Minister calls for urgent review of sow crates

Animal welfare regulators yesterday announced a lengthy review of the use of sow crates on pig farms, including analysing new research and two rounds of consultation.

Agriculture Minister David Carter asked the National Animal Welfare Advisory Committee (Nawac) this week to push pig welfare to the top of its priority list after images of seemingly distressed pigs were filmed by animal welfare activists.

Yesterday, Nawac - which has declined to be interviewed until a new code is ready for public comment - said that when it decided to allow sow crates in 2005, there was a lack of evidence for or against them.

The review comes after animal welfare activists broke into Colin Kay's piggery near Levin to reveal the conditions of his animals, which they claimed were inhumane.

Nawac said it had commissioned a review of the latest research to help it examine the pig welfare code, which the SPCA wants changed to outlaw sow stalls.

Under the Animal Welfare Act, two rounds of consultation must be held - one with pig farmers and one open to the public - before recommending a revised code to the minister, Nawac said.

Nawac is the Government-appointed independent body responsible for setting minimum standards for pig and chicken farming.

Yesterday, pig farmers continued their defence of using sow stalls, which they claimed were needed to protect pregnant animals from attack.

But the SPCA said pigs attacked each other only because they were in unnatural, close proximity.

The pork industry says 45 per cent of pig farms use sow stalls.

NZ Pork chairman Chris Trengrove said the stalls - which are too small for a pig to turn around in - were the only way to protect pregnant sows in crowded piggeries from vicious attacks which could be severe enough to break their backs. But the SPCA says the stalls are unnecessary and cruel and wants them quickly banned.

Chief executive Robyn Kippenberger said intensive farmers were making sows more aggressive by keeping them in small, unnatural groups without boars, where they became bored.

Like chickens, pigs were generally happiest in large groups similar to ones they would live in in the wild.

Use of sow stalls has been under scrutiny since Mr Kay's piggery featured on TV One's Sunday after animal welfare activists took pork advertising front man Mike King there to highlight the pigs' plight.

Prime Minister John Key labelled the images of pigs in sow stalls disturbing and Minister Carter called for their use to be quickly reviewed.

Mr Trengrove estimated that 35 per cent of New Zealand pig farmers kept sows in stalls for up to six weeks at a time during pregnancy, when other pigs may sense hormonal changes in the sow and become aggressive.

About 10 per cent of pig farmers kept sows in stalls for longer than six weeks at a time - sometimes for much of their lives, he said.

There is at present no way, on shop shelves, to identify pork that has been intensively farmed - unlike eggs, which are divided into free-range, barn-raised and cage-raised.

An investigation into hen welfare commissioned by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry found stress levels did not vary significantly between caged and free-range hens and that welfare largely depended on the individual farmer.

Those findings were disputed by Ms Kippenberger, who said the study did not differentiate between good and bad stress.

A stress response could be triggered by a positive experience like seeing a bug to eat, she said.

Birds that felt no stress were probably too sedentary.

Ms Kippenberger said caging chickens in groups of three to six increased the number that were victimised.

In large groups, only a few birds would be at the bottom of the hierarchy, but there would be a picked-on chicken in every cage.