The transport of live farm animals is one of the most significant and difficult-to-monitor welfare events in the food system. Understanding the welfare science of transport helps advocates push for meaningful reform.
Live animal transport is a welfare challenge whose severity scales with journey length. Short journeys to local slaughter are manageable welfare events; long-distance transport across multiple countries is profoundly welfare-compromising. The EU's 24-hour maximum for cattle and pigs is routinely exceeded with permitted extensions; the welfare consequences - dehydration, exhaustion, injury and extreme stress - are well documented. The UK's post-Brexit restriction on live export for slaughter represents a genuine welfare advance that other countries could learn from. However, domestic transport welfare - the journeys within the UK that affect far more animals - receives less advocacy attention than export, despite similar welfare concerns.