Padua, Rovigo, Venice: in the region, the Venetoalways described as “legality model”, There are to date Over 80,000 goats and sheep in more than 4,000 farms. All regular? Not exactly.
A new Food for Profit investigation shows once again one network of breeders, intermediaries and private buyers operating outside any health or regulatory control.
The scheme is always the same: animals are sold alive directly to citizens or slaughtered in a clandestine way. The meat thus obtained is then consumed or resold, without traceability or compliance with the hygienic-sanitary standards.
The investigation
Among the most documented alarming practices:
In some cases the breeders themselves explain to customers how to lie in case of checks, advising to declare that animals are “were found on the street“
Particularly raw is the scene in which a goat is immobilized with the encaping technique – a practice not only illegal but of extreme cruelty. In another case, a sheep suffered by advanced and unsuccessful mastitis, with visibly damaged breasts, is sold to a citizen for domestic slaughter.
The link with politics
One of the farms involved belongs to a publicly praised woman like virtuous example by the President of the Veneto RegionLuca Zaia. A detail that raises questions about the real control and supervisory conditions in the local supply chains and the links between politics and zootechnical sector.
The picture that comes out of these images that we have received is very worrying – concludes Giulia Innocenzi. Once again we are not faced with the “isolated case”, but to a system of controversial and illegal practices actually widespread, even among those who are publicly praised by politics. We know that people in the videos have been reported, but it is clear that the problem requires a more widespread system of controls.
