Governments have been urged to enact policies and practices to safeguard animal welfare and ensure they live a cruelty-free life.
Speaking at the launch of their 10- year strategic plan, World Animal Protection Director for Africa Tennyson Williams said at least 1.6 trillion wild animals suffer and are killed through people’s action annually, while more than 70 billion land-based farm animals raised inhumanely are consumed annually.
Addiction to meat, failed animal welfare policies and the demand for exotic animal pets were cited as causing horrendous suffering to both wild and farmed animals.
“With increasing pressure on land and animal habitats, humans will have to opt for alternative sources of proteins and also demand high welfare meat that ensure animals are raised humanely and sustainably,” Williams said.
To make a real difference for animals, root causes must be tackled.
Governments and big businesses must be held accountable for their continued investment in broken systems and persuaded to change.
The strategy dubbed ‘New World for Animals’ is dedicated to a ‘systems change’, transforming the systems that cause horrendous suffering to animals.
“System change is about addressing the root causes of problems – why things happen. Our strategy commits us to raise animal protection to a priority issue of global importance and to change attitudes and mindsets so that animals are no longer seen as commodities for people to exploit.” Williams added.
Acting Director for African Union Inter-African Bureau for Animal Resources Dr. Nick Nwankpa said they are embracing an unprecedented opportunity to advocate animals within a joined-up response to urgent global crises.
“Animal welfare must be placed at the heart of sustainable solutions on a grand scale, to build a better world for all,” Dr Nwankpa said.
At individual level, people must continue putting pressure on the institutions that fuel animal cruelty to change their policies and stop it. United and individually, there is power to demand change and overturn the systems that cause so much suffering to animals, he noted.
Majid Al Futtaim, the parent firm of supermarket chain Carrefour has committed to selling only cage-free eggs across its stores in the region under a newly signed animal welfare policy.
The Dubai-based firm, which has stores across the Middle East, Africa, and Asia says its working toward a 100 per cent cage-free shell egg private label assortment across all markets it operates in by 2030 and all national brands by 2032.
As demand for chicken meat and eggs grows so does the number of chicken farms. This is driven by Kenyans’ love for chicken meat at 92 per cent followed by beef (84.7 per cent) and fish (79.4 per cent), according to a 2019 study by animal welfare group World Animal Protection (WAP).
Unlike free-range chickens that roam freely on vast lands, factory-farmed chickens are kept in cramped, highly automated and unnatural environments as units of production with disregard for their welfare.
