Shut down slaughterhouses: Media Releases

Media release: Monday 26 May 2025

Farm Transparency Project has published hidden camera footage captured late last year at the Cowra slaughterhouse in NSW The footage reveals workers throwing, kicking, smacking and aggressively electrocuting animals to move them to the kill floor, where many are then ineffectively 'stunned' and killed while conscious  This is the 30th slaughterhouse investigated and exposed by the group across NSW, VIC, QLD, TAS and SA in the last two years, completing a pledge made in mid 2023 Farm Transparency Project (FTP) has completed its pledge to investigate and expose 30 slaughterhouses across Australia over two years, with Cowra Meat Processors in central...

Media release: Wednesday 16 Apr 2025

New footage captured at a Sydney poultry slaughterhouse shows chickens and ducks being killed while fully conscious and able to feel pain. The video showed workers placing ducks on the shackle line after the electrified stun bath, then slitting their throats. Other birds lifted their heads out of the bath, avoiding the water and remaining conscious. The footage was published by Farm Transparency Project and was captured in November 2024 when hidden cameras were installed inside two NSW poultry slaughterhouses.  Footage captured at Tinder Creek duck slaughterhouse in the western Sydney suburb of Tennyson shows chickens and ducks having their...

Media release: Friday 14 Mar 2025

Animal protection organisation Farm Transparency Project has released footage captured inside seven QLD slaughterhouses over a six-week period in August-September 2024.  The footage, obtained through the use of covert cameras installed by the group, shows multiple breaches of state and federal animal welfare legislation, including ineffective stunning, abusive handling of animals, and animals being slaughtered while conscious and aware. At one facility, a sheep is stabbed multiple times and decapitated while still conscious, while pigs are seen drowning in the scalding tank.  Farm Transparency Project is calling for the immediate closure of all seven facilities, which have been reported...

Media release: Thursday 19 Dec 2024

The Federal Court has refused to block the publication of footage of the slaughter of animals, which was illegally obtained by animal protection organisation Farm Transparency Project earlier this year at the Game Meats Company slaughterhouse in Eurobin, Victoria. The organisation will be allowed to publish the footage - which contains evidence of animal cruelty and illegal activity - once the month-long appeal window has passed.  The judgment follows a five-day trial in July where FTP admitted to trespassing at the facility and installing hidden cameras to capture footage of the slaughter of goats. In its judgment handed down...

Media release: Monday 9 Dec 2024

The South Australian government has confirmed to animal protection organisation Farm Transparency Project (FTP) that it will not be prosecuting the illegally operating slaughterhouse in Snowtown. The Snowtown Meat Service abattoir, 150km north of Adelaide, was formally reported in July 2023, after hidden cameras placed inside the facility by FTP revealed a complete absence of 'stunning' for goats and sheep, in clear violation of the Animal Welfare Act. Animals are pinned down and their throats cut while fully conscious, before they are shackled and left to slowly bleed out. While the facility has an exemption permitting them to 'stick'...

Media release: Thursday 24 Oct 2024

Senator Mehreen Faruqi, Cassy O’Connor and Abigail Boyd join state MPs to call for independent oversight of Australian slaughterhouses Farm Transparency Project, who wrote the letter, says that the government has failed to appropriately investigate hundreds of cases of alleged animal cruelty. The organisation is accusing the government department of corruption, claiming that their actions have raised doubts about their integrity and suitability to monitor and regulate animal welfare. Read the open letter View photos and footage An open letter, signed by a senator, several state MPs and animal protection organisations, is calling on the Prime Minister's office...

Media release: Thursday 24 Oct 2024

Dear Mr Albanese, I am writing on behalf of Farm Transparency Project, a non-profit animal protection organisation focused on raising public awareness about commercial animal farming and slaughter practices through comprehensive investigations into Australian animal use facilities. Over the past decade, our organisation has investigated a number of facilities and practices, catalysing significant animal welfare reforms. In recent years, this has included: Publishing footage of the foothold trapping and killing of native dingoes in Victoria by government contractors, stimulating debate and likely contributing to the Victorian government ending the practice in parts of the state. Investigating the failed phase-out of...

Media release: Thursday 5 Sep 2024

Hidden camera footage showing the ‘shocking' treatment of animals at a major Melbourne slaughterhouse has been released by animal advocacy group Farm Transparency Project. The footage, which was captured in June this year, depicts workers writing and drawing on the bodies of sheep and goats with blood, animals appearing to have their throats slit while fully conscious, goats and sheep struggling while soaked in the blood of others and even one mother goat giving birth in the stunning restraint, seconds before her throat is slit. The footage was captured at Cedar Meats, which has been rocked by scandals over...

Media release: Wednesday 14 Aug 2024

New hidden camera footage has been captured at a Victorian slaughterhouse, which has been previously exposed twice for animal cruelty. The footage, captured this year by Farm Transparency Project, shows sheep and goats being beaten and thrown by workers, as well as having their throats slit while fully conscious. MD Foods (formerly Riverside Meats) reopened in 2021, three years after shutting down. A 2016 investigation revealing significant animal cruelty had led to a mandated installation of CCTV to monitor slaughter. View photos and footage Animal advocacy organisation Farm Transparency Project has released new hidden camera footage, taken during a covert investigation by...

Media release: Monday 5 Aug 2024

A landmark legal trial has begun this week in the Federal Court of Australia, to determine whether animal protection organisation Farm Transparency Project will be restricted from publishing footage from a Victorian slaughterhouse operated by the Game Meats Company. In May, The Game Meats Company sought an urgent court order against Farm Transparency Project to censor the publication of hidden camera footage showing the slaughter of hundreds of goats at their slaughterhouse in northeast Victoria. Farm Transparency Project says that this lawsuit is an attempt by the slaughterhouse to hide its practices from the public, and that Farm Transparency will...

Media release: Monday 20 May 2024

Farm Transparency Project is being sued by a northern Victorian slaughterhouse, after it gave the government footage showing acts of extreme animal cruelty at the slaughterhouse and published that footage on its website The slaughterhouse sought an urgent order from the Federal Court to block the footage from being published, without notifying Farm Transparency Project Farm Transparency has taken down the footage to comply with the order but intends to defend its right to publish it Prominent animal advocacy organisation Farm Transparency Project is being sued by the Game Meats Company, a slaughterhouse in Eurobin, Victoria, following the release of...

Media release: Monday 6 May 2024

Photos and footage - protestPhotos and footage - FTP investigation Around 20 animal advocates are staging a protest outside the gates of Ralph’s Meat Co slaughterhouse in Seymour, Victoria. The protest is in response to new hidden camera footage, released by animal rights group Farm Transparency Project, which shows cows seemingly maintaining consciousness as their throats are slit and while they bleed out, as well as severely emaciated cows being herded to slaughter. The slaughterhouse is now under investigation by the federal Department of Agriculture as a result of the footage. The group has said that they intend to attempt...

Media release: Thursday 18 Apr 2024

View photos and footageView location evidence Hidden camera footage captured by investigators from Farm Transparency Project (FTP) in February 2024 shows ineffective stunning of injured and emaciated cows at Ralphs Meat Co in Seymour, Northern Victoria.  The daily slaughter of up to 500 cows, steers and bulls is documented, with many of those killed being dairy cows whose milk production has slowed. Footage shows workers jabbing cows in the face and head with painful electric prodders, and repeatedly hitting them with metal gates. Many show signs of consciousness after 'stunning' and even after their throats have been slit, suffering for minutes.  FTP's...

Media release: Tuesday 26 Mar 2024

Ineffective and painful stunning causes suffering to sheep, pigs, goats and cows.  Hidden cameras captured workers at Gathercole’s Wangaratta slaughterhouse using the bodies of sheep and pigs as punching bags, hitting them as they hang suspended on the shackle line, or as they are pulled onto the kill table to have their throat slit.  Footage also shows ineffective stunning of pigs, sheep, goats and cows who are shot or electrocuted multiple times as they struggle, before their throats are slit. Gathercole’s is the 13th slaughterhouse exposed by Farm Transparency Project in the past year, as part of a...

Media release: Tuesday 19 Mar 2024

Animal protection organisation Farm Transparency Project (FTP) has published interactive virtual tours of two Tasmanian slaughterhouses recently exposed for cruelty The tours were filmed with 360-degree cameras inside Tasmanian Quality Meats at Cressy, and Scottsdale Pork, during FTP's covert investigation last year With the state election just days away, FTP has published the tours - which incorporate footage from hidden cameras - to draw attention to months of inaction by the Rockliff government    Farm Transparency Project (FTP) has published on its website two interactive virtual slaughterhouse tours, filmed last year with 360° cameras inside the Tasmanian Quality Meats and Scottsdale Pork...

Media release: Tuesday 5 Mar 2024

Farm Transparency Project has released new footage of the slaughter of cows at Gathercole’s slaughterhouse in Wangaratta. The footage shows cows seemingly still conscious after multiple shots to the head, thrashing and kicking while workers pull them by their tails and poke them with sharp objects.  Gathercole’s Wangaratta slaughterhouse was investigated by the same group in 2014, with footage showing the incorrect and painful stunning of pigs and lambs. Photos and footage: https://www.farmtransparency.org/facilities/59c0f-gathercoles-wangaratta-abattoir  New hidden camera footage captured in January of this year shows cows shot in the head multiple times with a...

Media release: Tuesday 27 Feb 2024

Farm Transparency Project has released a new campaign calling for a ban of Dairy Australia’s Discover Dairy program, which provides lesson plans and activities to schools. The campaign, titled End Dairy Slaughter, features footage of the slaughter of week-old bobby calves and 4-6 year old dairy cows being violently slaughtered, which has been captured in Australian slaughterhouses in the past year.  Farm Transparency Project is calling out Dairy Australia for manipulative and deceptive targeting of children through their program which the group claims is biased and inaccurate.  A mother cow chases after a trailer taking away her newborn calf.  ...

Media release: Tuesday 30 Jan 2024

New footage from Gretna Quality Meats has revealed that animal cruelty is still rife, seven years after the facility was originally exposed by Animal Liberation in 2016. Footage, released by Farm Transparency Project and captured in September 2023, shows pigs, cows and sheep still blinking, thrashing and trying to stand for minutes after their throats had been slit, as well as cows who are shot in the head multiple times before they collapse.  A 2016 exposé of the slaughterhouse led to calls for the facility to be shut down, including from the RSPCA. Investigators are now saying that nothing has changed. Gretna Meatworks...

Media release: Monday 22 Jan 2024

New covert camera footage captured at Wal's Bulk Meats in Stowport, shows workers jumping on cows, sheep killed without stunning, cows shot multiple times with a rifle while crying out in pain and workers being kicked and chased by animals.  The group behind the footage, Farm Transparency Project, say that they were tipped-off about animal cruelty at the facility by an anonymous whistleblower. The group describes the footage they have released today as "revealing not only systemic and severe animal suffering, but exposing unsafe working conditions and absolute incompetence by workers." Wal’s is the fourth Tasmanian slaughterhouse exposed by...

Media release: Monday 15 Jan 2024

Campaigners from Animal Liberation Tasmania and Farm Transparency Project are planning on disrupting animal transport trucks at Tasmanian Quality Meats slaughterhouse, in a protest against “systemic animal cruelty in Tasmanian slaughterhouses.”

Media release: Thursday 11 Jan 2024

New footage from Scottsdale Pork slaughterhouse in Tasmania shows pigs being tipped into scalding water while apparently conscious, and showing signs of consciousness, including blinking, after their throats have been slit.  Farm Transparency Project, who captured and released the footage, are claiming that the abattoir was built as a result of government corruption and "shady backroom deals," and are demanding its closure in the wake of the footage. Scottsdale Pork is owned by members of the Plymouth Brethren (known as the Exclusive Brethren) religious group, and was built in 2020-2021 after receiving 2 million dollars of government funding.    View footage and...

Media release: Tuesday 2 Jan 2024

Meet Stephanie Tretheway, the 2024 Tasmanian of the Year. Last night we exposed The Local Meat Co, a Tasmanian slaughterhouse where cows and sheep are brutally killed. This slaughterhouse was bought in 2022 by Stephanie and her husband Sam through their business Tas Ag Co (@tas_ag_co). Up until last night, their ownership of the slaughterhouse was proudly listed on their website and social media accounts, and confirmed in ASIC records, domain registrations, and media interviews.  Following the release of the footage, we received an email from Stephanie, threatening legal action if we didn’t remove all mentions of her ownership...

Media release: Tuesday 2 Jan 2024

Animal advocacy group Farm Transparency Project has released new footage from the Local Meat Co, showing cows and sheep being beaten and ineffectively stunned before slaughter. Some footage of the Local Meat Co was exposed in December, alongside four other Tasmanian slaughterhouses, but the full footage has only now been released to the public. The slaughterhouse is owned by 2024 Tasmanian of the Year, Steph Trethewey, who bought the business with her husband in 2022.

Media release: Friday 22 Dec 2023

Tasmanian Quality Meats has been given the all-clear from the federal government to return to business as usual, despite evidence of systemic animal abuse exposed by us earlier this month. The slaughterhouse was originally threatened with losing its export license after our footage showed dozens of calves being violently killed while fully conscious, as well as workers kicking, hitting and throwing calves and sheep. But, after pressure from the slaughterhouse and the state government, the federal government has backed down, opting to allow the slaughterhouse to keep its licence to export sheep, and requiring that they replace their restrainer before...

Media release: Thursday 14 Dec 2023

All talk, little action The Tasmanian government has just released their response to our shocking exposé of Tasmanian slaughterhouses, and its far from the decisive action they pledged to take just four days ago. Rather than responding to evidence of systemic animal abuse immediately, the government has announced that the most they can manage is to re-investigate the facilities and form a task force to consider developing new animal welfare guidelines. Given that all five slaughterhouses we investigated were already in breach of existing state and national welfare legislation, we fail to see what developing new ones will manage, except...

Media release: Friday 8 Dec 2023

View photos and footage: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/14oe6RnPEip5M0CMPALvQECagjPiP1tzQ?usp=drive_link Animal advocacy group Farm Transparency Project has released hidden camera footage from five Tasmanian slaughterhouses, in what they’re calling a comprehensive and damning indictment of the state’s animal welfare regulators.  The footage shows the slaughter of sheep, cows, deer, pigs and week-old ‘bobby calves’ from the dairy industry. Many animals are revealed to be killed while fully conscious, including dozens of bobby calves who are captured dying slowly over minutes as they bleed out. Farm Transparency Project is working with...

Media release: Friday 10 Nov 2023

15 animal activists have been charged with trespass, seven months after they occupied a Benalla slaughterhouse in a protest against the use of gas chambers in pig slaughterhouses. The protest, which happened on April 13th, was in response to an investigation of three Victorian pig slaughterhouses, which revealed pigs screaming, thrashing and gasping for air inside carbon dioxide gas chambers. Seven protestors were arrested and charged on the day, while the remaining 15 were allowed to leave voluntarily, after chains and other devices they were using to lock-on were removed by police. 15 animal rights protestors have been charged with trespass after shutting...

Media release: Wednesday 12 Jul 2023

Animal cruelty investigators have used hidden cameras to capture new footage inside a South Australian pig slaughterhouse’s gas chamber, which shows pigs screaming, thrashing and trying to escape while slowly suffocating to death. Farm Transparency Project has captured hundreds of hours of footage from four slaughterhouse gas chambers, across two states, over the past six months. Its investigators say they have not once seen pigs die without terror, pain and frantic attempts to escape. The organisation is calling for a national inquiry into pig slaughter methods, claiming that Australian animal confinement and slaughter is “inherently violent and cruel." Farm...

Media release: Monday 10 Jul 2023

Animal advocate Chris Delforce has today announced that his organisation, Farm Transparency Project, plans to break into 30 slaughterhouses over the next two years, to capture and expose footage of Australian animal slaughter to the public. Delforce, who earlier this year shared groundbreaking new footage of pigs being gassed to death in Victorian slaughterhouses after hiding in a gas chamber, stated that his organisation has already investigated six slaughterhouses this year, and will be releasing a new investigation this week. Footage from three new Australian slaughterhouses is promised over the next few weeks, with Delforce sharing that Farm Transparency Project has...

Media release: Saturday 17 Jun 2023

Campaigners held an early-morning vigil outside Diamond Valley Pork while pigs were being killed in the gas chamber inside They followed this with an evening memorial in Melbourne CBD where they lay to rest the bodies of three piglets who they say represent the millions of pigs killed in Australian slaughterhouses every year  The protests were part of a national weekend of action calling for a federal inquiry into pig slaughter methods and a ban on the use of gas chambers in Australian slaughterhouses  Animal rights campaigners from Farm Transparency Project have organised a candlelight slaughterhouse vigil and city memorial...

Media release: Thursday 25 May 2023

A Victorian Parliamentary Inquiry into pig welfare has been announced less than two months after investigators from Farm Transparency Project released shocking footage of pigs being gassed to death in Victorian slaughterhouses. 

Media release: Wednesday 26 Apr 2023

Australian Food Group slaughterhouse in Laverton has shut down rather than installing CCTV mandated by government regulator PrimeSafe, according to a report by ABC. The slaughterhouse was last month at the centre of a national exposé into the use of gas chambers in pig slaughterhouses, after animal advocate Chris Delforce spent almost 10 hours inside the chamber filming the agonising deaths of pigs inside. Delforce says that AFG's choice to stop operating rather than install CCTV inside their chamber is "typical" of an industry unwilling to take accountability, however it represents a "massive win for pigs." One of Victoria's three largest...

Media release: Thursday 13 Apr 2023

30 protestors have stopped operations at Benalla slaughterhouse in Northern Victoria, chaining themselves onto the gas chamber used to paralyse pigs for slaughter.

Media release: Monday 27 Mar 2023

Prominent animal advocate Chris Delforce hid inside one of the pork industry’s “humane” carbon dioxide gas chambers to document the gassing of pigs. New footage captured by Farm Transparency Project inside Victoria’s three largest slaughterhouses, revealed exclusively on ABC’s 7.30 program last night, shows thousands of pigs screaming and thrashing in agony as they are lowered into the gas.  This investigation comes 9 years after Delforce first used hidden cameras to expose the use of gas chambers for pigs; the first time in the world that the widespread practice had been captured on camera. He says it “has only...