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The Council of Ministers has approved a royal decree that guarantees compliance with animal welfare legislation with the mandatory implementation of video surveillance systems in Spanish slaughterhouses.
Thanks to this decree, Spain will be the first country in the European Union (EU) with video surveillance systems for the control of animal welfare (SVBA).
The video surveillance cameras must cover the facilities where live animals are located, including unloading areas, driving aisles, and areas where stunning and bleeding activities are carried out until the death of the animals.
Video surveillance systems will not be mandatory in the waiting areas where the transport vehicles with live animals are located before unloading begins, but the companies must keep track of the time the animals remain in the vehicles.
In the case of poultry and pigs, the installation of cameras must allow for the recording of the scalding process in order to verify that animals showing signs of life are not subjected to this process.
Slaughterhouse managers must keep the footage of unloading, housing in the pens, driving to the stunning area, restraint, stunning, and bleeding to death for possible subsequent verification. They will also have to ensure that the reproduction, copying, or transmission of the same to other devices is done with the same quality as the original recording.
After the publication of the royal decree in the Official State Gazette (BOE), large slaughterhouses will have a period of one year to adapt to the new regulations and small slaughterhouses will have two.
August 23, 2022/ MAPA/ Spain.
https://www.mapa.gob.es
