Extreme temperatures during livestock transport cause preventable suffering and death for millions of animals annually, demanding better regulation and monitoring.
Transport is one of the highest-welfare-risk events in farm animal life. Thermal stress during loading, journey, and unloading causes open-mouth breathing, collapse, and death in severe cases. Pigs have limited thermoregulation capacity and no sweat glands, making heat during loading dock waiting times particularly dangerous. Minimum standards for ventilation, water provision, and journey duration exist but compliance monitoring remains inadequate.