Calves being exported for veal are heard bawling with hunger on the ferry crossing, and can be 21 hours without food as they are removed from their mothers before they are weaned. Numerous breaches of animal welfare in marts here as bull calves are considered worthless because they can't be used for dairy or fattened up enough for beef.
This is absolutely sickening.
I mean on the ones where they are sent away to be killed, at a few days old.
How is slaughtering cattle for veal any different to what we have here where cattle are slaughtered at say two years old ?
cattle have no concept of time and time alive is the only difference
the passage from Ireland to Poland etc should be comfortable, no argument there
We definitely have a serious problem in this country how we treat all animals.I didn't watch the programme last night but I grew up on a farm.
What do the farmers think is going to happen to the bull calves they sell? That they're going off to a lush field to frolic?
I think you make some good and fair points but accusing people of lazy stereotyping while using a lazy stereotype yourself is a bit ironic.
Every dairy farmer is part of the problem, they're producing something that there's no proper market for.
Once they supply this glut, selling on farm or through the mart they are part of the problem
Would it be so difficult to build and provide strategic rest areas across europe for calves with a levy on the milk price.
Let the lorry drive for twenty hours if he wants to but if he unloaded at ten hours and then pick up a fresh load that had been fed and rested for a day
Fran didn't even touch on the calves that were abandoned in the mart
Every dairy farmer is part of the problem
How can a dairy farmer that keeps all animal as calf-to-beef be in any way part of a problem of dealers/exporters/hauliers not treating animals correctly?
Plenty of them will. The live export market for calves is a realtively small fraction of the overall amount produced. Even the ones that are being exported could well end up in a field in another country.
Next time you chomp down on a non-horsemeat burger, will you come back to us and tell us whether it tasted of a dairy calf or a non-dairy calf?
Bull calves are not raised for beef though.
???
You are very confused I think
Dairy breeds do not kill out nearly as well or into as valuable cuts of meat. It doesn't mean that they aren't used for meat. Even old cows are killed for their meat when they reach the end of their milking life.
But puppies and dogs ARE treated terribly, people can buy a custom "pupper" for the 'gram and abandon it when it no longer suits. Look at the state of the shelters with the volume of unwanted dogs, all down to peoples' vanity and stupidity.
Maybe have an expose on puppy farms and peoples' obsession with pets as accessories to even the score?
Why are they considered to be of so little value and exported under horrific conditions for the veal industry then?
Some are exported, and some of them, as shown last night, are treated appallingly. They are considered of little value as the time and effort and costs to raise them to mature here is higher than the price they will get when slaughtered. Processors will penalise you for bringing such animals in to be killed. Now there's also a push to slaughter animals younger in order to cut emissions. Dairy bull calves won't be fit in may cases to meet those targets without pumping more cost into them via feed, thus making the calf worth even less than nothing to the point where some calf-to-beef operators are looking for the dairy farmer to give money along with the calf when changing herds.
Maybe he hadn't been trained in counter surveillance?
For the reasons mentioned above, dairy breeds will not kill out as well. Plus there can be a lot of them about which makes it a buyers market. That all means that the price can be very low for those calves. But people do still buy them and rear them for meat. Meat is meat - you won't be able to tell from your burger what breed the animals mother was.
Some "clever business people" notice that they can buy a calf in Ireland for a few Euro and ship it to another country and sell it for more, then they will do that. It is not a case that all are shipped live. But enough will be shipped so as to take some of the pressure off the market here. So that 5 Euro price goes up and if it keeps going up, then it could theoretically reach a point where it isn't worth the exporters time. It is not a fundamental law of physics that the businesspeople or hauliers have to treat the animals like sh1t. There are animal welfare regulations in place. If they break or ignore those, then action should be taken. If the regulations should be higher - then it is up to the authorities to fix that.
Meat processors in Ireland is close to a closed shop with no real competition. If a fairer price was ultimately paid for the animal, there would be more interest in rearing them.
Edit: Also, as roosterman alludes to above, there are also other regulations (environmental etc.) which actually have the consequence of making those breeds more nonviable.
Touché 😁 There was an element of frustration when writing that reply after reading some of the initial posts, but point taken.
We weren't shown inside the export lorries, calves have water. There are fans and a good straw bed. Hardly horrific conditions
Right. They were packed like sardines, couldnt possibly move to get water or lie down. There were even calves standing on top of other calves.
That wasn't the export lorry.
They're not weaned, water doesn't really cut it.
Department of Ag inspectors wouldn't let them travel if over crowded, everything has to be 110% perfect
On a lot of farms they'd be used to milk twice a day at that age, they'd be fine if the feeding stops were there and regulated, they'd also be better not drinking milk on the lorry.
The stops are clearly not regulated though, and the calves are not given milk on the ferry and were heard "bawling with hunger". It's animal cruelty regardless of the business model that was adopted here.
The calves would have to be unloaded to be fed, I'd hope they were fed before they got on the lorry which'd only be a couple hours before the ferry so it's not hunger that's making them bawl.
Calves are happy if they get their milk every 12 hrs, I've reared lots of calves here by feeding every 12 hours ,the ferry probably frightened them
This is being discussed in the Dail now, government policy being highlighted as the root cause and a call to ban live exports.
It's still animal cruelty regardless of whether the distress is caused by fear or hunger.
Haha you must have somehow missed the last 3 years.
What is their definition of overcrowded? They were on top of each other. The Dept.is complicit in it.
So anyone that questions RTE and government involvement is a "loon"
I suggest you rewind to the water charges and how RTE reported it.
Just because you disagree with someone doesn't allow you to call them a loon. RTE has been shown to be a corrupt organisation from top to bottom.
I think we can all accept that if society continues to develop that what is currently being done in regards food production will be looked at as barbaric, and in mean in a general sense. What the report revealed here is not surprising to me, albeit disappointing that even the most basic of humane treatment is not being provided. The idea that mistreatment is only a small minority does not wash with me and the issues need to be addressed. Until such time as we as a people wean ourselves off meat and dairy and move to a better alternative every effort should be made to make these animals lives as best as can be under the circumstances.
That really is not some wishy washy idea but is what is right at this time.
I highly doubt much will change and regardless much will continue albeit hidden from sight.
