Problems raised by industrial stock-breeding

Recommendation 514 (1968)

Author(s):

Parliamentary Assembly

Origin

Assembly Debate on 1st February 1968 (19th Sitting) (see Doc. 2317, report of the Committee on Agriculture). Text adopted by the Assembly on 1st February 1968 (19th Sitting).

The Assembly,

1. Having taken note of the report presented by the Committee on Agriculture (Doc. 2317) ;

2. Whereas the practice of "landless stock-rearing" by industrial enterprises having no links with the land is developing in most of the member States ;

3. Whereas, thanks to modern production and stock-rearing techniques and the capital at their disposal, these firms are capable of supplying large quantities of the animal products which have hitherto provided an important part of agricultural incomes ;

4. Whereas the very considerable efforts and investments devoted by member countries to modernising their agricultural structures are liable to be impeded by the uncontrolled development of landless stock-rearing ;

5. Whereas it is desirable not to prohibit all forms of intensive stock-rearing, but to control and restrict the development of landless stock-rearing, by industrial enterprises, and to associate farmers with modern production techniques so that they may benefit thereby ;

6. Having taken note of the regulations on landless stock-rearing already adopted or contemplated in certain member States ;

7. Whereas the methods of feeding and fattening stock practised today, particularly by the use of hormones and antibiotics, are not all free of risk in the matter of food hygiene and public health ;

Whereas, to be effective, measures for the control of industrial firms engaged in landless stock-rearing and to regulate the use of certain toxic substances should be worked out jointly by the European Governments,

8. Recommends that the Committee of Ministers :

Request member Governments

a to take steps to prevent the proliferation of landless stock-rearing by industrial enterprises and the uncontrolled increase of their production capacity from having harmful effects on the development of agriculture, which must continue to derive a growing part of its income from stock-rearing ;

b to prepare common regulations to ensure that any measures taken are effective on the plane of European trade ;

c to encourage farmers, individually or through co-operatives, to establish modern stock-rearing enterprises capable of providing them with a supplementary income and furnishing products that offer full guarantees from the point of view of food hygiene ;

Instruct the competent Committees of Experts of the Council of Europe to study the implications for food hygiene and human health of methods of feeding and fattening stock with the aid of hormones and antibiotics, and to prepare draft international regulations to prohibit the use of substances harmful to human health, on the understanding that such prohibition must apply to all forms of stock-rearing ;

Include in the Intergovernmental Work Programme of the Council of Europe the study of the problems raised both by the extension of landless stock-rearing by industrial enterprises, and by the use of hormones and antibiotics in feeding stock.