Agriculture & Food recommends that politicians vote against Denmark’s most popular citizens’ proposal.

Never before has a citizens’ proposal received more than 100,000 signatures. The proposal to improve animal welfare for conventionally raised pigs in specific areas is therefore the most popular citizens’ proposal to date since the scheme was introduced in 2018. However, the Danish Agriculture & Food Council (L&F) recommends that politicians vote against it. H.C. Gæmelke, chairman of L&F Pigs, said this when the proposal was discussed at a hearing at Christiansborg on Wednesday. “Parliament should not stigmatize an industry based on a few examples, but should take part in the process that has already been initiated with both the government and Parliament,” he said, referring to the pig sector’s four-party initiative that has been launched. “That is a place where we can stand together to develop, rather than dismantle, our industry.” H.C. Gæmelke stressed that L&F “of course” supports the Animal Welfare Act, and that he respects the “huge support” the citizens’ proposal has received. “The reason we don’t think this citizens’ proposal is particularly fantastic is that we could see that this pig-sector initiative was probably going to be launched.” ### A debate marked by slogans When Helena Artmann Andresen (LA) asked him directly about his position on the four proposals contained in the citizens’ proposal, H.C. Gæmelke declined to comment on them: “As I said at the outset, I don’t really want to take a position on them, precisely because I think it’s fantastic that we have created this forum through the pig-sector initiative, where we can sit down together, rather than deal only with the four proposals.” He also expressed that it had been a difficult time for the industry. “It has almost been a campaign against Danish pig production, and in a number of areas things have completely gotten out of hand. It has been marked by slogans, often with too few facts and hasty conclusions. The debate has made more noise than it has contributed to a constructive solution. But having said that, there must be no doubt that we are taking the criticism on board, because there have been examples of conditions that were not acceptable, and I will be the first to bow my head,” he said, acknowledging that his own farm is one of those where activists have filmed pigs living in conditions that were “not acceptable.” The citizens’ proposal calls for a total ban on tail docking, a complete ban on sow confinement, and breeding practices that select for excessively large litters. In addition, the pigs should have considerably more space and rooting material than they do today, when a 100-kilogram pig is entitled to 0.65 square metres. The Danish Society for Nature Conservation was among those behind the proposal, and its director, Brita Riis, had the honour of opening the meeting as a speaker: “This is where we stand today. Thirty years after routine tail docking was banned, following 15 working groups on pig welfare and countless unresolved voluntary agreements with the Danish Agriculture & Food Council. There has been plenty of talk. The pigs’ suffering is exactly the same. But now 100,000 Danes are saying stop. They know that we cannot continue in this way,” she said. When asked what pig production should ideally look like, she had a clear answer: “If we were to dream of good animal welfare, we would dream of organic farming, because organic farming provides good animal welfare. There are requirements regarding how much space the pigs must have during the periods when they are indoors—they do have indoor periods, albeit with access to outdoor areas. The sows roam freely in the fields, give birth to their piglets, and are able to care for them themselves. There are so many animal-welfare benefits, so that is what we would prefer to see.” ### We are already under way During the hearing, Christian Fink Hansen, sector director at L&F Pigs, pointed out that the industry is already working to improve conditions: breeding is being adjusted to produce more robust pigs, and piglet survival is currently at its highest level in 25 years. H.C. Gæmelke added the industry’s own “Whole Tails” initiative, which aims to curb systematic tail docking. Several parties from across the political spectrum took part by putting questions to the Minister for Nature and Animal Welfare, Christian Rabjerg Madsen (S), and to the experts on the panel, who represented research in animal welfare and socioeconomic issues, the agricultural industry itself, veterinarians, ethics and law. Members of all the parties’ committees expressed, to varying degrees, a desire for good animal welfare. The Conservatives’ Mai Mercado mentioned her own concern about long transport times and the practice of transferring animals abroad in order to transport them for longer than legally permitted, while the Moderates’ Ellen Emilie Mindegaard-Müllertz highlighted antibiotic use as something she herself was very concerned about. The Danish People’s Party’s Rune Bønneløkke repeatedly said that the animals must not become the losers in the case, but more strongly than the others suggested that the current legislation might be adequate and that the problem lay in inadequate enforcement. “So instead of tightening the rules further through additional legislation and more bureaucracy, we in the Danish People’s Party think it might be a good idea to ensure compliance with the legislation that already exists and follow up on it,” said Rune Bønneløkke. At the same time, he asked whether tightening the law in Denmark might risk moving production to countries with poorer animal welfare, and whether it might lead to job losses in rural areas. ### Minister: The development has been under way for a long time Minister Christian Rabjerg Madsen replied that agriculture had already been undergoing dramatic change for decades, with large numbers of jobs disappearing. “The development in agricultural employment is not primarily affected by the fact that I am a new minister or by this country’s animal-welfare ambitions. Structural change in agriculture has been dramatic. We need go no further back than our parents’ generation to find that a third or a quarter of Danes were employed in agriculture. That figure is dramatically lower today,” said Christian Rabjerg Madsen. According to the minister, the task is to transform agriculture so that it does better by nature, neighbours, public health and animal welfare. “But I have a clear ambition that this should be a transformation, not a dismantling. In other words, that we create new jobs, both within a different kind of agriculture and by looking at the opportunities offered by our land—for example, in the form of biosolutions and proteins.” The pig-sector initiative consists of the Danish Agriculture & Food Council, the Danish Society for Nature Conservation, the NNF Food Workers’ Union, the Danish Society for Nature Conservation, the Confederation of Danish Industry, the Danish Chamber of Commerce and the government itself. It will begin its work after the New Year, when the parties will have six months to find joint solutions. If they fail to reach an agreement, the government is prepared to take the necessary political initiatives to ensure that the transformation is carried out.