Livestock transportation

Beginning in the 19th century, canal barges and railways began to make overland livestock transportation easier, faster, and scalable.

As time passed and the New World developed, supply ships from England carried livestock as regular cargo.

The distribution of dressed meat exploded, causing the need to ship live cattle by rail to slowly decrease and to become economically unfeasible.

[1] According to RSPCA Australia senior policy officer Jed Goodfellow, livestock transportation 'is inherently high-risk, with decades of repeated evidence of suffering and cruelty.

'[2] In September 2020, Dutch Agriculture Minister Carola Schouten requested the EU Agriculture and Fisheries Council to adjust animal welfare regulations and limit the transport of livestock for slaughter; a special EU committee on animal transport commenced hearings in October.

[3] UK Environment Secretary George Eustice unveiled plans to ban the export of live animals for slaughter and fattening from England and Wales on 3 December 2020.

[3] The plans still had to be finalised, would exclude poultry and not affect Northern Ireland (under EU law), but Scotland would probably follow the example of England and Wales.

[3] Shortly before, a regional court in Germany prohibited the live exportation of 132 breeding heifers because the conditions under which they would be slaughtered in Morocco would be "inhumane".

[3] On 14 April 2021, the Government of New Zealand announced that, in order to raise animal welfare standards, it had decided to phase out the export of livestock by sea by 2023 after a transition period of up to two years.