Animals are not cargo

Ahead of Ban Live Exports International Awareness Day on Sunday, we’ve written to the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH), calling for stronger global standards for live animal exports, and ultimately a complete ban.

More than 130 charities, experts and celebrities including Brian Cox CBE, Alan Cumming OBE, and Zoë Wanamaker CBE, as well as organisations including Eurogroup for Animals, Four Paws, Animals International and World Animal Protection from 33 countries have signed our open letter, which has one clear message: animals are not cargo.

Gruelling journeys

Every year, millions of farmed animals are transported across land and sea on journeys that can last for days, weeks, and even months. On these trips, the animals are forced to endure severe stress, extreme heat and overcrowding, hunger and dehydration, injury, disease, and even death.

Just last month, around 4,000 sheep and goats died off the coast of Oman. These disasters happen time and again, with thousands of animals lost when ships are caught in conflict zones, or sink.

Right now, WOAH is revising its global animal transport guidelines for its 183 member states. The current standards are based on a framework which is over 20 years old.

That’s why this open letter is a key moment to bring standards in line with modern animal welfare science and recognise that long-distance live transport causes avoidable suffering.

Transporting meat, carcasses, and genetic materials (such as embryos and semen) for breeding can remove the need to transport live animals altogether.

A pressing opportunity

Charlotte Reid, Deputy Director of Global Campaigns at Compassion in World Farming, said:

Animals are living, sentient beings, they are not cargo. There is no justification for forcing millions of animals to suffer these gruelling journeys every year.

With WOAH leading the revision in transport standards, now is the time for each and every member country to bring this avoidable cruelty to an end. Strengthening their guidelines to prioritise animal welfare is an important step, but ultimately, they must ban all live exports and consign this appalling trade to the history books.

Actor Brian Cox CBE, said:

No animal should have to endure weeks at sea or on the road, only to face slaughter far from where they started. It is cruel, outdated, and completely unnecessary.

It is suffering we can prevent, so we must ban live exports.

Please sign the Compassion in World Farming’s letter to WOAH and urge them to end this cruel trade once and for all.

Help stop the suffering

Sign the open letter to WOAH and its 183 member states.

Open letter condemns ‘avoidable cruelty’ on Ban Live Exports Day