The intensive meat production system is embedded in our contemporary food consumption dynamics but it is unsustainable. Intensive livestock production has a major impact on public health, climate change and animal welfare. Agribusiness giants turn animals into meat under the most horrific circumstances. Italy in this global food production system is a key spot. With "Prosciutto" exported all over the world and famous cheeses like "Parmigiano" and "Grana Padano", the Italian agribusiness has become the frontline of a battle for animal welfare and against global warming. Over the past eight years I've been documenting the investigations of a young but fast growing animal-rights organisation based in Italy and called "EssereAnimali". They work on public awareness promoting ethical choices, mostly with undercover investigations and overnight mission, reporting and spreading their reports on meat production through international media, showing the real life animals endure in factory farms, slaughterhouses or other violent situations.
The body of a dead piglet is laying abandoned on the floor inside an industrial pig farm in northern Italy. Keeping dead animals inside the plant without being legally stocked is absolutely forbidden by EU health regulations, and risky for public health.
A broiler-chickens shed in northern Italy. Chickens are raised in warehouses that can hold up to 30,000 animals, 20 chickens per square meter, with no outdoor access. The broiler chicken – the most common breed for poultry farming – reaches slaughter weight in 6 weeks. Chickens, when allowed to live out their natural lives, can reach about 15 years of age. Through genetic mutations and hormone injections, these animals reach puberty far earlier than nature intended, so their bodies aren’t designed to support their advanced weight.
Animal-Rights activists coming back from a turkey factory farm after they took back SD-cards from their hidden micro-cameras placed outside and inside the factory farm. They install hidden cameras to record abuses and violence on animals by workers during the day. Almost 630 million turkeys are produced for meat each year, globally. Of there over 240 million in the Europe (FAO Stat, 2014).
A broiler-chickens plant in northern Italy. Three floors every building, tens of thousands of chicks every floor. Italy raises about 450 million chickens a year, producing more than it consumes. Feces and urine aren’t often cleaned from the sheds in a poultry farming like this one, which means that these chickens live in their own filth. The bacteria and virus that grows from feces and urines infects the chickens and results a very dangerous threat for public health. Because of the impossibility of individual care, the use of drugs and antibiotics on all housed animals is a practice that ensures their own survival.
A Friesian cow with a broken horn in a large-scale dairy farm. Cows are normally without horns in order to be handled without injuries in intensive livestock facilities. They do not fit well in the milking robot machine, that's why industrial farmers normally cut off the horns in the first few weeks of a cow's life.
A fecal waste tank in an intensive farm for dairy cow and calves. One of animal agriculture‘s greatest environmental impacts is its contribution to global warming and climate change. According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations (UN), the animal agriculture sector is responsible for approximately 18%, or nearly one-fifth, of human-induced greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In nearly every step of meat, egg, and milk production, climate-changing gases are released into the atmosphere, potentially disrupting weather, temperature, and ecosystem health.
Laying hens are seen trapped in a cage with six to eight hens, each given less than a square foot of space to roost and sleep in. The cages rise five floors and run thousands long in a warehouse without windows or skylights. Laying hens live an average of two years and produce about 600 eggs before being slaughtered.
The majority of intensive farmed rabbits are reared in barren environments, with just a drinker and feeder and a wire mesh floor. This does not allow for natural behaviours. 99% of rabbits in Italy are raised in cages. Bare wire floors cause them injuries, and filthy conditions spread disease. In 2019 one billion rabbits were slaughtered for food production (FAO stats).
Automatic egg picking machine, a new type of modern technology in the process of laying chicken breeding.
Activists controlling the gates while using Walkie Talkie Earpieces to communicate with two activists sneaked inside a swine intensive farm in Northern Italy . This moment is part of a clandestine investigation about "Prosciutto di Parma" carried out by "Essere Animali" crew. Their intent is to document shocking images that reveal the institutionalised suffering that humans inflict on pigs to produce "Prosciutto", the famous Italian dry-cured ham.
After weaning, the swines stay in the same crowded cage for 4 to 6 months, then they’re divided in two groups: fattening or reproduction. Pigs raised in intensive farms can reach 150/160 Kg; in one year of intensive farming, a pig grows about 500 grams per day. In Italy in 2019, 11 million pigs were slaughtered, almost half destined for Prosciutto di Parma, and 30% is distributed abroad.
A room for sows and their piglets. Sows live their whole lives without access to open space.
These orange lamps are special infrared lamps that duplicate infrared sunlight. Inside an intensive farm, the piglets are never going to see the sunlight, so these infrared rays are absorbed by swines to reach desired weight as soon as possible to be slaughtered and sold.
Two activists from the Italian non-profits organization "Essere Animali" during a nighttime investigation in a pig reproduction plant. Their aim is to document the inhumane conditions in which animals live in intensive farms, the violence they are exposed to and to publicly denounce farmers who put public health at risk for profits.
A dead piglet lying in pen. Sows are often confined in narrow crates, unable to move freely, when they are pregnant and nursing their piglets. Often the mother involuntarily crushes a puppy because of the extremely narrow space in which she is forced to live. Cannibalism between piglets is common.
A group of calves in a cage. During the first weeks of life, a calf lives far from its mother and in single box, then is temporarily moved to a box with other calves of the same age. If they are male, they will be slaughtered at six months of age; if female, they will be destined to become milk cows.
Night view of a dairy cow and veal farm in northern Italy.
A shed for artificial insemination and gestation of sows in a swine intensive farm that is part of an Italian "Prosciutto di Parma" certified circuit. Inside a swine industrial plant like this, the sows are never going to see the light of the day, they are not able to move, and they are just fed and injected with drugs and antibiotics to reach the desired weight as fast as possible to be slaughtered and sold.
The bloodstained floor of a slaughterhouse seen at night during a nighttime investigation with the facility closed.
A sow kept in individual crate during lactation. Crates like this restrict the sow’s movement so that she is only able to stand up and lie down; she is unable to turn around or walk more than one or two steps. This metal platform is similar to a stall for pregnancy except that there is space to the side for the piglets. The sows are fed with a small quantity of high nutrient-dense feed and injected with antibiotics to avoid deseases.
The body of a dead rabbit lying on the floor of an intensive farm filled with feces.
Most layer egg-hens live their lives in wire battery cages. These cages give the animals very little room and force them to reside next to and even on top of one another. They can’t clean themselves or turn around comfortably. There are 38.9 million laying hens bred in Italy every year. More than half of the eggs produced in Italy come from caged hens.
An activist collects SD memory cards from a hidden camera inside a large-scale meat company. The videos they record during night missions, undercover investigations, or hidden cameras serve to educate people about the real life animals endure in factory farms, slaughterhouses or other violent situations. The videos and photos are also the tool that activists use to expose and shut down entire production facilities.
Hooks inside a slaughterhouse facility.
Activists of the animal-rights group "Essere Animali" during a night mission inside a plant of Italian swine farming for the production of "Prosciutto di Parma". In this photo the activists document the living conditions of the sows with their piglets in metal platforms equipped with infrared lamps for rapid growth. The piglets will be separated from their mothers after 3 to 4 weeks of life.
A stressed and tired swine is seen inside an intensive factory farm for "Prosciutto di Parma" production.
An activist during a nighttime visit inside a slaughterhouse in central Italy
