Gestation stall ban rejected by Connecticut legislature

The Connecticut General Assembly has defeated legislation that would have banned the use of gestation stalls. America’s pork producers expressed gratitude for the Connecticut General Assembly’s fortitude in standing with local family farmers and supporting their use of a safe and humane form of housing pregnant sows.
The vast majority of the country’s independent hog farmers use gestation stalls to house pregnant sows because they allow for individualized care and eliminate aggression from other sows. The housing method is approved by the American Veterinary Medical Association and the American Association of Swine Veterinarians.
As Connecticut family farmers stood up for their right to farm, the legislation failed on multiple fronts, including in the legislature’s Environment Committee, which removed stall ban language from a bill that would create a livestock care board. Farmers across the state rallied for their right to farm, attending hearings and submitting comments. Animal-rights groups hired out-of-state volunteers to lobby the assembly.
“Wealthy animal-rights groups appear to have a bumpy road ahead of them after so many failed legislative attempts to criminalize farmers for using humane farming practices,” said Dr. Howard Hill, a veterinarian and pork producer from Cambridge, Iowa, who is president of the National Pork Producers Council. “The outlook for their future state-level crusades against local family farmers, thankfully, is grim.”
The defeat in Connecticut is just one in a series of state-level failures for animal-rights groups, which have pushed gestation stall bans in states with little agriculture production, spending exorbitant amounts of their donors’ contributions.
“The legislative power of animal-rights groups is waning as state after state has stood up in favor of local farmers,” said Hill. “These groups are introducing the same legislation in the same states and being served defeat after defeat.”

Some EU countries still struggling to meet sow loose housing rules

The first week of September 2013 was the deadline by which European Union (EU) member states of the EU-28 group of countries must inform the European Commission of their progress in implementing the requirement for all sows to be in loose housing for gestation. A failure to supply the information could result in the particular country being referred to the European Court of Justice and penalized financially for infringement.
Under rules introduced by the European Union, from January, 1 2013, all pregnant sows in EU herds must be loose-housed rather than in individual confinement stalls or crates.

British pig association calls for ban on imports from ‘medieval farms’

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 get tough on pig farms where sows are illegally confined for most of their lives.
Therefore, retailers and food manufacturers must continue to be vigilant, warns Britain's National Pig Association. It argues that British consumers expect all imported pork and pork products to be traceable back to farms that comply with the EU's January 2013 ban on the full-time use of sow stalls.
According to new data from the European Commission only 13 member countries are fully compliant: Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Latvia, Malta, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Sow stalls have been banned outright in the United Kingdom since 1999.
The commission started infringement proceedings against 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.
The National Pig Association has used its 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. The association is currently carrying out a number of spot-checks to ensure companies that made the Wall of Fame pledge are sticking to their word.
One hundred companies and brands have pledged total traceability for the imported pork and pork products they sell, including most major retailers and leading foodservice companies such as McDonald's, Costa and Premier Inn.
"Sow stalls are narrow cages. They make life easier for pig farmers, but they are medieval in the eyes of British consumers because the sows spend most of their lives being able to do little more than stand up and lie down," said Dr. Zoe Davies, National Pig Association general manager. "The response to our campaign for traceable higher-welfare pork for British consumers has been outstanding -- far better than we ever envisaged."
The National Pig Association says it is confident that the pledges on its Wall of Fame at have helped reduce the flow of pork from illegally-operated farms. At the beginning of the year, the association 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, it was feared that many British consumers were unwittingly supporting the trade in illegally-farmed pigs.

13 EU countries are now sow stall ban compliant

Thirteen EU member states are now sow stall ban compliant, according to a report from the European Commission. European Union animal welfare legislation banning sow stalls went into effect on January 1, 2013.
Compliant member states include Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Latvia, Malta, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and the UK.
The European Commission is investigating nine countries in accordance with the partial sow stall ban. Infringement procedures are in process against nine member states and six remaining member states are still under investigation, according to the commission.