Factory farming is the greatest cause of animal suffering in the world today.
Whether in Australia or in Europe, where these new investigations took place, the experience of the animals – confined day in, day out in factory farms – is the same: lives of utter deprivation.
Compassion in World Farming investigators went undercover on 16 farms across four countries in Europe – Poland, Italy, Spain and France – to document standard farming conditions for pigs. Some of the farms supply premium global brands Bayonne and Parma Hams (which exported nearly 100,000 hams to Australia in 2021).
The conditions pigs are living in – that cause so much suffering – are not only normal for the industry but in most cases, entirely legal. The evidence revealed:
- Sows confined in cages barely bigger than their own body
- Sows forced to lie in their own urine and faeces
- Sows performing abnormal behaviours of repetitively biting the bars and sham chewing
- Painful and preventable injuries
- Sows unable to interact normally with their piglets
See the evidence for yourself then take action to call on European leaders to end the cage age.