SHEEP & BEEF CATTLE
All supermarkets are doing comparatively well on the welfare of sheep and beef cattle. Most have some access to pasture at least during the grazing season but some are still kept in permanent indoor housing.
HOW DID THEY SCORE?
M&S is ahead of other supermarkets on sheep and beef cattle by banning beef from all double-muscled breeds (which suffer, for example, from birthing difficulties) and giving some outdoor access and bedding to all animals.
Sainsbury’s and Tesco are bottom – they allow some sheep and cattle to be kept in permanent indoor housing, never allowed out to graze on grass.
The vast majority of sheep are subject to painful mutilations such as tail-docking and castration, usually without anaesthetic or pain relief. Sainsbury’s shows the most improvement in reducing tail-docking and castration; in contrast Co-op, while still allowing the least mutilations, shows a large increase since our last survey. No supermarkets source meat from lambs that are mulesed (a procedure which involves cutting the skin away from the rump).
