A line has formed at the massager.

A pig stands grunting under the yellow brush that is scrubbing its back.

A few others are lying in the straw next door, squinting comfortably in the sun and waiting for their turn.

Jonas Jansen

Business correspondent in Düsseldorf.

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Elmar Schulze Heil stands on the edge of his premium barn on the farm in Münsterland and grins: “The animals can use the brush themselves, that's really popular.” There is less wellness for other pigs across the street: they stand between concrete walls, some daylight penetrates through the windows, and ten percent more space than required by law means that they are kept at level 2.

The farmer keeps a good half of his roughly two and a half thousand pigs in these classic stables, the other half gets fresh air, more space and straw.

Schulze Heil started upgrading its stables for pig fattening a good eight years ago.

The farmer would like to continue.

“We are on the right track, but not finished yet because we still have to get approval from the other stables.

It's not that easy, ”he says.

The farmer is a supplier to the controversial Tönnies Group, the largest meat producer in the country, which stands for everything that the public does not like about factory farming, but with its consumer behavior declares it to be indispensable.

In addition, he has a boss who, with his patriarchal leadership of the FC Schalke 04 football club, stands for splendor and decline at the same time.

Schulze Heil will show whether animal-friendly pig farming is possible.

With products that are accepted by the customer.

There is a nature reserve less than a kilometer south, so no more emissions are allowed to arrive.

And the ammonia from the pigsty gets outside more easily if there is no wall in the pigsty to bring the pigs into the fresh air.

The noises are added to the feeding time.

Level 4 is still the exception

The fifty-two-year-old farmer invested a good two hundred thousand euros in the renovation, and he is also worried that he will be able to recover his future expenses.

Twice as much space in housing level 4 means half as many animals and half of the turnover if the price per pig does not rise.

The farm has existed for more than twelve generations, and he doesn't want to be the one to lock the barn door one last time.

The animal-friendly husbandry levels 3 and 4 are still an absolute niche: According to the Tierwohl Initiative, which designed the husbandry label, they account for only 1.5 percent of sales.

Two thirds of the meat still comes from level 1, where it is only a matter of complying with statutory minimum standards, around thirty percent comes from level 2.

The conversion of livestock husbandry for more animal welfare is politically and socially desirable.

It is clear that this will be more expensive.

It is still unclear who will pay for it in the end.

At the beginning of last year, a government commission suggested that consumers should pay 40 cents per kilo extra at the till to finance the barn conversions.

What the traffic light thinks of it is uncertain.