What if the stimulus plan also improved animal welfare at the slaughterhouse?

Illustration of pigs in a slaughterhouse.

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• In the 100 billion euros of the recovery plan announced this Thursday, there is also a little for animals.

  A budget of 250 million euros should be used to help breeders to get out of intensive breeding, but also to modernize slaughterhouses.

• On this second part, Caroline Brousseaud, from Afaad, points to "good news".

  “Many small slaughterhouses are in financial difficulty and cannot make the necessary investments to take better account of animal welfare”.

• And their disappearance is not necessarily good news.

  Explanations.

This is not the most commented measure in the recovery plan presented by Prime Minister Jean Castex this Thursday after the Council of Ministers.

But in the 100 billion euros of aid that will be injected into the French economy to allow it to recover from the crisis linked to the coronavirus, some will go to animal welfare.

The Ministry of Ecological Transition thus evokes an envelope of 250 million euros, "to promote open-air breeding and especially the modernization of slaughterhouses".

"The health crisis has shown that many slaughterhouses are now in difficulty and are pushing back the investments essential to guarantee acceptable animal welfare conditions", we justify.

"Do not let small slaughterhouses disappear"

This envelope is globally "good news, reacts Caroline Brousseaud, president of the Association in favor of the slaughter of animals with dignity (Afaad).

In any case, we put our finger on a major problem, she explains.

The standards to be observed are increasingly important, so that small slaughterhouses, especially public ones, do not have sufficient funds to carry out the necessary modernizations.

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Result: they disappear, which is not necessarily good news for animals, even if in those which close, some were indeed bad students on the question of animal welfare.

“A major challenge today is to maintain a sufficient network of slaughterhouses in France,” continues Caroline Brousseaud.

There are still 265 [butcher's slaughterhouses, excluding poultry], a number that has declined significantly in recent years.

Territories then find themselves devoid of it, which only lengthens the journey times of the animals.

However, the transport of animals is the other black point of animal suffering denounced by associations.

Sébastien Arsac, spokesperson for the L214 association, adds that the "big" slaughterhouses are not necessarily better than the small ones on the issue of animal welfare, even when they have the financial base to modernize their tools. job.

"The cadences also play a lot in animal abuse," he insists.

As well as the lack of will or the lack of training of the staff.

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Training and transparency too

On August 27, questioned on RTL on the opportunity represented by the recovery plan to support the slaughtering industry, Julien Denormandie, Minister of Agriculture, did not limit himself to the modernization of equipment, but added "the training of staff working there ”and“ transparency of the profession ”.

“Here again we touch on fundamental points already underlined at the time of the commission on the conditions of slaughter of slaughter animals led by deputy Olivier Falorni [in 2016], reacts Caroline Brousseaud.

In particular, there is a certificate of animal protection skills, but this training is very theoretical and essentially comes down to a MCQ.

It is insufficient to learn the right gestures.

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The transparency of the slaughtering chain is a much more sensitive subject.

It is often summed up in the introduction of video surveillance in slaughterhouses, one of the strong measures proposed by Olivier Falorni.

Voted by the National Assembly in January 2017, it was finally abandoned in the bill presented by Stéphane Travert - then Minister of Agriculture - in early 2018.

Is the debate on cameras again?

The stimulus plan and the money put into modernizing slaughterhouses could be an opportunity to put the subject back on the table.

Still on RTL, on August 27, Julien Denormandie did not rule out this possibility.

“This transparency is normal.

Does it go through cameras or other systems?

These are discussions that we must have with all the players (…), I do not exclude anything at all, ”he declared.

It's not all about cameras, confirms Caroline Brousseaud.

The president of Afaad also mentioned the inspection reports of the veterinary services on animal protection carried out at least once a year for each slaughterhouse.

“In 2016, Stéphane Le Foll, the Minister of Agriculture at the time, made a commitment to make them public,” she recalls.

This has never been the case, although these are invaluable documents for associations, but also breeders and professionals in the sector.

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Awaiting details

This envelope of 250 million euros "in any case leaves room to do a lot of things, assures Caroline Brousseaud.

It remains to know the details, she comments.

We do not even know very well what part of this amount will go to the development of open-air breeding and what other will go to the modernization of slaughterhouses.

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Come to think of it, Sébastien Arsac recommends investing much more in the first part, that of supporting farmers to exit intensive breeding.

“We could make sure more easily that the money goes to small farmers and not to the heavyweights of the food industry that we often find behind slaughterhouses,” he begins.

And then, we would go in the direction of a change of model, from which animal welfare will surely emerge a winner.

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And why not a helping hand for mobile slaughterhouses?

This is one of Caroline Brousseaud's questions to date.

In these 250 million euros, will there be a little to support mobile slaughterhouses, which go directly to the farmer?

The subject is close to the heart of Afaad, "if only because these mobile slaughterhouses avoid having to transport animals, a major source of stress for them," says its president.

They also have the particularity of not imposing high speeds, which makes it easier to take animal welfare into account.

“They are not banned today, the Agriculture and Food Law [promulgated on November 1, 2018] allowing a four-year experimentation phase, continues Caroline Brousseaud.

But none is currently running in the territory, the initial investments being heavy.

On the other hand, several projects are very well advanced.

This is the case of Ethical Beef, carried by the breeder Emilie Jeannin, in Côte-d'Or, or even AALVie (Slaughter of animals in their place of life), carried by a collective of breeders from Loire-Atlantique.

“These two projects are currently the subject of crowdfunding campaigns,” explains Caroline Brousseaud.

The recovery plan could be an opportunity for the State to put its hand in its pocket.

• Coronavirus

• Recovery plan

• Slaughterhouse

• Animals

• Animal protection

• Planet