Factory farming is animal cruelty, says world’s animal rights body

KAMPALA, Uganda: Animal activists have described as cruel the wide-scale factory farming of animals. “The caging of hens, pigs, goats, and other domestic animals is a fundamental abuse of their rights,” the activists observed.

Sending the message home under their umbrella body the World Animal Protection, the animal activists urged the media to be proactive and spread the news about animal rights.

Speaking at a day-long media training at Imperial Royale Hotel in Kampala on Wednesday, the Wildlife Campaign Manager, Africa, Edith Kabesiime said, “animals are forced to endure short, miserable lives. Crammed into cages, crates, and pens, and treated like cogs in a machine.”

She said World Animal Protection seeks to ensure freedom from hunger and thirst, freedom from discomfort, freedom from pain, injury or disease as well as freedom from fear and stress.

Patrick Muinde, from World Animal Protection, said animals have various roles they play to the population despite the many challenges.

“Our wildlife is facing many challenges such as increasing population, that has led to habitat loss, clearing of the land to create more space for crop farming, increased human-wildlife conflict, human activities, poaching, exotic pets trade, calamities attributed to climate change, increased drought and disease outbreaks.”

He described the driving forces behind the decline in wildlife population as the increased demand for Wild trophies and increased demand for bushmeat, the thriving business for exotic pets in the US, Europe, and Asia, as well as the increased demand for their derivatives: traditional medicine and skins.

The media were given tips to report on Animal welfare issues such as reporting on injured animals, animals killed by poisoning, and those that suffer during transportation in squeezed cages, overcrowded trucks.