The Slaughter of Farmed Animals: Practical Ways of Enhancing Animal Welfare

Temple Grandin · Michael Cockram

Jun 2020 · CABI

About this ebook

This book provides both evidence-based scientific studies and practical guidance to enhance the welfare of cattle, pigs, sheep and poultry at slaughter. Temple Grandin and Michael Cockram have brought together a range of international experts to prepare chapters on philosophical and ethical views on the slaughter of farmed animals. These include welfare issues and their assessment, the condition of animals on arrival and their management during lairage, animal handling, methods of humane slaughter and assessment of unconsciousness. The book boldly tackles controversial issues around the compromises necessary when balancing animal welfare concerns with commercial realities, as well as religious slaughter. Chapters cover methods of stunning, pre-slaughter handling, equipment design, monitoring welfare with abattoir data and auditing methods. It is an important publication for those involved in implementing improvements in the humane slaughter of farmed animals and is recommended for veterinarians, students, abattoir managers and government regulators.

About the author

Michael Cockram is a Professor at the Atlantic Veterinary College, University of Prince Edward Island, Canada where he is the Chair in Animal Welfare, at the Sir James Dunn Animal Welfare Centre. Dr. Cockram has a veterinary and academic background in animal welfare. He obtained his veterinary degree and PhD in the UK and then worked at the University of Edinburgh. He studies the welfare implications of the management of animals, and the relationships between health, physiology, behavior and animal science. He has published research on the transport, lairage and handling of livestock and poultry, and other animal welfare issues. Much of this research was conducted within commercial slaughter plants. He has worked with industry groups to apply the results of scientific research to commercial situations and has participated in the development of several animal welfare codes of practice. His previous book chapters have been on the welfare implications of health and disease, sheep transport and the effects of handling, transportation, lairage and slaughter on cattle welfare and beef quality. Dr. Cockram serves as the Welfare and Behavior Section Editor for Animal: An International Journal of Animal Bioscience; he organized the 2018 International Congress of the International Society for Applied Ethology; and is currently the Chair of the Large Animal Subcommittee of the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association, Animal Welfare Committee. Temple Grandin was born August 29, 1947 in Boston, Massachusetts. She is a bestselling author, doctor and professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University, and leader of both the animal welfare and autism advocacy movements. Grandin was diagnosed with autism in 1950. She was immediately placed in a structured nursery, had speech therapy, and had a nanny spend hours playing turn-based games with her. At the age of four, she began talking and her progress continued. In 1970, Grandin received her bachelor's degree in psychology from Franklin Pierce College in Rindge, New Hampshire. She received her master's degree in animal science from Arizona State University in 1975, and in 1989, she received a Ph.D. in animal science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Grandin, being a high-functioning autistic, is widely-known for her work in autism advocacy. She has been featured on major televisions programs such as the Today Show and ABC's Primetime Live. She has also been featured in Time magazine, People magazine, Forbes, and the New York Times. Grandin was the subject of the Horizon documentary "The Woman Who Thinks Like a Cow" and was described by Oliver Sacks in the title of his narrative book: An Anthropologist on Mars. Grandin's bestselling book: Thinking in Pictures is scheduled to be released as an HBO film in 2009. Grandin's Animals in Translation and Animals Make Us Human have also been bestsellers. Grandin lives in Colorado, but has speaking engagements on autism and cattle handling around the world.