Shut Down Slaughterhouses

Pigs screaming, thrashing and gasping for air inside carbon dioxide gas chambers. Five day-old calves, crying for their mum’s and herded on wobbly legs down a narrow corridor before being shot with a bolt-gun. Goats hiding under each other and struggling frantically as they dragged onto a blood-soaked platform. Sheep watching with wide-eyed terror, looking for a way out as they are picked off in front of each other, one by one.

This is the reality of Australian animal slaughter. It can never be humane. 

Over the past 10 years, Farm Transparency Project's investigators have entered dozens of Australian slaughterhouses and knackeries, revealing the horror within to an often stunned public. Yet, Australian slaughter industries, including meat dairy and eggs, continue to lie to consumers, claiming that what happens behind the closed doors of farms and slaughterhouses can somehow be humane.

We’ve given the industry enough time to sort itself out. In the ten years since FTP was founded, things have only gotten worse, and the industries that rely upon commercialised animal abuse have become more willing to do whatever it takes to protect their secrecy. With the increasing criminalisation of those who expose legal and illegal animal abuse, we know that our work will only get harder and more dangerous. So, before the industry comes for us, we’re going to tear down every wall they put up to hide their practices from the world. We will stop them, before they stop us. 

We’re going to take that secrecy away from them, and ensure that there is no-one left in this country who can say they don’t know what happens inside Australian farms and slaughterhouses. Over 2023 and 2024, we will investigate and release new footage from 30 Australian slaughterhouses.

View all 104 videos for this campaign in the video gallery

Online Week of Action: South Australian slaughterhouses

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On the 10th July, we submitted formal complaints to the South Australian government about all three of the slaughterhouses we have exposed over the past month. As part of their investigation, we have supplied hundreds of hours of footage and given evidence to the Department for Environment and Water. Yet, despite clear evidence of illegal activity and violations of state and federal animal welfare regulations, the slaughterhouses remain open and operational.

These places should have been shut down as soon as they were reported. We encourage all our supporters to call the Department this week and ask why illegal slaughter is being allowed to happen in South Australia, and whether they will support a federal parliamentary inquiry into the lack of legal protection for farmed animals.

Contact the Department: (08) 8204 1910
Contact the Minister, Susan Close: (08) 8226 8520

We will keep exposing these places, one-by-one, until there is nowhere left for the industry to hide, and until every one of their brutal secrets is revealed

Take action to call for a Federal Parliamentary Inquiry into the lack of legal protection for farmed animals.

What we want

Legal protection for farmed animals

Most of what is done to farmed animals in farms and slaughterhouses  is only legal because of exemptions to our animal welfare laws which mean that what would be illegal if it was done to a dog or a cat, is legal when done to a pig or a cow. We are calling for legal protection for farmed animals which recognises their sentience and ability to feel and suffer, starting with a federal inquiry into animal slaughter methods and the lack of legal protection for farmed animals

A just transition to slaughter-free food production

The technology which would allow us to transition away from commercialised animal slaughter already exists. Through a combination of plant-based food innovation and the emerging cell-based meat industry, we are more than capable of feeding our country without current levels of suffering and violence. Our government needs to move away from meat, dairy and eggs towards slaughter free food production. This includes:

• Investing in slaughter-free food production including plant-based and cell-based protein development.
• Redirection of the millions of dollars in public funding currently funnelled into meat, dairy and eggs away from slaughter-based food production and into alternatives
• Supporting vulnerable workers to escape the slaughter industry. Developing a just transition for workers in these violent industries, linked to high levels of mental illness and brutality, into alternative roles. 

Footage and photos

Media releases

• 10 July 2023: Animal activists vow to break into and expose 30 slaughterhouses over two years to force industry transparency
• 12 July 2023: Hidden cameras reveal pigs slowly suffocating for 20 minutes in “horrifically cruel” South Australian slaughterhouse

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