Supporters demand transparency and an end to routine cruelty in the dairy industry
ROSEMONT, Ill. — On October 29, Mercy For Animals hand-delivered thousands of petition signatures to the headquarters of Dairy Management Inc., urging the corporation to stop whitewashing the routine cruelty behind dairy products. The action follows a recent undercover investigation at a New York dairy farm that captured disturbing footage of mother cows grieving as their calves are taken away, cows being beaten and animals suffering from painful untreated conditions. The farm supplies dairy producers Leprino Foods and Saputo.
The signatures, gathered from more than 30,000 concerned citizens, call on Dairy Management Inc. to stop hiding behind their feel-good marketing campaigns and publicly acknowledge standard industry practices such as mother-calf separation, painful mutilations without anesthesia and the slaughter of “spent” dairy cows.
“DMI has a choice — to continue misleading the public or step into transparency,” said Walter Sánchez-Suárez, veterinarian, doctor of animal behavior and Mercy For Animals’ animal welfare scientist. “This petition delivery is a demand for honesty and an end to cruelty as business as usual.”
Mercy For Animals’ investigation revealed these and other horrors:
- Cows beaten, kicked and left with untreated injuries.
- Mutilations without pain relief.
- Filthy, overcrowded barns raising disease risk.
- Routine separation of newborn calves from anguished mothers.
Despite similar investigations dating back to 2014, companies in the dairy supply chain, including countless farms that fund Dairy Management Inc, have made little meaningful change.
Dairy farms also raise public health and environmental concerns: One 950-cow farm alone can produce as much manure as the city of Albany, permeating the air and often contaminating local water sources. Moreover, conditions at these farms foster cow-to-cow spread of bird flu.
For more information or to schedule an interview, contact Melanie Greene at [email protected].
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Mercy For Animals is a leading international nonprofit working to end industrial animal agriculture by constructing a just and sustainable food system. Active in Brazil, Canada, India, Mexico, Southeast Asia and the United States, the organization has conducted over 100 investigations of factory farms and slaughterhouses, influenced over 500 corporate policies and helped pass historic legislation to ban cages for farmed animals. Learn more at MercyForAnimals.org.
