Authority discovers farm in Gelderland where private individuals could butcher animals
The Netherlands Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (NVWA) found four men who were about to butcher a pig that had just been killed at a farm in Gelderland. Inspectors found a dead pig on a pallet upon arrival at the farm on May 23. Its hair had been removed with the use of gas burners.
“The four men present stated that they had just bought the pig and that they wanted to slaughter it on the spot. The farmer was no longer present at his company in the meantime,” the NVWA said.
Investigators interrogated the farmer on Wednesday, who admitted to selling pigs to private individuals over the past two years. Buyers were “allowed to slaughter the animal in the barn,” the inspectorate claimed.
Slaughterhouses are required to comply with specific rules for protection. “Illegal slaughter is unsupervised. This creates major risks for the welfare of the animals and the safety of the meat.”
Commercial animal welfare rules are generally the same regardless of the size of a slaughterhouse. Dutch law allows for some flexibility regarding religious slaughter of animals to produce meat certified as kosher or halal, for people who practice Judaism or Islam. In these cases, animals do not need to be stunned before being killed, but they may only be slaughtered by a specially approved abattoir.
The NVWA seized the pig carcass and the slaughtering equipment they had found.
