Brussels, 21/03/2002 (Agence Europe) - The Scientific Committee advising the European Commission on animal welfare adopted a report on Wednesday on the welfare of animals during transport, putting forward a number of measures to improve transport conditions for horses, cattle, pigs, goats and sheep. It puts forward new conditions concerning maximum transit times; resting times, watering and feeding intervals, loading densities and loading methods. The Committee recommends banning the transport of very young animals and stresses the importance of proper training for the personnel responsible for animals during transport. The scientific opinion will now be carefully examined by the Commission with a view to follow-up proposals.
To ensure a proper level of protection of animals during transport, the scientists recommend scientific recommend specific space allowances in relation to the type of transport, increased heights of the decks when animals are transported on lorries and new maximum travelling time limits. Higher standards to ensure the welfare of transported horses are also recommended, for example the necessity to transport them in individual stalls.
The scientists found that loading was very stressful for the animals and was therefore recommending to avoid unloading animals at staging points.
In January 2001, the Commission published a report on the implementation of EU animal transport rules which criticised the suffering endured by horses and found major shortcomings in national authorities' enforcement of the legislation. In April 2001 more stringent requirements on ventilation, temperature and humidity controls were submitted to the Council and these are currently under discussion. Further proposals presented in August 2001 have been adopted which require that a veterinarian must certify animals as fit for travel.
Full report available on the Web at: http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/food/fs/sc/scah/outcome_en.html