In 2021, Ban Live Exports International Awareness Day took place on 14th June. This year overall, and the month of June especially, may turn out to be turning points in the effort to ban live export of animals across the globe.
Concerning sheep, Stop Live Transport states that ‘trade in live sheep annually worldwide’ is 16.05 million (and with ‘trade in live sheep annually from European Countries’ being 5.5 million). Describing what the problem is with live exports, Compassion in World Farming [CIWF] depicts the frequent results of long distance live animal transport to be these: overcrowding; exhaustion and dehydration; pain and stress; illness and disease; a lack of legal protection; unexpected issues.
An ‘unexpected issue’ arose earlier in 2021, in March. This was when a container ship, the Ever Given, became grounded in the Suez Canal, a major shipping channel. The grounding caused halt of progress of other ships, and among which were about twenty - a lot of which had started out from Romania and Spain - carrying about 200,000 live animals, and which the majority were believed to be sheep. It was reported by the Daily Mail newspaper that most of the log-jammed vessels were carrying sheep or cattle and were destined for ‘Middle Eastern countries such as Saudi Arabia’, and which it stated to be ‘the world’s largest importer of sheep by some margin.’ As Gerit Weidinger of Animals International said, ‘getting stuck on board [vessels] means there is risk of starvation, dehydration, injuries, waste building up so that they [the animals] can’t lie down’. This disaster put the perils of live export firmly before the eye of the world’s public.
It can seem amazing that live export of animals is still going on in our day and age. The likelihood, more or less certainty, of live animals suffering from any long journeying is surely evident. And during a journey, once borders of country or area of departure have been crossed over, responsibility or control of what happens on the carrier may not any more prevail, may diminish, or there may then be less exacting, or no, requirements imposed from countries or territories passed through or from the destination. A long high-sea journey is perhaps the live export situation most threatening of all to the welfare of live animals. Representing such a trip are those between Australia and countries of the Middle East. And if a journey is, moreover, in hot weather, the threat to animals’ welfare is even more great. The essential cause of exports of live animals being required is likely to be a want, on religious grounds, for slaughter to be done at destination so that Halal criteria can be adhered to. But with Halal slaughterers now available in Australia, the argument for live export surely evaporates.
Writing about Australia, CIWF says this:
‘Australia exports around two million live sheep every year, mostly to the Middle East, in vessels carrying as many as 85,000 animals. They may have travelled up to 50 hours by road to get to the sea port, followed by a journey of three to five weeks by sea and a further journey by road to the final destination. Shockingly, thousands of these animals die every year before they reach their destination. Despite the implementation of an export supply chain assurance scheme by the Australian government, investigations by animal welfare groups have documented terrible suffering at slaughter after export.’
Heartening news, which CIWF reported recently, is that Australia’s neighbour, New Zealand - having stopped exports for slaughter already - is now banning all live exports by sea.
The UK, Animal Aid states, exports live around 390,000 sheep each year. This year the UK government indicated, by way of the Queen’s Speech in May, its intention to bring in legislation which would ban export of live animals for fattening and slaughter. This would apply to England and Wales: the SNP (Scottish National Party) has shown an intention to ban likewise.
On 8th June this year came a UK government’s expression of intent in relation to live exports, in a press release statement about its intended Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill. The words were:
‘Live exports: Live animals can endure excessively long journeys during export, causing distress and injury. EU rules prevented any changes to these journeys, but the UK Government is now free to pursue plans which would see a ban on the export of live animals for slaughter and fattening. We will become the first European country to end this practice.’
And in the same press release, the Environment Secretary said, proudly:
‘As an independent nation outside the EU we are now able to go further than ever on animal welfare by banning the export of live animals for slaughter and fattening …’.
The EU has a Committee of Inquiry into live exports, and the European Commission is reviewing the law which allows the trade, which CIWF welcomes. In addition to demanding that UK live exports should cease, CIWF is calling for live exports beyond the EU to be banned; journeys within the EU to be no more than eight hours in length; a ban on transport of unweaned animals. And CIWF also wants to ‘ensure international legislation and guidelines on the welfare of animals in transport and slaughter are enforced’. The last is a crucial thing needing to happen.
In relation to the EU, Animal Aid says:
‘Current EU rules allow sheep to travel for 14 hours without a rest or water. They must have a rest period of one hour after a 14 hour journey, after which, they may be transported for a further 14 hours. After the second 14 hour journey, if the destination has not been reached, the sheep must be unloaded, given food and water and rested for 24 hours before they can be transported again.’
Live export is an entity involving many countries and attitudes. So, addressing the matter cannot only be done nationally or locally: an international basis of approach is necessary and essential. Maybe a candidate for the role could be World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE). In relation to animal welfare, it says, ‘The OIE, at the request of its Member Countries, is the international organisation responsible for setting standards on this topic’. So, the OIE has the position and global reach to be the body for bringing about change of attitude and behaviour throughout the world on live export. But would a difficulty be that its members did not have a common view on live export of animals?
Live export of animals is a welfare issue. It is an issue too displaying our attitude to animals. It reveals the degree to which the world is enlightened and civilised. Live export of animals should not still happen in our time. It is cruel and inhumane.
This year there have been instances to encourage hope that change is, at last, happening. With some banning of live export occurring or in train, now maybe there will be a domino-effect happening, and leading to the ending, all over the world, of the export, and long-distance travel, of live animals.
19th July 2021