NORTH BATTLEFORD, Sask. – Canadian producers aren’t safe even though they are an ocean and a few thousand kilometres from powerful European animal rights groups, a British food retailer says.
If producers expect to build a European market for their bison and wild boar, they’d better take European sensitivities about animal welfare seriously, said consultant John Gray.
“You need to be bomb proof. It’s a regrettable thing, but in order to supply (the European market), your ducks have to be in a row.”
Gray spoke at Discovery 99, a Saskatchewan agri-culture department conference focusing on specialty livestock.
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Gray said European animal rights groups are committed, even to the point of terrorism, and can kill an industry if they can find evidence against it.
Gray, who has worked with some of the largest English supermarket chains, said the kangaroo meat market was virtually eliminated by an animal rights group. Members of the group went to Australia and documented cruel and brutal treatment of kangaroos by farmers and shippers, then revealed their findings to consumers. Public outrage prompted supermarkets and butchers to stop carrying kangaroo meat. Veal was also driven out of the British market after charges of cruelty.
Gray said the same thing could happen to Canadian exporters if they are not careful. For instance, shipping live wild boars from the Prairies to a slaughter plant in Ontario would upset many European consumers, who would see long-distance shipping as a cruel practice.
Inspections made
He told producers that English retailers or distributors often send out inspectors to make sure the meat they buy is safe and humanely raised.
Gray suggested Canadian specialty meat producers establish a code of practice that is as strong as European animal welfare standards. Records should be kept on the farm and for transport “so that when you are questioned by anybody, whether it’s a consumer, a member of the media, a government agency, that you’re able to show what you do.”
In an interview after Gray’s speech, Murray Woodbury, a specialty livestock professor at the Western College of Veterinary Med-icine in Saskatoon, said Canadian producers don’t seem to understand how important animal welfare is to overseas consumers.
“The rest of the world is looking very closely at how the animal is raised,” said Woodbury.
North American consumers tend to trust farmers to raise animals well. That trust doesn’t exist in Britain, New Zealand or Australia, Woodbury said.
No problem yet
Saskatchewan wild boar producer Steve Jenkins said he hasn’t run into problems with animal rights groups when he has shipped meat to Europe.
“But I’ve heard stories,” he said.
Gray said Canadians may have to toughen their animal welfare regulations if they want to ensure they are safe when exporting to Europe.
But he said Canadian products have some advantages.
“These clean, frosty, natural attributes are a Canadian selling point,” said Gray.
After Gray’s talk, he and Jenkins discussed how to best cut and package Canadian wild boar meat for European retailers.
Jenkins said he wasn’t scared of European scrutiny and hoped to turn heightened sensitivity to animal welfare there to his advantage.
“We want to present that it does come from open spaces, large pens and not from closed barns,” said Jenkins.
