Break-ins into stables

Animal rights activists counter accusations: “Completely absurd”

Farmers want to secure their stables, animal rights activists want to educate.

(Bild: Sepp Pail)

The young Styrian farmers are causing a stir with their "Stop barn break-ins!" campaign - and are receiving support from interest groups. The Association Against Animal Factories (VGT) fires back sharply and speaks of "misrepresentations" and "animal industry propaganda".

More and more break-ins into stables, secret video and audio recordings, reports that lead to high psychological pressure on farming families: Representatives of the Styrian Young Farmers' Association have now gone public, criticizing the "radical activists" and calling for a change to the penal code. In future, the offense of "trespassing" should also apply to stables.

Farmers' representatives in favor of changing the law
On Wednesday, they received support from Chamber of Agriculture President Franz Titschenbacher and other farmers' organizations. "Nobody wants strangers to break into their living room at night. Our pigsties are no different," says Kurt Tauschmann, Chairman of Styriabrid, a producer association of pig farmers.

Hans Peter Schlegl, Chairman of the Styrian Poultry Industry, has a similar opinion: "The animals react very sensitively to disturbances, especially at night. The resulting stress puts a strain on our animals and leads to incalculable stress reactions, which can even lead to the death of individual animals." 

Martin Balluch from the Association against Animal Factories

(Bild: APA/HERBERT NEUBAUER)

Death of 60 pigs: animal rights activists fight back
The focus is on the Association Against Animal Factories, which usually publishes the video footage - and always emphasizes that it was only leaked to them. Chairman Martin Balluch fires back sharply in a press release, for example because the incident involving 60 suffocated pigs in Großklein is linked to animal welfare activists: "It is completely absurd to want to blame this crime on animal welfare. Animal rights activists would never deliberately suffocate pigs. Nor did the executive investigate the animal welfare milieu."

It is also denied that animal rights activists would break down doors and cause damage to property. "I am not aware of a single such case." Balluch admits that criminal proceedings often do not follow reports, but says: "If the Animal Welfare Act and its regulations were taken seriously, then all animal factories would be illegal."

The VGT stands by the publication of images from stables. These revelations would serve to educate consumers. "A task that the animal industry is deliberately undermining and trying to prevent."