Ban Live Exports from Australia

Jun 082011
 

The incredible story of Bill and other animals has emerged after investigation footage of animals exported live from Australia was filmed by Animals Australia investigators in Indonesia recently. Please join us, Animals Australia, and RSPCA Australia to demand justice for Bill and all animals exported live through the live export trade.

You can watch Bill’s story and cast your vote at Ban Live Export

(Please note that the second half of the video is very difficult to watch.)

If you can’t bear to watch all of the video, you can still protest about this. There is a form letter to sign, or you can write your own, and you can share it through Facebook or Twitter. Please do this – we can make a difference from here.

‘Medical’ Abuse of Animals in the USA: a success story with more you can do

May 162011
 

After a long campaign by PCRM and its members, Massachusetts General Hospital has ended its lethal use of sheep in Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS) courses! Given the status and reputation of Mass General in the medical community this is a monumental achievement, and make no mistake about it, this would never have been possible without your dedication and commitment. This decision by one of the world’s most prominent hospitals supports the superiority of medical simulation—rather than live animals—for trauma training.

Since PCRM launched its public effort on Mass General in October 2009 with a peaceful demonstration in Boston, you and others have sent more than 38,000 e-mails to hospital leadership. Now we need to keep that momentum going. Please take a moment to ask the president of Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass., to end its use of pigs in ATLS training immediately.

Baystate is currently the only ATLS program in Massachusetts—and one of the last in all of the United States and Canada—that continues to use live animals. The American College of Surgeons, which oversees ATLS courses, has approved the use of human patient simulators such as the TraumaMan System to teach these courses, but at Baystate, trainees learn on live animals. After numerous invasive procedures are practiced on the animals, they are killed. Baystate continue to use pigs for this training despite the fact that it already owns the TraumaMan System simulator.

So far, the responsible faculty members and administrators have ignored our pleas to change their methods. Please contact the president of Baystate today.

Thank you for all of your help and for all that you do for animals.

Christchurch Animal Aid – We Need You!

Feb 282011
 

SAFE is assisting with the Christchurch relief effort for people and animals who are separated and to support animal welfare groups on the ground. We have set up the Animal Aid facebook site which lists all the resources for those who have lost animals and those who have found them, in an attempt to link everybody up.


This Animal Aid site is for Christchurch people who have lost or found animals following the catastrophic earthquake. Please BECOME A FAN too, then SHARE with friends to help us unite people with their beloved animals. Let’s help lessen their worry and suffering.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Animal-Aid-Christchurch-Earthquake/128399143899998#!/pages/Animal-Aid-Christchurch-Earthquake/128399143899998

Hen Code Proposes Cruel New Cage System

Feb 092011
 

MEDIA RELEASE

8 February 2011
The draft welfare code for layer hens, released for public consultation today, has left animal advocates outraged and questioning the logic of the Agriculture Minister’s animal welfare advisors. The code proposes to ban existing battery cages on the basis that they fail to comply with welfare standards, yet allows their replacement with equally cruel cages.

National animal advocacy organisation SAFE says that the draft code, developed by the National Animal Welfare Advisory Committee (NAWAC), intends to phase out existing battery cages over a yet to be determined period but possibly not until 2030. The group is at a loss to understand why NAWAC would allow so-called ‘enriched’ cages (also referred to as colony systems) that do not provide the animals with adequate living conditions.

“These modified battery cages provide largely illusory improvements for the hens. The enrichment features, a nest box, perch and scratch pad, are of such minimalist design that the cages still do not meet the hens’ behavioural and welfare needs,” says SAFE director Hans Kriek.

”Enriched cages provide each hen only 600 square centimetres of usable space, this is smaller than an A4 sheet of paper, nowhere near enough for the animals to lead a normal life. As a result, these cages are condemned by international animal welfare agencies and are already banned in Germany and Austria. It is ludicrous to introduce a cage system that is already banned overseas on the grounds of cruelty,” says Mr Kriek.

“NAWAC would have us believe that these new, modified battery cages provide significant animal welfare benefits and that New Zealand egg producers should invest millions of dollars in these cages. These modified cages, with their token accessories, will not be accepted by the New Zealand public as a humane alternative,” says Mr Kriek.

Last year SAFE successfully convinced the Government to ban cruel sow crates. Eight out of ten New Zealanders are opposed to battery hen cages and SAFE believes that it is time for the Government to listen to the public’s concern and introduce a complete ban on the caging of all commercial laying hens.

This week SAFE launches its NoCages campaign, urging New Zealanders to make a submission calling for an immediate ban on cages for hens.

For more information, contact SAFE director, Hans Kriek: 027 446 2711.

For information on the campaign and to sign a submission visit http://www.nocages.org.nz

Animal Testing Ban Successes

Feb 012011
 

Together, we continue to save lives and stop cruel training practices! We recently learned that PCRM was successful in ending the use of rabbits and pigs in trauma training courses at two Canadian medical facilities.

In a pediatric trauma training course in Hamilton, Ontario, trainees made an incision between live rabbits’ ribs and inserted a plastic tube into the animals’ chest cavities. In another course at Hamilton Health Sciences, up to 91 pigs per year were used in a course in which needles were inserted into the animals’ chest cavities and the sacs around their hearts. Pigs were also used in a trauma training course at Saint John Hospital in New Brunswick. Both hospitals now teach these crucial lifesaving procedures with medical simulators modeled on the human body.

PCRM urged course directors and administrators at both medical centers to adopt nonanimal training methods. We also filed a federal complaint against Hamilton Health Sciences with the Canadian Council on Animal Care before the hospital confirmed that it had replaced animal use.

These victories are part of PCRM’s highly successful United States- and Canada-wide effort to replace the use of animals in Advanced Trauma Life Support courses. With your help we have saved thousands of animals from being used in these courses and advanced medical training at dozens of facilities across North America. Please help us make Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass., the next program to replace animal use by e-mailing its CEO and chief of trauma.

Thank you for your continued work on this important effort and your support of PCRM.

Very truly yours,

Ryan Merkley
Manager of Research and Education Programs

$2 million Anti-Factory Farming Fund Launched

Nov 082010
 

8 November 2010

A two-million-dollar fund is being launched today to challenge cruel factory farming practices in New Zealand in an effort to stop widespread animal suffering on factory farms. National animal advocacy group SAFE will administer the fund and says the Animal Justice Fund (AJF) will act as a national watchdog for factory pig, chicken and battery hen farms.

The Animal Justice Fund has been established to promote animal protection through strategic litigation, public awareness campaigns and the prosecution of persons or businesses who commit offences against animals on factory farms or through commercial practices.

The Animal Justice Fund is financed by former Kathmandu founder and philanthropist Jan Cameron. Ms Cameron and SAFE are confident that the AJF will have a significant impact on cruel farming practices in New Zealand.

“Ms Cameron is a passionate supporter of SAFE’s factory farming campaigns and has, over the last four years, donated more than A$35million to various human and animal-related causes in Australia and New Zealand,” says SAFE director Hans Kriek.

“The Animal Justice Fund will enable SAFE to step up its public awareness campaigns and provide a strategic opportunity to take court action against companies who mislead consumers about the origins of their products. SAFE may even challenge, in the High Court, welfare codes that allow ongoing abuse of animals,” says Mr Kriek.

The Animal Justice Fund will also provide rewards of up to $30,000 for information provided by farm workers and other industry insiders who expose animal cruelty that leads to a successful prosecution or a significant animal welfare outcome.

“In New Zealand, no routine inspections of factory farms are carried out by animal welfare enforcement agencies. This means that animal welfare standards are not properly monitored, let alone enforced, and the suffering of millions of animals goes unnoticed. The need to encourage those who witness cruelty to come forward is more critical than ever,” says Mr Kriek.

Ms Cameron has initiated a similar Animal Justice Fund in Australia where she has contributed A$5million. SAFE is extremely grateful for Ms Cameron’s generosity and willingness to help factory-farmed animals in New Zealand.

“Ms Cameron has a proven track record as an astute business woman and she will bring that same level of determination to the campaign to improve the lives of millions of abused factory-farmed animals in New Zealand,” says Mr Kriek.

For more information contact SAFE director, Hans Kriek on 027 446 2711.

Photographs of animal cruelty on New Zealand factory farms or examples of SAFE’s new ‘Animal Justice Fund Whistleblower’ advertisements, that will soon be appearing in rural newspapers, are available on request. For more information visit: The Animal Justice Fund

Petition for Animal Welfare – Please Sign

Sep 132010
 

Please visit Your Petition.co.nz and sign this online petition, which already has about two thousand signatures collected manually last year, and is is now online.  Please disseminate as wide as you can so we can create an impact when the Bill is debated in parliament.  Please note that this is not Sue Kedgley’s proposed Bill but was drawn up last year after the Animal Rights conference.

Say No To Religious Slaughter in NZ

Sep 122010
 

Please support SAFE’s campaign to stop religious slaughter of animals. Act now – this is an urgent matter causing great suffering, and it’s happening right here.

Despite a recent law change making it illegal to slaughter animals without pre-stunning, animals in New Zealand will continue to have their throats slit without first being rendered unconscious.

Despite a recent law change making it illegal to slaughter animals without pre-stunning, animals in New Zealand will continue to have their throats slit without first being rendered unconscious.

http://safe.org.nz/Campaigns/Religious-slaughter/

NZ Open Rescue member in court this week

Aug 162010
 

Open Rescue member John Darroch will be appearing in the Hamilton District next week facing charges relating to an act of civil disobedience earlier this year. Please come along and show your opposition to pig farming in New Zealand. John is facing one charge of tresspass and another of unlawfully being inside a building for a protest where he locked onto a silo near Cambridge. This followed an investigation into pig farming which revealed shocking conditions in Waikato pig farms.

Open Rescue and supporters will be holding a protest outside court to draw attention to the cruel nature of pig farming in New Zealand. The rally before court will start at 8.30 and continue until ten. Supporters are welcome to stay and watch the trial after this.

If anyone wishes to come from Auckland and requires a ride please contact J Darroch

Thursday 19th August

Hamilton District Court – 116 Anglesea St Hamilton

For more information about Open Rescue and for information about recent investigations visit http://www.nzopenrescue.org.nz/

New Zealand Open Rescue

PO Box 37612 Parnell,

Auckland,

New Zealand

Online Poll: Do you think battery cages should be banned?

Aug 162010
 

The Code of Welfare for Layers Hens will be reviewed later this year. Government and the egg industry won’t make positive changes for hens by themselves. Consistent pressure from the public is the key to creating change. That means you!

Do you think battery cages should be banned?

Go to our website and participate in our online POLL to make your voice heard!

New Zealand Open Rescue
PO Box 37612
Parnell, Auckland, New Zealand
www.nzopenrescue.org.nz

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