Floods in Emilia-Romagna: new photos expose dead and abandoned animals on farms

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Floods in Emilia-Romagna: new photos expose dead and abandoned animals on farms

28 May 2023
Essere Animali
News
Essere Animali documented the situation in Italy’s Emilia-Romagna region as flooding continues to impact the lives of people and animals. They discovered thousands of animals trapped and waiting for rescue.

On 19, 20 and 21 May, the Essere Animali investigation team visited farms affected by the floods in the provinces of Ravenna and Forlì-Cesena, in order to document the conditions of the animals confined in factory farms of the region. 

Emilia-Romagna is - together with Lombardy, Veneto and Piedmont - one of the regions of Italy with the largest number of reared animals and intensive structures, with more than 20 million poultry and over 1 million pigs reared per month.

The situation was dramatic and the most striking case was that of Bertinoro, where a farm with thousands of pigs was still partially flooded, with no operation underway to feed and rescue the animals. 

Piles of dead pigs - in particular one with more than 100 animals - and operations to move the dead animals outside the farm were documented.

In San Lorenzo, three sheds were found to be flooded and more than 60,000 hens had died.

Essere Animali expresses solidarity with all the people affected by this tragedy, and highlights how Italy is once again fragile and unprepared for the emergency, which affects people and animals such as those bred and confined inside factory farms, where very often there is no evacuation plan for emergencies.