Posted on August 10, 2017 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Note that although this is England – Ramsgate is on the Kent SE English coast, all the transporters are Dutch – you can tell by the ‘BV’ carried at the end of the name above the cab or the yellow number plate with 3 sets of 2 digits. Obviously all left hand drive also – we have right hand drives in the UK. Policing paid for by the people of Kent from their taxes – a Conservative government which takes the money and does nothing but allowing this to happen.
The whole set up, including the ferry named ‘Joline’, is operated by a Dutchman named ‘Onderwater’. He was convicted in a UK court (Folkestone) several years ago and fined in excess of £10,000 due to animal welfare convictions. He is a UK convicted criminal found guilty in a British court of law. Why does the EU still allow him to operate ? – why does the gutless UK Conservative government allow this to continue ?
You know what, they (EU and UK government) are both as bad as each other; which is just as bad as Onderwater.
They talk about respect – what with this – you must be joking !
Venus has kindly been looking into this more – and has provided a lot more information which we think you will fine interesting.
Dear Mark,
I promised you to write a post about the “Pig Baron” Straathof, here it is.
The story is old, as old as corruption in the meat business and the boundless exploitation of the animals of the system and its servants.
And unfortunately, the story repeats itself.
The case Straathof and the Holocaust of 24,000 pigs
On the 27th of July 2017 about 24,000 nonhuman beings were burnt alive at the “Knorhof” in Erichem (NL).
Adriaan Straathof
Owner of the animal barracks: the Dutchman Adriaan Straathof, the “pig baron”.
For years this barracks has been under criticism, it was actually built as a poultry shed.
Straathof converted this barracks into two floors and got the permission for:
-2,000 sows with suckling piglets, -7,600 rearing piglets and -9,600 Fattening pigs
Adrianus Straathof is one of the largest pig producers in Europe.
He produced 1.5 million piglets per year in Germany alone, when he was still allowed to work there.
Since 2016, Straathof has been forbidden to work in Germany.
Here the chronology:
December 2014: Against Straathof, a ban on feeding and caring has been imposed.
March 2015: Evidence of serious animal welfare violations; Criminal officers carry out a major raid in the pig farm ‘Gut Thiemendorf’.
April 2015: Nevertheless, the ban on banning animals is canceled by the Supreme Administrative Court. The evidence is not sufficient.
June 2015: Straathof remains in the sights of the authorities: 100 officials searched the breeding farms of his pig empire!
June 2016: In Magdeburg, the professional ban against the pig owner Adrianus Straathof is being tried in court.
July 2016: The Administrative Court in Magdeburg confirms the ban on the profession against Straathof. Straathof appealed against the judgment of the Administrative Court Magdeburg.
On 4 November 2016, the Senate of the Higher Administrative Court of Saxony-Anhalt rejected this request for appeal.
Since then, he has been forbidden to work in Germany.
And so Straathof returns to his home country, the Netherlands, and builds a new barracks for 20,000 pigs in a two-storey poultry stable.
Straathof ignores in his new home, as in Germany, every precept which concerns the animal husbandry.
And so there is the burning of 24,000 living beings in Strathof’s barracks.
But, is Straathof a single offender?
No! No way!
Straathof only does what is allowed to him. Politicians and authorities, these are the main guilty, these are our enemies.
The problem is the system.
The state and no one else is responsible for checking whether all, even fraudsters such as Straathof, adhere to animal welfare.
And this control is traditionally weak, you might say miserable.
Because in the lobby republics, the interests of the big businessmen are always taking their place.
Straathof is nothing more than the controlled actor of a corrupt system.
I still trust 24,000 creatures who were unfortunate enough to be born, bred, tortured, and burned in the barracks of Adriaan Straathof.
Dear friends, They were burnt alive — 20,000 pigs packed into tiny pens with nowhere to run.
But his farms were hell long before that:
sick piglets beaten to death,
extreme overcrowding,
animals left suffering with broken bones and protruding organs.
Dutch farmer Adriaan Straathof has a gruesome reputation and Germany has already banned his farming.
Now other EU countries must do the same.
The farmer hopes to just carry on, but if we make this huge, we can force a whole new level of scrutiny, and get regulators to suspend his permits while all his farms are urgently investigated.
To local, regional, national, and European regulators: “As citizens outraged but the incredible suffering of animals on farms owned by Adriaan Straathof, we urge you to take advantage of all possibilities offered by local, regional, national, and European laws to withdraw his farming permits, ensuring he is unable to farm or keep any livestock or other animals. We also urge you to pass stricter fire and animal welfare regulation to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”
Straathof is one of the biggest pig farmers in the EU, with 6 mega farms in the Netherlands and a string of others in Hungary and Germany. And while the Dutch food safety authority has inspected his farms 14 times, and reports of abuse, fines, and violations are piling up, he’s just got a permit to farm another 11,000 pigs!
Enough — this isn’t farming, it’s industrial torture!
Together we can make sure that these were his last victims. Let’s create a massive public appeal, forcing regulators to intervene and stop the next bloodbath:Sign with one click: No More Torture Farms
Our movement has been on the frontline of fighting violence against animals, from China’s dog meat festival, to the cruel trade in horse blood. We know that when we come together in massive numbers to protect animals, incredible things can happen — and this time will be no different.
With hope and determination, Mike, Anneke, Luca, Danny and the entire Avaaz team
Well done everybody who supported and took action on this campaign – you have achieved a positive result to dramatically help horses – but now further action is required to STOP other organisations stepping in and taking over on your victory congratulations on the MSD action ! – SAV.
Mark,
You did it!
After years of investigative work by the Animal Welfare Foundation, its partners in Uruguay, and hundreds of thousands of SumOfUs members like you taking action, Merck, Sharp and Dohme (MSD) has cut all ties with horse blood farms in South America!
Thank you for campaigning against this sickening business. And thank you for not shying away from confronting the biggest and most powerful corporations out there.
Together, we’ve moved a pharma giant.
Together, we are a force to be reckoned with.
But we cannot stop here.
Cruel horse blood farms will still operate as long as there are pharma companies willing to buy their products — and the next big player could step in and take over the business MSD has left behind.
Mark, will you share our campaign against IDT Biologika with your friends?
The more we are, the better our chances of getting IDT Biologika to stop working with these torturous blood farms as well.
Or you can copy and share this email if you prefer:
Dear Friends,
Big pharma is making huge profits from the torture of horses. Thousands of horses are raised purely for the purpose of having their blood extracted and sold — with dire consequences.
It’s a sickening business that the SumOfUs community has been standing up against for months. And together we just scored a major victory against it! Pharma giant Merck, Sharp and Dohme (MSD) cut all ties with the most notorious blood farms we know about!
Now we need to stop the next big player — IDT Biologika — from stepping in and taking over the business MSD has left behind.
Posted on August 4, 2017 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Don’t support this cruelty by drinking cows milk:
In all my years doing live export campaign work; the thing that used to get to me the most was witnessing truck loads of baby calves destined for the veal farms of Europe. You could hear the transporters often before you actually saw them, such was the noise of hundreds of baby calves desperately bellowing for their mothers. They would never see them again – such was the human want for veal steaks and money.
That is why I gave up meat a long, long time ago and turned to a cruelty free diet – I cannot support the dairy industry or anything that involves meat production. To me it is all an industry of cruelty and animal exploitation in return for a financial result.
Some will think I am stupid for what I do and that is fine by me.
In my opinion, when those same folk have heard it, seen it and smelled it then they can criticise me, but not before. They are the kind who just want to turn the other way and try to pretend that there is nothing wrong.
Well, in my opinion, they are the ones who are wrong.
There is something desperately wrong with the whole animal farming process.
Below is one of hundreds of photos I took of calf transporters going through Dover port in England.
Click on the image to enlarge it and you will see the tongues of many calves licking the bars of the transporter. They are trying to get milk as they would naturally from their mothers. They would endure this for another 8-10 hours before they arrived at Dutch veal farms where they would be given a cheap and crappy milk substitute to drink. They would never taste their own mothers milk ever again. Now confined to a crate and waiting for death in the name of veal in 6 months or less.
That is why I don’t do milk or meat – cows milk is for baby cows, not humans.
Other images below form part of the investigation reports into calf exports submitted to the EU.
With thanks to friends at PMAF. See more about this at ‘About Us’ – tab at top of page.
Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Serbian Animals Voice (SAV) 