Help End The Cage Age for mother pigs
Subject: End the Cage Age for Mother Pigs
Dear Minister,
I am writing as someone who cares deeply about farm animal welfare to ask Defra to commit to a full ban on the routine use of cages for sows, and to move straight to well-designed free-farrowing systems as the new legal minimum standard.
I welcome the fact that the Government is looking at plans to phase out farrowing cages. However, I am concerned that allowing so-called temporary crating or “flexible farrowing” would mean sows remain caged, simply for shorter periods, but still for sizeable amounts of time. This can be for up to 10 days at a time, beginning right at the worst time before giving birth, when hormones drive them to be active.
Farrowing cages are one of the starkest examples of confinement in UK farming. They stop mother pigs from turning around, walking freely, or carrying out natural behaviours such as building a nest, at one of the most important times in their lives. I do not believe that kind of confinement should be part of modern British farming.
I understand that concerns are sometimes raised about piglet welfare in free-farrowing systems. But countries and farms that have already moved away from cages show that, when systems are properly designed and managed, piglet mortality is no higher, and good, sometimes even better, outcomes are possible for both sows and piglets in free-farrowing systems.
I also believe it makes sense to avoid investing in systems that still rely on farrowing cages. A direct move to free-farrowing would give farmers greater certainty, help avoid a costly halfway step, and move to genuinely cage-free systems that the public can have confidence in.
I therefore urge Defra to make sure its forthcoming consultation is one that sets out a clear transition to free-farrowing. This is the only way to genuinely end the cage age for sows and deliver the higher-welfare farming that the public expects.
Yours sincerely,
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