Aquatic animal experts join Animal Equality in calling for CCTV in farmed fish slaughterhouses
GUEST ARTICLE: With millions of salmon and other fish farmed and slaughtered every year in the UK and with relatively few protections as revealed by recent ground-breaking investigations, Abigail Penny, executive director of Animal Equality UK, talks us through their latest campaign to keep a closer eye on the industry.
Trillions of aquatic animals around the world are killed every year for human consumption – so many, in fact, that the industry responsible for these deaths reports them by weight in tonnes, rather than individuals slaughtered.
Where estimates do exist, it appears that the UK farms and kills up to 52 million salmon and 25 million rainbow trout every single year - that's more than two per second. 42 died while you read this single paragraph. On top of these already alarming figures are millions more individuals of another species, deliberately bred and exploited because of their natural behaviours by the UK’s aquaculture industry - cleaner fish.
As footage from Scottish Salmon Watch and others show, farmed fisheries are typically riddled with disease and lice. The lice literally eat away at the face and bodies of the fish confined in cages who have nowhere to escape. The industry’s response? ‘Harvest and deploy’ cleaner fish to eat those lice, often ineffectively and unsuccessfully. The cleaner fish - those who are not predated upon and eaten alive by the salmon and trout during their short lives - are eventually also killed, once they have served their supposed purpose. Discarded as worthless by the fish farming industry, figures suggest that the UK slaughters as many as ten million cleaner fish each year.
Scientists recognise that fish, much like other farmed animals, experience pleasure and pain. Studies published by Dr Lynne Sneddon, world-leading expert in animal biology, show that fish are particularly vulnerable to skin damage, especially when handled by humans. Pain receptors have been identified in fish and are strikingly similar to those found in humans, cows, pigs and other mammals. Dotted all over the head, body, face and fins, these receptors are especially sensitive, meaning what we believe to be a soft touch would be immensely painful for the fish. And it’s not just fish either - thanks to the work of Crustacean Compassion and others, the UK Government recently recognised that other aquatic animals - including octopuses, crabs and lobsters - are also sentient beings capable of suffering.
Although there is often a common misconception that fish lack intelligence, in many cases the opposite is true. Research spanning several decades evidences that teleost fish (the class to which salmon and trout belong) have long-lasting memories and show an aversion to risk; that some species are susceptible to optical illusions; while others are able to identify themselves in a mirror.
Despite these undeniable truths, aquatic animals aren’t afforded even the most basic of protections by law. It is currently legal in the UK for farmed fish to die a slow, agonising death by suffocation or to be clubbed to death, for lobsters to be boiled and dismembered alive, and for live crabs to be ‘chilled’ in a commercial freezer for 40 long minutes. After enduring a life of misery and suffering, these animals are shown no mercy in their final moments of life.
The solution? Spare them the suffering and switch to plant-based alternatives that, fortunately for us, are currently taking the UK market by storm. With Brazilian firm Future Farm offering tasty ‘tuna’ in Sainsbury’s; Wasabi making headlines with its ‘Zalmon’ nigiri rolls; and traditional chip shop Sutton & Sons serving up a vegan menu of scampi, prawn cocktail and banana blossom fish, there’s plenty of choice for the conscious consumer.
And as we vote for a better world with our choices and with our voices, we must continue to fight on behalf of those still trapped in this cruel system. We cannot turn away from those currently terrified and in pain, whose fate is sealed and whose final destination is a supermarket shelf. Nor can we ignore the millions more soon to be born and bred into a world that uses and abuses them for their flesh. If we can make their severe struggle that little bit less in life, don’t we have an obligation to do so?
Current aquatic animal slaughter methods across the UK would be considered entirely unacceptable under the country’s existing slaughter standards for any other species of animal killed for human consumption.
No doubt, by their very nature, slaughterhouses are and will always be pitiless places, no law will ever change that. And we also know that the laws that are in place are routinely breached. Take, for example, Animal Equality’s investigation in 2019 into a sheep abattoir in Wrexham, North Wales, where we filmed emaciated sheep falling through a gap in a conveyor system, while others became painfully jammed in the machinery and were left to hang in mid-air as they were brutally killed and decapitated. As if that’s not disturbing enough, all this took place in the presence of an official Food Standards Agency inspector, who gave a nod of approval and commented “spot on”.
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Legislation will always be one of the most meaningful ways that we can demonstrate progress towards the world we are all fighting for, but it means little if it exists merely on paper and not in practice. However, when the full force of the law is used, it does act as effective leverage. Laws mean that when Animal Equality’s investigators covertly film illegalities - which we so often do - we can push for hefty fines and force producers to pay for their crimes. Laws allow us to prompt prosecutions against animal abusers, and they persuade communities to hold companies to account in the court of public opinion.
Without meaningful, specific protections in place for aquatic animals at the time of killing, this ruthless industry is being left entirely to its own devices. Right now, the aquaculture industry is policing itself.
Such a high level of trust is most definitely unwarranted, as investigations evidence. In late 2020, Viva! released harrowing footage from four rainbow trout farms supplying high-end supermarkets and ‘luxury’ retailers including Waitrose, Abel & Cole, Harrods and Fortnum & Mason. Video clips from a Test Valley Trout farm, supplying ChalkStream Foods and endorsed by Jamie Oliver, showed workers throwing live trout, kicking them with frustration, and hitting them on the head with a wooden baton.
And, even when shiny multi-million-pound machinery is in place, severe suffering can still occur. In February 2021, Animal Equality released ground-breaking undercover footage captured within a slaughterhouse operated by The Scottish Salmon Company - supplier to Waitrose and Co-Op and one of the largest fish producers in the world. We discovered serious animal abuse, with significant numbers of salmon having their gills painfully cut while fully conscious, and others falling to the floor and being left to suffocate.
Formal Freedom of Information requests carried out by The Humane League following Animal Equality’s investigative release publicly revealed that there are in fact no routine animal welfare inspections taking place in farmed fish slaughterhouses in England, Wales and Scotland. Up to 77 million farmed fish are killed for human consumption each year in the UK, yet the Government is not even attempting to hold the industry to account. There is a troubling disregard for these vulnerable creatures.
That’s why Animal Equality - joined by 70 world-leading animal welfare experts and academics - is urging the UK’s Governments to enact new laws on behalf of aquatic animals, laws that we can use to hold this deadly industry responsible. In our latest public-facing action we have partnered with prominent aquatic animal specialists to demand increased oversight and mandatory CCTV in farmed fish slaughter facilities, with a call for all footage published publicly for our collective scrutiny. It is within the public interest that these harsh realities are shown to the world.
In the words of the renowned aquatic animal expert, Dr Lynne Sneddon of the University of Gothenburg: “Had Animal Equality not carried out an investigation into the industry, I very much doubt the suffering of these particular aquatic animals would have ever come to light. We should not be relying on non-profits to carry out what is essentially a public service - it’s the UK Government’s duty to protect the animals killed for human consumption and, currently, it is failing to carry out this basic duty of care. Specific, meaningful legislation is a critical part of the puzzle, and equally so is heightened enforcement and oversight”.
Our team continues to work closely with key decision-makers, sympathetic Parliamentarians and influential government bodies to prompt change for these beings who suffer silently and in huge numbers.
Where companies commit illegalities, they must be found out and called out. It cannot be left only to organisations like Animal Equality to uncover the truth.
You can sign Animal Equality’s petition and amplify the voices of farmed fish here: Animalequality.org.uk/act/scottish-salmon.
Abigail Penny is the Executive Director of Animal Equality UK, a leading, international animal protection organisation working with society, companies and governments to enact meaningful changes for farmed animals.
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