Care about animal welfare

 That’s the view of DairyNZ’s team leader for animal husbandry and welfare, Nita Harding. Her comments come as MPI investigates a recent well-publicised complaint about skinny cows on a Cook Strait ferry.

Harding says she knows of the complaint but not whether it is valid or not. But she says with cellphones everyone has a camera and “there is nowhere to hide”.

She says farmers transporting stock cannot just call up a truck and load animals onto it. 

“Farmers need to think about what animals they’re putting in the truck and what condition they’re in. There’s a whole process farmers should be working through in selecting animals for transport; they shouldn’t delegate that job to a junior staff member. General guidelines [require taking account of] the mode of conveyance, duration of the journey, health of the animals, their age, body condition, physiological state and any particular stress to which the animals might be exposed.”