The images are particularly difficult to watch, like most of the videos published by the L214 association. Filmed between May and September 2023, they show intensive pig farming in the Marne where piglets are slammed on the head to kill them, castrated alive and whose tails are cut off without anesthesia. The video also shows the remains of piglets crushed by their mother, corpses intended for rendering colonized by maggots.
Castration without anesthesia has, however, been banned in France since January 2022, specifies L214, who filed a complaint “for serious abuse and mistreatment of animals”. “The complaint targets the company, the manager and the veterinary practice which monitors the breeding”, specified the lawyer of L214, Me Carole Lanty, who underlines that it was also filed for “breaches of the rules for the management of corpses and rendering”. According to L214, the breeding in question depends on the Cirhyo cooperative and would supply meat for the Herta brand.
Scheduled inspection
The prefect of Marne thus indicated on Thursday that he had ordered an inspection in the department’s pig farm. This inspection aims to “verify the operating conditions provided for by the regulations in force for this type of breeding”, specified the prefecture in a press release to AFP. “In the event of non-compliance, administrative and/or criminal action will be taken,” she added.
The piglet slamming method is “practiced on millions of piglets each year in France” and “concerns animals deemed too weak to allow economic profitability,” specifies the association. A petition calling for an end to these “cruel practices and source of great suffering for piglets” has collected 25,759 signatures at the time of writing this article.