Have you met Animal Equality UK?

Have you met Animal Equality UK?

23 February 2023
News
Each month we interview one of our member organisations about their work, main battles and achievements for animals. This month we are pleased to interview Jenny Canham, Campaigns and Public Affairs Specialist at Animal Equality UK.
Although Animal Equality is an international organisation with offices in eight countries, Jenny works in the UK. We will therefore focus this interview primarily on the activities of Animal Equality UK.

Tell us about your organisation?

Animal Equality is a leading international animal protection organisation working with society, corporations and governments to enact meaningful changes for farmed animals. Widely recognised for our investigations into intensive animal farms and slaughterhouses, our exposés receive high-profile media attention, with exclusive coverage in The Times, The Independent, Sky News, BBC News, talkRADIO and more, reaching millions of people each year.

Animal Equality’s vision is a world in which all animals are respected and protected. By taking a multi-faceted approach to our advocacy, we are able to successfully raise awareness among politicians and the public alike about the cruel realities of factory farming, and to encourage individuals, regulatory bodies and companies to put in place meaningful changes that can impact and save the lives of millions of animals.

In which countries do you work?

Animal Equality has offices in eight countries: the United States, Mexico, Brazil, Germany, Italy, Spain, India and the United Kingdom. I work in the United Kingdom, so will focus primarily on our UK activities.

Animal Equality UK
Animal Equality UK dream team

Tell us more about you and your role?

I am the Campaigns and Public Affairs Specialist at Animal Equality UK.

In my role, I’m responsible for creating and carrying out our strategies for all of our UK campaigns and public affairs work. This currently focuses on three priority areas: working to ban the importation of foie gras made by force-feeding in the UK, strengthening legal protections for farmed fish, and working towards stronger enforcement of UK animal protection laws.

Jenny from Animal Equality UK

To achieve our objectives, I engage with UK Government officials and politicians to build momentum around our campaigns and call for critical changes to be implemented. But of course, we couldn’t do the work we do without the support of the public. So another key part of my role is managing our network of Animal Protectors, a community of volunteers who take digital actions to evidence the strong public support behind our campaigns. We currently have over 10,000 volunteers and these people really are integral in demanding change from decision-makers.

When and why did you join Eurogroup for Animals?

We joined Eurogroup for Animals in 2019 to be part of a community of animal protection groups working to create a better world for animals, to learn from and share ideas with others and to unite to make our efforts stronger where possible. We are so grateful for the important work that other members working with Eurogroup for Animals are doing and are proud to be part of such a strong network.

What are your organisations main achievements?

2023 has already been such a busy year for us at Animal Equality UK! In January, we released a new investigation, revealing that 2022 saw record on-farm mortality rates amongst Scottish salmon. Working with Scamon Scotland, we evidenced that 15 million farmed salmon died between January and November, a figure nearly double that of 2021 and triple that of 2020. Quite rightly, the public has been outraged by this new information. Members of the Scottish Parliament have joined together to demand an urgent inquest into the Scottish salmon farming industry. These mortality rates are having a devastating impact on the environment as well as animal welfare, so action must be taken.

This investigation also comes at a crucial time for fish welfare in the UK. The Animal Welfare Committee (AWC), an official advisory body of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), has been working for several months on assessing what legislation it believes ought to be enacted to better protect farmed fish at the time of slaughter, and is due to release its updated recommendations very soon. We have been offering consultation behind-the-scenes throughout this process, whilst publicly campaigning for stronger legal protections for fish since the start of 2021. Many people are not aware that under UK law, fish only receive very basic and minimal protections, and our first-of-its-kind investigation into Scottish salmon slaughter practices - released in early 2021 via The Times - revealed that extreme suffering is taking place as a result of this lack of clear, species-specific legal guidance and oversight. We are on the cusp of a critical point for fish and have a rare opportunity to change how fish are protected in law, so are continuing to work closely with the AWC to make sure these recommendations are as strong as possible.

Another priority as part of our fish work is calling for stronger enforcement, given that laws mean very little in practice without adequate enforcement. Our investigations evidence that even the very minimal protections fish do receive in law are, we argue, often not followed. Therefore, we are calling for mandatory inspections by Governmental bodies and CCTV in fish slaughterhouses. We achieved progress in this area in February 2022, after meeting with representatives of the Scottish Government who introduced mandatory inspections in fish slaughterhouses for one year in Scotland as a result. Freedom of Information requests carried out by Animal Equality reveal that five inspections have now been carried out in fish abattoirs in Scotland since this progress was first announced. This must now be extended to include the rest of the UK and be made permanent.

Our work towards stronger legal enforcement for fish led us to question to what extent UK animal protection laws for all farmed animals are currently being enforced. At the end of 2022, we released a unique report, working in partnership with The Animal Law Foundation, to answer this question. This was the first time a report of this kind had ever been produced in the UK, and it was unique in that it combined evidence with undercover investigations, data gathered from extensive Freedom of Information requests, and publicly-available information obtained from Government sources. The results were nothing less than shocking

We discovered that, over a four year period, fewer than 3% of farms were inspected on average, and a mere 0.33% of farms were prosecuted following an initial complaint. As a result, farmed animals are suffering from illegal abuse in the most extreme ways, as is proven time and again by undercover investigations.

This huge issue impacts millions of farmed animals and must be addressed, so we are currently calling for all UK farms and slaughterhouses to be licensed in order to begin to strengthen the enforcement of laws that should be offering animals some protection. In licensing all farms, they would be subject to more robust and frequent inspections, increased costs to cover those inspections, and where illegality was discovered, would receive appropriate penalties.

Meanwhile, there’s also been a lot happening in our campaign working towards a UK-wide ban on the importation of foie gras made by force-feeding. This ban is so important to achieve to show that we are moving forward in the realm of animal welfare, and it would save the lives of approximately 250,000 ducks and geese every year. Foie gras is such a devastatingly cruel product, and the UK banned its production years ago, so there’s no logical reason for us to still be importing it. 

The UK public overwhelmingly supports a ban on foie gras, and in a letter coordinated by Animal Equality and PETA in February, high-profile celebrities including Miriam Margolyes, Alesha Dixon and Peter Egan have submitted a letter to the UK Prime Minister to show that, as a nation, the UK will continue to demand that cruel foie gras is banned for good.

How can people support you?

Public support is such an important part of all the work we do, and we’re so grateful that so many people feel just as strongly as we do about the extent to which farmed animals are currently suffering in places like factory farms. Thankfully, there are many ways people can get involved to help.

  • Signing petitions is a great way to speak up for animals. You can find petitions related to all the topics I’ve spoken about on our website.
  • If you’re keen to take even more actions for animals, you can sign up to become an Animal Protector. We’ll send you quick and easy actions to carry out, they only take a minute but really can add up to create huge changes for animals. We also provide you with all the tools you’ll need to be the most effective advocate for animals you can be. 
  • You can also donate to help us continue the important work we are doing to change the world for animals. As a charity, we rely on the generosity of the public and are immensely appreciative of any financial support that we receive.

Words to live by?

One of my favourite quotes that I feel perfectly encapsulates our team at Animal Equality is,

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has."- Margaret Mead

Working with such passionate and committed people every day is one of my favourite things about the work I do, and I’m so grateful to be a part of a team of people who really are changing the world for animals.