About pigs

Pigs are intelligent and fun animals. They are very sociable and have a higher intelligence than dogs. Scientific studies have shown that they have intelligence comparable to three-year-old children. They can learn to play video games and appreciate music. They dream and prefer to cuddle face to face. Pigs have a wide range of temperaments and personality traits. Sows identify their piglets on the first day and use different sounds to call them. The piglets learn to recognize their mother's call on the second day. Sows are caring mothers and they "sing" to their piglets. Pigs are playful and they have a high need for exercise. Pigs wag their tails when they are happy. Contrary to popular belief, pigs are very clean.

 

Factory farming in Iceland

Pigs live in terrible conditions in factory farms in Iceland. Confined in cramped pens, they have no opportunity to engage in their normal behavior. They are never allowed outside and therefore never get a breath of fresh air. They are not allowed to play in normal conditions or root in the dirt with their snouts. Sows farrow up to three times a year. They spend long periods in pens that are so cramped that they cannot turn around. They can only stand up and lie down. They cannot nuzzle their piglets that suckle through bars. Piglets' teeth are ground down. Their tails are clipped without anesthesia by factory farm workers. This is against the law and regulations, but such operations must be performed by veterinarians if necessary and anesthesia should always be used. Tail docking is a painful operation in which a bone is cut from the animal. These clean animals are then left to languish in cramped pens in their own waste. The conditions for pigs in factory farms are much worse than regulations allow. On Icelandic pig farms, it is more the rule than the exception that regulations on pig welfare are violated. A 2015 report by the Icelandic Food and Veterinary Authority found that every other pig suffered from bedsores and that the pigs had poor leg health due to lack of exercise.

The final step in the production process is euthanasia, which usually takes place in a gas chamber under horrific conditions. In gas chambers, a group of pigs can be suffocated, but their death struggle can take up to 60 agonizing seconds. The gas is highly irritating and causes burns to the mucous membranes and severe shortness of breath. In Iceland, about 80,000 pigs are slaughtered annually.

AWI encourages people to reduce their consumption of pork. By rejecting meat produced under unacceptable conditions, producers receive a clear message to switch to farming where the animals are treated better. All animals deserve a life worth living.