Animal welfare in New Zealand

Animal welfare in New Zealand is governed by the Animal Welfare Act 1999 and a number of organisations actively advocate for both animal welfare and animal rights. Pest control and farming practices have been scrutinised with respect to animal welfare issues.

The New Zealand economy relies heavily on agriculture and many animal welfare issues involve the farming sector.

There were animal welfare concerns on the controversial CraFarms and in June 2011 five people involved with Crafers Taharua Dairy Farm pleaded not guilty to 714 charges of alleged animal welfare offences.

In 2013 a farmer was convicted of animal welfare offences after breaking or injuring the tails of 230 cows and he was banned from owning cows. The case was the worst of its type that had been seen by the authorities.

A resource consent application under the Resource Management Act 1991 for the intensive farming of cattle in the Mackenzie Basin in 2009 attracted opposition because of concerns over animal welfare, even though animal welfare is not a part of the RMA. The application was "called in" under provisions of the RMA.

The usage of 1080 in New Zealand (a pest control and animal health measure) attracts some opposition on animal welfare grounds but a 2007 assessment of 1080 (sodium fluoroacetate) concluded that the benefits outweighed the risks.

In 2010 Landcare Research New Zealand Limited prepared a paper for MAF Biosecurity New Zealand called “How humane are our pest control tools?” [1]. Various vertebrate toxic agents such as 1080, Brodifacoum, Cholecalciferol and so on, kill traps in mammal species, in-burrow rabbit control methods and leg hold traps, rotenone, alphachloralose and DRC-1339 looked at the ‘animal welfare impact’ (humanness) of these control tools. The paper describes in detail how various toxins affect different animals. Information on level of consciousness at various times/events after dosing are still needed to fully assess its negative experiences and humanness.

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