Neil Hamilton, MS for Mid & West Wales, and Leader of UKIP Wales, has urged farmers to have their say on proposals to improve animal welfare during transport.
Mr Hamilton, a member of the Climate Change, Environment and Rural Affairs committee, has called on them to take part in The Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, DEFRA, consultation.
He said:
“Many farmers will have serious views on this matter and they should make sure they share their views. It is vitally important as much information as possible is gathered during this consultation.
“I strongly support measures which will lead to improvements to animal welfare during transport and I am pleased to see the deadline for comments has been extended until February 25th.
“Everyone wants to ensure that our animals are kept safe and well during travelling. However, it is also important that producers, particularly of eggs and poultry, are not impacted adversely, so it is vital that producers and farmers do make sure they respond to the consultation within the timeframe.”
The consultation, seeking views on how to better protect animal welfare during transport, was originally launched on December 3 to run for eight weeks but it has now been extended until the end of February.
While the headline proposal is to ban live exports for livestock and horses for slaughter and further fattening, a range of other measures including reducing maximum journey times and restricting movements in cold and hot weather were also announced in the consultation.
The government stated in their manifesto a commitment to ban, with no exceptions, exports of livestock and horses for slaughter and for further fattening where the animals are slaughtered within six months of being exported.
As it stands the export of live poultry is not included in this proposed ban. This consultation is issued jointly by the UK and Welsh governments and would also apply to livestock transiting through England and Wales from Scotland, NI or other EU member states for slaughter or further fattening in the EU.
The main proposals affecting poultry include limiting journey time for transporting broiler chickens to slaughter and journeys for recently hatched chicks. No journey will be allowed to take place for any poultry species if the forecasted external temperature for the journey is below 5°c or above 25°c, unless the vehicle can regulate the internal temperature within a 5°c to 25°c range. Poultry is exempt from the proposed ban on live exports for slaughter (or further fattening for slaughter within six months of export).
NFU national poultry board chair Thomas Wornham said: “As poultry farmers our main priority is the health and welfare of our birds and the poultry sector has invested heavily in improving bird welfare at all stages throughout the supply chain. We are concerned that the proposed regulatory changes to domestic journeys for poultry and the export of chicks could have enormous practical implications for both poultry meat and egg producers. Furthermore, we could see negative impacts on the resilience of the wider UK food supply chain if some of these proposed changes were introduced.”
To submit your views go to the Defra website. NFU members can contact NFUPoultry@nfu.org.uk if they have any queries about the consultation.
