The Humane Slaughter Association (HSA) supports research, training, and development to improve the
welfare
Welfare, or commonly social welfare, is a type of government support intended to ensure that members of a society can meet basic human needs such as food and shelter. Social security may either be synonymous with welfare, or refer specificall ...
of
livestock
Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to animals ...
during
transport
Transport (in British English), or transportation (in American English), is the intentional movement of humans, animals, and goods from one location to another. Modes of transport include air, land (rail and road), water, cable, pipeline, an ...
and
slaughter. It provides technical information about handling and slaughter on its website, training for farmer staff and vets, advice to governments and industry, and funding of science and technology to make slaughter more
humane
Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, culture, an ...
.
HSA is the sister charity to
Universities Federation for Animal Welfare
The Universities Federation for Animal Welfare (UFAW), is an animal welfare science society. It is a UK-registered scientific and educational charity.
UFAW works to improve animals' lives by promoting and supporting developments in the science ...
.
History
The Council of Justice to Animals (CJA) was founded at a meeting held on 17, January 1911 to improve humane methods for the slaughter of livestock and address the killing of unwanted pets.
["HSA Centenary 2011"](_blank)
Humane Slaughter Association. The
Duchess of Portland was elected President, physician
Charles Reinhardt
Charles Emmanuel Reinhardt (1868–1920) was a British physician, animal welfare activist and anti-vivisectionist.
Biography
Reinhardt was the first physician to advocate open-air treatment in England. He established the Hailey Open-Air Sanato ...
was Chairman and novelist
Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry of William Word ...
was a member of the committee.
[Lee, Paula Young. (2008). ''Meat, Modernity, and the Rise of the Slaughterhouse''. University of New Hampshire Press. p. 108. ] In 1928, CJA merged with the Humane Slaughter of Animals Association to become the Council of Justice for Animals and the Humane Slaughter Association, which is most often called "the HSA.".
On 1 April 2016 the Humane Slaughter Association became a charitable incorporated organization and the Council of Justice for Animals was dropped from the name.
![Cattle Market- Everyday Life at Cattle Markets in Kent, England, UK, 1944 D22206](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b4/Cattle_Market-_Everyday_Life_at_Cattle_Markets_in_Kent%2C_England%2C_UK%2C_1944_D22206.jpg)
In the early 1920s, HSA introduced and demonstrated a mechanical stunner, which led to the adoption of humane
stunning "by 28 London boroughs and later by 494 other local authorities." HSA helped improve water, shelter, and handling conditions at animal markets. It lobbied for transporting cattle by train instead of on foot, and in 1941, rail lines were built to a major slaughterhouse for this reason.
HSA played a key role in passage of
* UK's Slaughter of Animals Act 1933, requiring mechanical stunning of cows and
electrical stunning of pigs
(The law excluded pig facilities without electricity, sheep, and Jewish/Muslim meat.
)
* UK's Slaughter of Animals (Pigs) Act 1954, which required mechanical stunning of pigs outside slaughterhouses
* Canada's 1960 humane-slaughter regulations, partially inspired by HSA's captive-bolt demonstrations in 1950
* UK's ban on live exports for slaughter in the early 1970s (reversed in 1975).
HSA was asked for its views on the UK Slaughterhouses Act 1958 and the Prevention of Cruelty and Hygiene Regulations. HSA was mentioned in the House of Lords debates over UK's Slaughter of Poultry Act 1967.
Research support
Humane Slaughter Award
HSA aims to encourage research and development of more humane livestock-slaughter methods with its Humane Slaughter Award, which recognizes "individuals or organisations, based anywhere in the world, whose work has resulted in significant advances in the humane slaughter of farmed livestock."
Scholarships
HSA has given a total of 48 Dorothy Sidley Scholarships of £2,000 each "to enable students or trainees in the industry to carry out a project which is clearly aimed at improving the welfare of food animals in markets, during transport or at slaughter." Research supported has included the welfare of sheep while transported at sea, handling methods for poultry, rejection of carcases in religious slaughter, and captive-bolt stunning of alpacas.
In 2011, HSA gave a Research Training Scholarship for PhD research to Jessica Hopkins of the
Scottish Agricultural College
Scotland's Rural College (SRUC) is a public land based research institution focused on agriculture and life sciences. Its history stretches back to 1899 with the establishment of the West of Scotland Agricultural College and its current organis ...
for exploration of humane mechanical methods to kill sick or injured chickens in emergency situations on farms, as an improvement over
cervical dislocation
Cervical dislocation is a common method of animal euthanasia. It refers to a technique used in physical euthanasia of small animals by applying pressure to the neck and dislocating the spinal column from the skull or brain. , which is thought to not be completely humane.
The research has been presented at several conferences.
Grants
![Cattle Barn - geograph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/Cattle_Barn_-_geograph.org.uk_-_363207.jpg)
HSA offers grants "for essential research and other projects aimed at improving animal welfare during transport, in markets and at slaughter." Past grants have addressed livestock transport vehicle emergencies, monitoring atmosphere stunning of poultry, and electrical stunning on sea bass.
Conferences
A 2004 HSA workshop in
Lochearnhead
Lochearnhead (Scottish Gaelic: Ceann Loch Èireann) is a village in Perthshire on the A84 Stirling to Crianlarich road at the foot of Glen Ogle, north of the Highland Boundary Fault. It is situated at the western end of Loch Earn where the A85 ...
, Scotland demonstrated an electric stunner for farmed trout.
Electric stunning
Stunning is the process of rendering animals immobile or unconscious, with or without killing the animal, when or immediately prior to slaughtering them for food.
Rationale
Within the European Union, most animals slaughtered for human consumpt ...
of farmed fish has since been widely adopted at least in the UK.
In 2011, to celebrate its
centennial
{{other uses, Centennial (disambiguation), Centenary (disambiguation)
A centennial, or centenary in British English, is a 100th anniversary or otherwise relates to a century, a period of 100 years.
Notable events
Notable centennial events at a ...
year, HSA organized the symposium "Recent Advances in the Welfare of Livestock at Slaughter", which was attended by 250 people from around the world.
The event featured over a dozen presentations, including one by
Temple Grandin
Mary Temple Grandin (born August 29, 1947) is an American academic and animal behaviorist. She is a prominent proponent for the humane treatment of livestock for slaughter and the author of more than 60 scientific papers on animal behavior. Gra ...
.
In 2013, HSA convened a workshop on Low Atmospheric Pressure Stunning (LAPS),
a proposal to kill chickens by withdrawing air from a chamber over the course of 5 minutes. The lack of oxygen induces unconsciousness without a rise in heart rate and with brain activity that resembles a sleep-like state before death.
Training and advice
HSA offers training courses to farmers (large-scale, small-scale, and hobbyist), slaughter workers, and students.
For example, here is a subset of the trainings HSA conducted during 2009-2010:
* teaching a major UK duck farmer and processor about humane on-farm killing of sick and injured birds
* training a poultry processor in Thailand, a UK turkey processor, two retail sites for red-meat processing, and a pig processor
* training a salmon producer in Norway and rainbow-trout farmers in central Scotland
* five
smallholder
A smallholding or smallholder is a small farm operating under a small-scale agriculture model. Definitions vary widely for what constitutes a smallholder or small-scale farm, including factors such as size, food production technique or technology ...
poultry-welfare courses and six courses on captive-bolt stunning for pigs.
HSA educational materials have won International Visual Communications Awards in 1995 and 2000 and the Meat Industry Awards Training Initiative of the Year, Poultry Welfare in 2006.
HSA also provides advice to meat producers, governments, and academics. At the request of a producer or retailer, it performs inspections of slaughterhouses and livestock markets to assess animal welfare and suggest improvements.
See also
*
Animal slaughter
Animal slaughter is the killing of animals, usually referring to killing domestic livestock. It is estimated that each year 80 billion land animals are slaughtered for food. Most animals are slaughtered for food; however, they may also be slau ...
*
Fish welfare at slaughter
*
Controlled-atmosphere killing
Inert gas asphyxiation is a form of asphyxiation which results from breathing a physiologically inert gas in the absence of oxygen, or a hypoxia (medical), low amount of oxygen, rather than atmospheric air (which is composed largely of nitrogen and ...
*
Temple Grandin
Mary Temple Grandin (born August 29, 1947) is an American academic and animal behaviorist. She is a prominent proponent for the humane treatment of livestock for slaughter and the author of more than 60 scientific papers on animal behavior. Gra ...
References
{{Authority control
1911 establishments in the United Kingdom
Animal killing
Animal charities based in the United Kingdom
Animal welfare organisations based in the United Kingdom
Organizations established in 1911