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Horse slaughter is the practice of slaughtering to produce horse meat for consumption. Humans have long consumed horse meat; the oldest known cave art, the 30,000-year-old paintings in France's Chauvet Cave, depict horses with other wild animals hunted by humans. Equine domestication is believed to have begun to raise horses for human consumption. Early Domestication of Horse , Lilian Lam, Swarthmore College Environmental Studies, retrieved May 9, 2012p. 21. Élise Rousseau. 2017. Horses of the World. Princeton University Press. The practice has become Equine Ethics in some parts of the world due to several concerns: whether horses are (or can be) managed humanely in industrial slaughter; whether horses not raised for consumption yield safe meat, and whether it is appropriate to consume what some view as a companion animal.
According to equine-welfare advocates, the physiology of the equine cranium is such that neither the penetrating captive bolt gun nor gunshots are reliable means of killing (or stunning) a horse; the animal may be only paralyzed. Unless properly checked for vital signs, a horse may remain conscious and experience pain during skinning and butchering. Use of the 'Penetrating Captive Bolt' As A Means Of Rendering Equines Insensible For Slaughter Violates The Humane Slaughter Act Of 1958 , Manes and Tails Organization, retrieved May 10, 2012 Horse Slaughter Images and Description , Intl' Fund for Horses, retrieved May 10, 2012 Canadians: Act Now to Ban Horse Slaughter! , People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, retrieved May 10, 2012,
Horse meat also was a traditional protein source during food shortages, such as during World War I and World War II. Before the advent of motorized warfare, campaigns usually resulted in tens of thousands of equine deaths; troops and civilians ate the carcasses, since troop logistics were often unreliable. Troops of Napoleon's Grande Armée killed almost all of their horses during their retreat from Moscow to feed themselves. In his biography, Fifty Years a Veterinary Surgeon, Fredrick Hobday wrote that when his British Army veterinary field hospital arrived in Cremona from France in 1916 it was the subject of a bidding war (won by horse-meat canners) for salvageable equine carcasses.
During World War II, the less-motorized Axis powers troops lost thousands of horses in combat and during the unusually-cold . Malnourished soldiers consumed the animals, often shooting weaker horses as needed. In his 1840s book, London Labour and the London Poor, Henry Mayhew wrote that horse meat was priced differently in Paris and London.
Several equine and animal-welfare organizations oppose slaughter or support a ban on horse slaughter, but other animal organizations and animal-agriculture groups support the practice. According to livestock-slaughter expert Temple Grandin, horse slaughter can be humane with proper facility design and management.
Stolen horses have been sold to auctions, where they are bought by "kill buyers" and shipped to slaughter. Auctions enable horses to be sold without owner consent, by theft or misappropriation. According to California Livestock and Identification Bureau statistics, the 1998 ban on horse slaughter in California was followed by a 34-percent decrease in horse theft.
| + Argentina-Horse Meat world production figures , Farming UK, January 17, 2009. | |
| * Includes donkeys | |
| + Horses slaughtered in Ireland, by year |
In 2024, an RTÉ Investigates program, Horses – Making a Killing which went undercover inside an Irish horse slaughterhouse, found widescale animal abuses and incidents of workers purposely misidentifying animals. Animals were shown to have identifying markings covered with spray paint and new microchips inserted prior to slaughter. Journalists from the Investigates program examined the details of 2,400 horses slaughtered at Shannonside Foods Ltd between January 1, 2023 and March 1, 2024. They found that 71% of the slaughtered animals were Thoroughbred bred for the Horse racing, over 400 of which had racing careers, and the rest were sport or leisure horses. The documentary led to investigations by Europol, the European Commission and the Irish Department of Agriculture. Meat from the abattoir featured in the documentary was later destroyed over food safety concerns.
Before 2007, three major equine operated in the United States: Dallas Crown in Kaufman, Texas; Beltex Corporation in Fort Worth, Texas; and Cavel International in DeKalb, Illinois. All were Belgian-owned, with Multimeat also having French and Dutch ownership; Velda owned Cavel, Multimeat owned Beltex and Chevideco owned Dallas Crown. The slaughterhouses exported about $42 million in horse meat annually, with most going overseas. About 10 percent of their output was sold to zoos to feed their carnivores, and 90 percent was shipped to Europe and Asia for human consumption. Although the House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to end horse slaughter in 2006, the bill never came to a vote before the Senate. The two Texas horse-slaughter plants were ordered closed in 2007, after protracted battles with local municipalities who objected to their financial drain on the municipalities (no tax revenue), ditches of blood, dismembered foals and noxious odors in residential neighborhoods. Later that year, the Cavel plant was closed after local community action.
The director of equine protection of the Humane Society of the United States reported seizing large numbers of horses, and equine-rescue facilities were taking in more horses than ever despite a record number of horses shipped to Canada and Mexico for slaughter.Amy Hamilton, Horse abandonment rises , January 24, 2010, trib.com Cases of horse neglect, abandonment growing in Colorado , January 24, 2010, Colorado Springs Gazette The equine market was saturated by increased breeding. The unintended consequences of a ban on the humane slaughter (processing) of horses in the United States , Animal Welfare Council, Inc.
In March 2012, Wyoming state Representative Sue Wallis proposed a new horse-meat processing plant in Missouri or Arkansas. According to Wallis, she had six million dollars to invest and support from Belgian horse-meat buyers. In May Wallis sought local investors in Wyoming to help finance the plant, which she said could cost between two and six million dollars and would process up to 200 horses a day for sale abroad and to ethnic markets in the US. In 2013 the Barack Obama Administration proposed the removal of funding for USDA inspection of horse-slaughter plants in the 2014 fiscal year, which would prevent horse slaughter.
H.R. 2744-45 Sec 794, The Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration and Related Agencies Appropriations Act 2005-2006 was successfully passed to end funding for inspection, effectively ending the processing of horse meat in the US until a future government was willing to reinstate. The USDA resisted by creating a loophole with regulation CFR 352.19 which allowed existing slaughterhouses to pay inspectors directly instead of the agency relying on federal funding. This loophole was closed for Illinois and Texas, the states still engaging in horse slaughter, through a series of court rulings in 2007.
In 2012, the Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2013 excluded the wording necessary to continue blocking federal funds for USDA inspection of slaughterhouses processing horse meat In June 2013 a New Mexico meat plant fulfilled the requirements for USDA inspection of their horse slaughter facility and reopened the horse slaughter debate in congress. In 2014 Barack Obama proposed and passed a budget that once again included language to prohibit horse slaughter in the U.S by defunding federal inspection budget.
Efforts have been made to create a federal law ending the slaughter of American horses for human consumption. On September 8, 2006, the House of Representatives passed a bill which would have made killing or selling American horses for human consumption illegal in the United States; however, it was not passed by the Senate.
Two bills, H.R. 503 in the House and S. 1915 in the Senate, were introduced in the 109th Congress to prevent the slaughter of horses for human consumption. H.R. 503 was passed by the House on September 7, 2006, by a recorded vote of 263–146. Bill Summary & Status : 109th Congress (2005–2006) : H.R.503 : All Congressional Actions with Amendments. S. 1915 was read twice, referred to committee and not voted on. Bill Summary & Status : 109th Congress (2005–2006) : S.1915 : All Congressional Actions. Both bills died at the end of the 109th Congress, and were reintroduced in the 110th Congress on January 17, 2007, as H.R. 503 and S. 311.H.R.503 was referred to committee and not reported out for a vote. Bill Summary & Status : 110th Congress (2007–2008) : H.R.503 : All Congressional Actions. S. 311 was reported out but not taken up for a vote. Bill Summary & Status : 110th Congress (2007–2008) : S.311 : All Congressional Actions. The bills were not reintroduced in the 111th Congress. Two bills were introduced in the 112th Congress: H.R. 2966 and S. 1176, the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act of 2011. The latter was introduced on July 9, 2011, by Senators Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) to amend the Horse Protection Act of 1970 () to prohibit the shipping, transporting, moving, delivering, receiving, possessing, purchasing, selling, or donation of horses and other equines to be slaughtered for human consumption. S.1176 , June 9, 2011, Government Printing Office.
A new iteration of the SAFE Act was introduced in 2021 as H.R. 3355 to the U.S. House of Representatives on February 19, 2021, by Rep. Janice Schakowsky (D-IL) but as of this date has not been brought to the floor for a vote
A 1998 USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service survey to determine welfare problems during equine transport to slaughter found severe problems in 7.7 percent of the transported horses; most arose from owner neglect or abuse, rather than transportation. The report recommended fining individuals who transport horses unfit for travel.Dr. Temple Grandin: Survey of Trucking Practices and Injury to Slaughter Horses . However, despite those recommendations, in an April 2011 report on equine transport violations, of 458 violators and 280 cases reported since February 1, 2002, 51 violators were fined a total of $781,350. The highest fines imposed were $230,000.00 on Charles Carter of Colorado, $162,000 on Leroy Baker of Ohio and $77,825 on Bill Richardson of Texas. A 2007–2015 investigation by Animals' Angels found overcrowded pens, aggression, rough handling, transport with no rest, untreated injuries and no water or food for more than the 28 hours required by law. On February 22, 2007, Representative Robert Molaro introduced HB1711 to the Illinois General Assembly to prohibit the transport of horses into the state for the sole purpose of slaughter for human consumption.
US Department of Agriculture regulations govern the transportation of horses, 9 CFR 88.3 - Standards for conveyances , vlex.com . but the USDA has said that it does not have the resources for enforcement. H.R. 305 Passes House Committee , animallawcoalition.com . In 2009, a bill which would have prohibited the interstate transport of live horses in double-deck passed out of committee in the House of Representatives and was placed on the Union Calendar. The bill died at the end of the 111th Congress.
On November 18, 2011, the ban on the slaughter of horses for meat was lifted as part of the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2012. However, it was reestablished by Congress on January 14, 2014, with the passage of the Fiscal Year 2014 Omnibus Appropriations Act.
On March 12, 2013, Senators Landrieu and Graham introduced S. 541, the Safeguard American Food Exports (SAFE) Act of 2013. The SAFE Act amends the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to deem equine (horses and other members of the family Equidae) parts an unsafe food additive or animal drug. The SAFE Act also prohibits the knowing sale or transport of equines (or equine parts) in interstate or foreign commerce for human consumption. An identical version of the bill, H.R. 1094, was introduced in the House of Representatives by Representatives Patrick Meehan (R-PA) and Jan Schakowsky (D-IL).
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