Published 28/03/2008

The British pig industry is using a new ad claiming that "British pig farms have very high welfare standards." We believe this is inaccurate and misleading and so we have made a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority.

We applaud the fact that British pig farmers don't use sow stalls and don't castrate their pigs. We completely support them in saying that supermarkets should give them higher prices for their products. But we cannot agree that overall welfare standards on British pig farms are "very high".

Many fattening pigs are farmed industrially. They are kept indoors in overcrowded, barren pens. They are kept on fully slatted floors with no straw - as a result they cannot engage in their natural behaviours of rooting, foraging and exploring. Most are tail docked. These conditions cannot be described as high welfare; rather they are conditions of very considerable deprivation. In addition, most British sows are forced to give birth, and then mother their piglets, in farrowing crates which are so narrow that they cannot even turn round.

Further reading:

• Read the full complaint here ( 29.89KB)