I thought that after all the recent thought provoking stuff it would be nice to give some uplifting news and to show that we can make a difference!
HUGE NEWS: New Zealand Announces Total Live-Export Ban!
It’s the news we’ve all been waiting for: New Zealand will finally end its live-export trade.
The country – which currently sends around 3 million live farmed animals every year on horrific voyages around the world to be used as “breeding stock” – will phase out the practice over the next two years.
News reports suggest the New Zealand government delivered a letter to the Chinese Embassy on 31 March signalling the end of the trade.
Tragedy After Tragedy
PETA has written to the New Zealand government several times over the years urging it to ban live export. Just last month, we wrote when a blockage in the Suez Canal trapped at least 20 ships carrying cows and sheep, putting the lives of hundreds of thousands of animals at risk.
We also wrote in September 2020, when the vessel Gulf Livestock 1 went missing in the East China Sea after leaving Napier in New Zealand. Forty-one crew members on board died, alongside nearly 6,000 cattle.
Countless investigations have shown the ghastly conditions in which animals spend weeks travelling at sea, enduring seasickness, crowding, and exposure to all weather conditions.Animals Exported as ‘Breeding Stock’ Still Suffer and Die
Unlike Australia, New Zealand opted to end live-animal exports for slaughter in 2008. However, just because New Zealand’s animals aren’t headed straight to slaughterhouses doesn’t mean they’re any less susceptible to illness and death on board vessels, and if they survive, it certainly doesn’t mean they’ll lead happy lives elsewhere.
In 2020, New Zealand exported almost 3 million live farmed animals, including 110,00 cows who will spend their short lives being forcibly impregnated on intensive dairy farms in China.
Day-old chicks make up the vast majority of exported animals. They’re torn away from their mothers and crammed into boxes by the thousands for transport overseas.
The
animals tossed about on rough seas, trampled by their shipmates,
suffocated by their own faeces, and dying of dehydration, starvation,
and illness aboard these ships don’t care that New Zealand “only”
exports “breeding stock”. They still endure gruelling journeys – and
face unacceptable risks – only to give birth over and over on depressing
factory farms, before being killed in ways which would be illegal in
New Zealand.
The New Zealand government has made a historic and compassionate move. With this decision, the Ardern administration said “no more” to sending millions of animals – and many humans – on horrible journeys fraught with injury, dehydration, starvation, illness, and death.
Now, all eyes are on Australia to follow suit. Please join us in calling on Agriculture Minister David Littleproud to end this disgusting, dangerous trade at last:
Victory! Australian Surgeons to Stop Mutilating Live Animals
Following an extensive, nearly four-year campaign by PETA and PETA Australia, the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS) has announced that it will stop forcing civilian and military surgeons to cut holes into the throats, chests, and limbs of live pigs and sheep during the Early Management of Severe Trauma (EMST) program. Instead, EMST participants will now learn how to treat traumatic injuries in this course using advanced human-simulation technology. RACS’ announcement comes after more than 100,000 people wrote to RACS officials through PETA’s online action alert, a PETA Australia petition with thousands of signatures, and thought-provoking ads and protests.
Taiwan FDA Finalizes Regulation, Ends Drowning and Electroshock Tests on Animals After PETA Pressure
The Taiwan Food and Drug Administration has finalized a regulation and removed animal-testing recommendations and requirements for companies wanting to make anti-fatigue health marketing claims about their food and beverage products. It will now require only safe and effective human tests. This follows pressure from PETA that included the submission of a detailed scientific critique at the agency’s request and e-mails to agency officials from more than 73,000 supporters opposing animal experiments.
Prior to the agency’s announcement, thousands of animals were tormented and killed in efforts to establish anti-fatigue health claims for marketing food and beverage products. Experimenters fed mice or rats large quantities of the test foods, starved them for up to 24 hours, dropped them into individual beakers filled with water, and observed how long they struggled before drowning or remaining underwater for eight consecutive seconds. Experimenters also fed rats large quantities of the test foods and then put the animals on treadmills equipped with electrified plates to measure how long it took for them to choose repeated electroshocks over continuing to run at increasing speeds and steeper inclines.
Great news for our animal companions!
The blog song for today is: "Mr Blue Sky" By the ELO
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