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| Source: Google |
The headlines are
screaming about the discovery of supermarket products containing horse and
potentially donkey meat. Residents of
the UK and Ireland are shocked, disgusted and angry that they have been eating
horse instead of < insert name of farm animal here > and the police are now
involved in tracing how the horse meat entered our food system.
Although what has
happened is both appalling and wrong I struggle to feel any sympathy for people
who have little or no regard of where their food originates and how the animals
killed are treated prior to and during slaughter. What do they expect? As I write, I am listening to a conversation
between work colleagues (one of them claims to be an animal lover) and feel disappointed
at how uninformed they are about the factory farming industry. The only positive comment from “the animal
lover” was a vow never to buy processed meats again. I suppose that is better than nothing.
In most of the articles,
news bulletins and conversations I have followed not a single person has spared
any thought for the horses and possibly donkeys that have been slaughtered but why
should they if they never consider cows, sheep, pigs, chickens, ducks and any
other animals they enjoy eating. Is it
too much to hope this wakes people up and makes them take more care in what
they are buying and eating?
Reports now suggest that
a Romanian abattoir is one of the main sources of the horse meat and openly butchers
hundred, potentially, thousands of horses each year. Abattoirs in the UK have also been raided by
police and there have been claims of pork being passed off as beef in some
supermarket ready meals.
As mentioned previously
here, Compassion In World Farming (CIWF) has been campaigning for more
transparency in how our food is produced and quite rightly say that food should
be simply, clearly and correctly labelled to enable consumers to know what they
are eating and if an animal product, how the animal has been reared.
Compassion in World
Farming’s CEO, Philip Lymbery says:
“Today’s scandal of
horse meat in beef products is likely the tip of the iceberg. There are real
and deep-rooted problems sitting below the surface of our broken food system.
And the bottom line is that we clearly, all too often, just don’t know what’s
in our food or how it’s produced.”
Please support the
Labeling Matters campaign by clicking
here.
As well as clearer food
labeling we also need to closely monitor slaughterhouses to ensure animals are
being treated humanely prior to being slaughtered. Barbaric treatment of animals has been
exposed by undercover investigations and the RSPCA are campaigning for CCTV monitoring
equipment to be installed in slaughterhouses across England, the Food Standards
Agency agrees that this would be a useful tool.
The campaign has already
had a degree of success with the majority of supermarkets now demanding that the
abattoirs where they source their products are fitted with CCTV monitoring
equipment. RSPCA wants to make it
compulsory CCTV to be present in all slaughterhouses.
As it happens, the
Government are due to update legislation concerning the slaughter of animals so
now would be a good time to take action by clicking here.
Whilst people have been
forced to think about what they eat and where it has come from why not use this
perfect opportunity to spread the word about the two very worthy and on topic
campaigns so please do share on Facebook and Twitter (which you will be able to
do at the links provided above).
