully compliant: Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Latvia, Malta, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.
The Commission started infringement proceedings against the following nine countries in February: Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Poland and Portugal. The Netherlands, Italy, Hungary, Finland, and Slovenia are still being investigated.
NPA started a "Wall of Fame" campaign to persuade retailers and food companies to pledge they will not import pork and pork products from non-compliant pig farms on the continent.
At the beginning of the year NPA estimated as many as 40,000 pigs an hour were being delivered to continental processing plants from illegally operated pig farms.
As Britain imports around 60 percent of its processed pork, NPA concluded that many British consumers were unwittingly supporting the trade in illegally farmed pigs.
For more stories, go to http://www.meatingplace.com/.
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