Brussels, 23/09/2002 (Agence Europe) - At the public debate on welfare conditions for animal transport at Monday's Agriculture Council, all Member States came out in favour of stepping up controls, but disagreed over the maximum time of transport. For essentially financial reasons Spain, France, Ireland, Italy, Greece and Portugal oppose the 8 hour maximum transport time for livestock supported by the European Parliament - thereby opposing Germany, Austria, Sweden, Denmark and Finland, which slammed shortcomings in the current regulations. The President of the Council, Mariann Fischer Boel, also noted the following from Germany (supported by Austria) to harmonise transport documents and from the Netherlands to set up an EU procedure for registering companies transporting animals. Commissioner David Byrne will be unveiling a draft directive in this connection by the end of the year. He said he would not recommend an 8 hour maximum transport time because this is opposed by many Member States. Spaniard Miguel Arias Canete said that current animal welfare conditions for transport were sufficient, whereas Swede Margaretha Winberg said it was high time to put an end to the hellish cycle of treating animals cruelly, describing the setting of maximum journey time as an important tool in terms of animal welfare, controlling disease and the quality of food. She added that without effective, targetted controls, even the most ambitious animal welfare legislation would be pointless. French minister Hervé Gaymard acknowledged the legitimacy of querying the EU framework defined more than a decade ago, adding that France had already taken measures outstripping the EU framework in terms of the training and authorisation of people transporting animals, but that setting a maximum journey time was not the most appropriate solution with regard to the aims (adding that there was the risk of requesting countries getting supplies from suppliers even further away but not subject to any particularly animal welfare measures). Portugal also found current transport time legislation sufficient, if it is strictly applied. German parliamentary secretary of state for agriculture Matthias Bernlinger (speaking on behalf of Renate Künast who had been unable to attend because of the general elections), said that the fact that administrative documents varied so widely from one Member State to another made it very difficult to monitor animals transiting between EU Member States, and for this reason harmonisation of the relevant forms was required and a stepping up of controls at the EU's external borders. Welcoming the EP resolution on transport times, he suggested reducing the density of animals in transport vehicles and keeping the loading and unloading of animals to the bare minimum. Finland agreed with the idea of restricting animals' journey time to eight hours, adding that derogations were needed for difficult to access regions. Austrian farm minister Wilhelm Molterer said that the transport of live animals should be avoided as far as possible, pointing out that Austria had adopted legislation setting maximum journey time for animals at 6 hours, but this had been cancelled following a ruling from the European Court of Justice. The UK called for the Commission to work on the basis of a maximum journey time of eight hours in future negotiations. The Netherlands argued that the aim should be a maximum of 8 hours of travelling or 500 km. Ireland was clearly opposed to cutting animal transport times, on the grounds that this could go against the single market. Italian farm minister Giovanni Alemanno was not in favour of restricting transport time to 8 hours either, nor was Greek agriculture minister Georgios Drys, who emphasised the importance of controls when animals are loaded into vehicles.
David Byrne pointed out that the report published in March 2002 by the Scientific Committee on Animal Health and Animal Welfare did not recommend cutting animal transport times, recognising that many Member States put forward economic arguments to justify transporting animals over long distances (protecting jobs in the food industry, transport industry and abattoirs). He did, however, argue that it was clearly unacceptable to keep things as they were, so he would be proposing measures to improve the level of staff qualifications and the registration of companies transporting animals.
He was also in favour of suspending transport licenses for failure to comply with Community rules.
Controversial issue of refunds on exports of live animals
Commissioner Franz Fischler moved the discussion onto the issue of refunds on exports of live animals to third countries. He recalled on this issue that, in the context of mid-term review of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), the Commission proposed to strengthen conditions for controlling the transport of animals and granting refunds. Today, he noted, only those who comply with all animal export conditions until they reach destination are eligible for the refunds. Problems appear when animals leave EU territory as, Mr Fischler said, "we no longer have any legal instrument allowing us to take action". He went on to add that there are no difficulties for high value livestock ("which are generally well treated") but mainly for animals intended for slaughter which are sacrificed on the spot (for traditional if not cultural reasons). Thus, the abolition of export refunds "would not put an end to the trade in live animals to replace it by a meat trade", stressed Mr Fischler, who believed that, on the contrary, these countries would then import animals from other countries "where animal welfare standards are much lower than our own". Another hypothesis is that these countries will agree to far longer journeys (for example from Australia to Egypt in one of the newly built Australian boats able to transport up to 25,000 head of cattle). On this theme, Sweden, Austria and Denmark restated their appeal in favour of abolishing refunds on live animals and of slaughter at the production site. According to Ms Winberg, until export refunds on animals have been abolished, "animals will continue to be considered as merchandise and not as living creatures, and economic interests will come first (…) Such a point of view is unworthy of us as human beings, amoral, incomprehensible and unjustifiable to the public".