After crazed and depressed crated pigs were shown on the Sunday programme many viewers reacted with horror, rightly considering that this is no way to treat intelligent and sensitive creatures.

The pork industry is fighting back, using allies from the veterinary profession to give it an air of respectability.
The debate is being framed as one of science versus emotion, of weak willed sentimentality by well meaning but misguided animal lovers versus the knowledgeable and hard nosed veterinary profession, who know what is really best for animals.
Industry bosses and their tame veterinarians take great pains to assure the ignorant masses that pigs are really better off kept in conditions that – coincidentally – also maximise profits for the industry.
This ploy is clever marketing but it is not science. It is not honest. And it is not ethical.
No matter how much the industry likes to chant the sound science mantra, most of their utterances are self-serving, anti-science nonsense showing an abysmal knowledge of even school level biology. Either that or they confirm George Bernard Shaw's dictum that anyone who would not hesitate to abuse animals would certainly not hesitate to lie about it.
Respected animal welfare scientists who are unaffiliated with the industry have agreed keeping a sow in a space so small she cannot turn around is not at all conducive to her welfare. These findings have been confirmed through a scientific methodologies, including physiological responses, monitoring behaviour and observations of feral pigs.
Contrary to claims made by the industry, sows are not fire breathing monsters intent on devouring their young and each other.
Like all social species, including our own, pigs can be aggressive at times, but if they are provided with sufficient space, food, a separate toilet area and plenty to do, they can rub along quite well together. Solitary confinement may be required in a minority of cases, as it is with our own species, but the sow should still be given bedding and plenty of space to move.
Studies have shown there is no difference in piglet mortality in countries where farrowing crates are allowed and countries where they are banned. I am sure the free range farmers featured on page four of the June issue of Coast & Country would agree with this scientific appraisal.
The industry claims if they were forced to improve welfare they would be unable to compete with imported pork. This could easily be overcome by placing the same restrictions on imports as on domestic products. The WTO rules allow this and the regulations were tested recently, when the EC placed a ban on all seal products from Canada on animal welfare grounds.
As a scientist I have learned all the behavioural and physiological indicators back up the common sense view that animals like pigs and battery hens suffer in severe confinement. And as a human being, such barbaric cruelty makes me sick.

Dr Michael Morris has a PhD in zoology from the University of Auckland. He is presently teaching degree courses in environmental management at the Bay of Plenty Polytechnic.